base talk Why does Beyoncé never sell as much as Taylor?

[QueenBLadyG]

 

4 hours ago, alexrex said:

Because B doesn't write her own songs 

She's highly involved in all her material on her records whether that be writing lyrics, or adding melodies and harmonies to tracks, which all are considered aspects of songwriting. Repeating lies isn't going to change facts. 

 

She, and any other musician, doesn't have to be a solo writer to get respect, acclaim, or success. That's an asinine thought process.

[QueenBLadyG]

2 hours ago, fab said:

wait.. 

Do you want me to post some of Taylor's ridiculously juvenile and elementary lyrics to compare? Ya Ya is a throw back to records of the 60s, the delivery and style is 100% a choice, it's not because they somehow lacked the ability to fill it in with Shakespearean lyrics. 

 

CC is filled to the brim with some of the most impressively complex and captivating lyrics of Beyoncé's whole career. Stop being a jackass.

[dnboy1]

Because a few reasons, in my opinion

1. She's a white woman that caters to white women of all ages, which is a majority demographic.

2. She has the "relatable" factor of being portrayed as the "girl next door" kind of vibe, and being "awkard"
3. Her fanbase has insanely more younger folks, which are typically more prone to stream, mass buy, etc 

This isn't to negate her quality of work. Her music is not my taste per se, but I'll give credit where credit is due. The girl knows how to market herself. 


Beyonce is the "elusive billionaire with three kids" that talks mainly about her family, her riches, sex, and political stances. Very polarizing sometimes. 

[Joaco95]

18 hours ago, Josh said:

There's nothing kid friendly about Folklore 

no kid friendly but more than half of the album is about teenage drama caused by a love triangle lol so it stills approach a young audience (or people who thinks they are still teenagers)

[KingBeyonce.]

6 hours ago, TayDuaStan said:

She'll sell more when she becomes more relatable. How can someone relate to her when most of her lyrics look like this: "We clappin'
We drummin'
(Ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) oh, ya-ya-ya
(Oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya
(Oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) ya-ya-ya
B-E-Y-I-N-C-É, ya" or "It's not the diamonds
It's not the pearls
I'm that girl (I'm that girl), it's just that
I'm that girl (I'm that girl)
It's not my man (ooh)
It's not my stance (ooh)
I'm that girl (I'm that girl), it's just that
I'm that girl". Plus she needs 20+ co-writers for this  

 

LMAO plenty of people can relate to feeling like "that girl" what are you talking about?  Are you saying you have 0 confidence and can't believe that other people in the world do? Plus music is supposed to be hyperbolic at times. And using ya ya like those are supposed to be actual words is just pitiful. What a pathetic attempt at proving your point. In that case, I guess you're saying people relate to this instead, huh?  
 

Quote

We would pick a decade
We wished we could live in instead of this
I'd say the 1830s but without all the racists

 

[Nippy'sReceipts]

Taylor is a copy and paste artist like Pink imo. 
 

The songs on the new album could easily come from old albums and vice versa.

 

You can't put Texas hold em on Renaissance and cozy on Cowboy Carter or Sorry on 4. 

[KingBeyonce.]

5 hours ago, newaespa said:

btw, isn't SZA black as well? Yet she is selling extremely well.

 

so the excuses Beyhive giving...it is just so weird

This is like saying black people haven't had socio-economic disadvantages in the U.S just because there are rich & successful black people. Doesn't mean that the disadvantages and systems don't exist. Let's not speak on things we don't have the range for honestly. Just prove your point in another way.

[CherryBay]

Apples vs Oranges

[swissman]

On 4/18/2024 at 6:17 PM, GardenPanty said:

A lot of people would say Beyoncé is the biggest pop star in the world. While Beyoncé does well compared to the rest of her peers, Taylor Swift seems to be demolishing her in touring revenue and now album sales.

 

I know that these numbers are going to cause stan wars in the future, but rather than use this thread to put down a hard working woman who just reclaimed a genre I figure we could have a discussion about why we think this is. To put it frankly, I think Beyoncé should be selling a lot more than she does, especially first week.

 

What do you think? 

Several reasons:

 

Namely, Beyoncé simply does NOT make the same kind of music that Taylor does. And so Taylor has a wider appeal with her songs and albums which are generally far more vanilla than Beyoncé's, making it far more specific as to the audiences you will garner. We can see proof of this in that Beyoncé's more vanilla singles are always her biggest in each era: Irreplaceable, Halo, TEXAS HOLD 'EM, etc.

 

And Since 2013, Beyoncé has had a political angle (overt or otherwise) to ALL her releases. At times, this has only lightly aggravated people (like the "Feminist" banner VMAs moment) and at other times it has outright angered (like Formation at the Super Bowl). Overall, though Beyoncé is not intrinsically controversial, she does attempt to push buttons that Taylor simply does not press, nor has Taylor seemed to try to press. The most controversial thing Taylor has done musically has been to switch from country to pop. Compare that to Beyoncé going from pop to country, as a Black woman. The two things cannot at all be compared.

 

But also historically and currently, it's much rarer for Black women to sell as much as White women. If you look at the artists who have spent the most weeks on the Billboard 200, the only female artists who have scored over 1000 weeks have been [blonde] white women. This is a clear sign that the buying public simply has not been buying/listening to the works of Black women as they have white men or white women.

