Diane Warren recently called Beyoncé out for having a lot of writers on a Renaissance song and is now addressing the topic.

Diane Warren took to Twitter to question a song on Renaissance with 24 writers credited on it. She followed it up with an eye-rolling emoji to cement that she didn’t view it as a positive thing.

“How can there be 24 writers on a song?”

https://twitter.com/diane_warren/status/1554129983487877120?s=21&t=9kLVvsJCYh1JN18DhpEEjA

She then pulled the, “just curious” card which really doesn’t make sense in this situation. If she was, “just curious,” there were so many other steps she could have taken— she has worked in the music industry for decades, the most important detail seeing as she would definitely already know how sampling works; she could have googled the answer or talked to one of her many connections to get knowledge from somebody with real experience as opposed to randoms on Twitter; and she has also worked directly with Beyoncé in the past, meaning she could have asked her directly.

With all of those factors in mind, it’s very probable that Diane was trying to throw shade at the Renaissance singer. Although, Warren’s motive is still unknown.

One possible reason that Warren could have brought up the topic of crediting writers is the alleged theft of a Kelis sample on her fifth track ‘Energy.’ Kelis became outspoken on the issue when Beyoncé’s Renaissance was leaked a few days prior to its release. Kelis stated that when the album leaked, it was the first she heard that her song, ‘Get Along With You’ would be sampled. Her name is still missing from the writer’s credits for ‘Energy.’

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“This isn’t meant as shade, I’m just curious”

“It’s not meant as shade but you use the eyeroll emoji and followed it up with another shady tweet??? Pack it up Pete Wentz!!!”

“Ok, it’s prob samples that add up the ammount of writers”

“But if a song is only sampling a melody or harmony of another song- and not the lyrics— why are the songwriters of the sampled song still credited as songwriters of the new song? I’ve had this question the last 10 years. Someone should write a book or pamphlet that explains it”

“Because someone is responsible for writing those melodies. The instrumentation is just as valid as the lyrics”

“This is kind of a boring ass narrative at this point and it’s sad to see artists attempt to devalue one another. Even if she had 50 writers on one song, does that make her any less of an artist? Celine Dion never wrote a song in her life, do we constantly discredit her?”

“It doesn’t make her less of an artist. Beyonce isn’t a songwriter, that’s known and that’s okay. Diane, a literal songwriting legend, was simply asking how 23 people get credited on a song. No need to take it as an attack on Bey.”

“Diane is a complete legend and one of the best writers of all time. I would agree with it being a genuine question if she didn’t follow it up with the tweet below. Like you said she’s a legend, she knows how sampling and interpolations work even if she doesn’t do it herself.”

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