Gary Holt thinks Beyoncé is overrated and lacks songwriting skills.
During a recent appearance on the Scandalous podcast, the guitarist praised Taylor Swift but criticized another pop star Beyoncé by saying:
“Beyoncé will put out a song and there’s 30 f*cking people on it. How can 30 people write a song, all gathered together? It’s just like a factory of songwriting! Who even knows who did what anymore, when there are like 20 names on it. I think Beyoncé is the most overrated talent on Earth. I think she’s marginally talented.”
In the same chat, he also declared his love for pop music:
“I love pop! I listen to pop mostly in the car, I don’t listen to metal. There’s some heavy sh*t on [SiriusXM streaming]… but I’d rather listen to George Michael, myself.”
Not Every Rocker Is Impressed By Swift
Holt isn’t impressed by Beyoncé but likes Swift because she writes and performs her own music. This is different from what some musicians, like Dave Grohl from Foo Fighters, have suggested about Swift not performing live. Last month, Dave made this comment during a Foo Fighters show on June 22, while Swift was performing nearby. The rocker said:
“I tell you, man, you don’t want to suffer the wrath of Taylor Swift. So we like to call our tour the ‘Errors Tour.’ We’ve had more than a few eras and more than a few f*cking errors as well. Just a couple. That’s because we actually play live. What? Just saying! You guys like raw, live rock’n’roll music, right? You came to the right f*cking place.”
Then, Swift responded to him at her third Wembley show:
“Every one of my band members, every single one of our crew, my band, who’s gonna be playing live for you for 3.5 hours tonight, they deserve this so much. And so does every one of my fellow performers. And you just gave that to us so generously, we will never forget it.”
Later, guitarist Joe Bonamassa supported Grohl on X by saying ‘Rock and Roll is not dead.’ On the other hand, Alex Skolnick agreed with a user who thought Grohl was just joking about Swift’s live performance. Skolnick said Grohl’s comments were meant to be light-hearted, though they were misunderstood online.