 

And then we have the image. Beyoncé is sexualized. She's super confident. She is "un-relatable". Meanwhile Taylor has maintained her PG-13 persona and always projects the image of that of your popstar-best-friend. This undoubtedly has an effect on how fans connect and hold onto Taylor, and why she appeals to so many people and not just musically but as an entity, and thus creates a LOT of fans worldwide who contribute to her astounding numbers.

And since Taylor put her music back on streaming, she has been going all out at every release and between them to continue growing her numbers. There really is no one who releases like Taylor these days, who is not afraid to use new schemes and tactics to increase her sales. Beyoncé may play into a couple things (vinyl variants, for example, but only four) but it's by no means at the same scale or seeming desire for commercial success that Taylor has, and that's another crucial difference. Beyoncé seems to be making music for the sake of it, and even going so far as to sabotage her success... like for example releasing a Nicki Minaj remix at the height of Nicki's fame to SoundCloud, whereas Taylor released an Ice Spice remix and sold it, put it on streaming, included it on the physical copies of her album's deluxe edition released the day the song came out, released a music video, and performed with her the night of its release. 

 

Touring wise, we see that Beyoncé is the highest grossing Black act of all time. And it's interesting to note that one of the other highest touring Black acts of all time is Jay-Z, who would still have appeared on that list had his two tours with Beyonce been the only tours to his name. She clearly has massive touring power and probably is under-utilizing it (her last three tours had under 60 stops each [49, 49, 56, respectively]), so to compare her to an artist who is far less controversial, who makes more palatable music for the GP, and who doesn't face inherent racial bias...is a little weird.

 

 

Edited April 20 by swissman

[swissman]

7 hours ago, newaespa said:

btw, isn't SZA black as well? Yet she is selling extremely well.

 

so the excuses Beyhive giving...it is just so weird

But the question isn't whether or not Beyoncé as a Black woman can sell well, it's why isn't she selling as much as Taylor Swift specifically.

 

Is SZA really pulling Taylor numbers?

[swissman]

9 hours ago, TayDuaStan said:

She'll sell more when she becomes more relatable. How can someone relate to her when most of her lyrics look like this: "We clappin'
We drummin'
(Ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) oh, ya-ya-ya
(Oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya
(Oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) ya-ya-ya
B-E-Y-I-N-C-É, ya" or "It's not the diamonds
It's not the pearls
I'm that girl (I'm that girl), it's just that
I'm that girl (I'm that girl)
It's not my man (ooh)
It's not my stance (ooh)
I'm that girl (I'm that girl), it's just that
I'm that girl". Plus she needs 20+ co-writers for this  

 

Hm, yes, what could be relatable about a Black woman reclaiming several genres over the scope of a single song?

 

Pointing out the repetitive lyrics in YA YA is also soooo silly because the song makes it clear that "YA YA" is supposed to be a sort of nonsense catch-all term that is used to describe a variety of different situations that Beyoncé brings up in the lyrics. It's supposed to be fun, and it IS fun.

 

But I do agree that Taylor's "relatability" is a major factor in her success.

 

Though you are incorrect in stating that either of those songs referenced have 20+ writers, not even when combined. I'M THAT GIRL has six. YA YA has ten, three of which are from samples.

[Joaco95]

music not the bling 

[Joaco95]

9 hours ago, TayDuaStan said:

She'll sell more when she becomes more relatable. How can someone relate to her when most of her lyrics look like this: "We clappin'
We drummin'
(Ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) oh, ya-ya-ya
(Oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya
(Oh, ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya) ya-ya-ya
B-E-Y-I-N-C-É, ya" or "It's not the diamonds
It's not the pearls
I'm that girl (I'm that girl), it's just that
I'm that girl (I'm that girl)
It's not my man (ooh)
It's not my stance (ooh)
I'm that girl (I'm that girl), it's just that
I'm that girl". Plus she needs 20+ co-writers for this  

 

Ooh, look what you made me do
Look what you made me do
Look what you just made me do
Look what you just made me
Ooh, look what you made me do
Look what you made me do
Look what you just made me do
Look what you just made me do
Ooh, look what you made me do
Look what you made me do
Look what you just made me do
Look what you just made me
Ooh, look what you made me do
Look what you made me do
Look what you just made me do
Look what you just made me do

 

edit: also renaissance main influence was ballroom and she was giving us opulence 

Edited April 19 by Joaco95

[Movimento Perpétuo]

15 pages omg

[TeemoR]

Beyonce is black. 

 

And many other reasons....

[CaptainMusic]

As others have said, Beyoncé is black and far more polarising than Taylor. 

[Devin]

bro why is this thread still going?

[Odette Violet]

Bey being black and she's makes music that celebrates her culture which sadly the masses aren't here for 

 

While Miss Swift is white who writes love songs so there's that 

Edited April 20 by Odette Violet

[starsailor]

I can take Bey all day (cause she slays), Taylor on the other hand.....

[Lightbringer007]

racism and misogyny on an extremely high degree unfortunately 

[Noodles]

I just have to thank GOD that that's not what Beyoncé's focusing on.

[Jamie Starr]

People actually enjoy Taylor's music and not just the idea of her.

[alanmontes]

People playing the race card 

Taylor is the bigger and more popular artist. That's why. 

[Frappucino]

Racism

[Lana Banana]

Oh my god this thread is the biggest delulu rabbit hole I've read in a long time on ATRL

 

From TS allegedly being relatable to all ages, gay men to B taking risks and writing her lyrics.

 

 

   

 

 

 

Edited April 20 by Lana Banana