on turning back time

Legendary songwriter wasn’t legendary enough to dunk on Beyoncé and oh how the tables have turned

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Now that we’ve all had a few days to process Beyoncé’s transcendent dance floor opus, the internet’s awash in lyrical analysis and deep dives into Renaissance‘s eclectic influences and inspirations.

There are, of course, some bad takes, too. Among the nominees for the Best Worst Tweet of the day is none other than perennial Oscar loser Diane Warren, who not-so-subtly critiqued the credit roll on Beyoncé’s seventh solo album.

First things first: Warren is an unassailable icon in the film and music industries. She’s the prolific songwriter behind countless massive songs, from Cher‘s “If I Could Turn Back Time” to Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing,” many of which have been used to score memorable movie moments over the years. And though she’s yet to score a Best Original Song win at the Academy Awards, her track-record for nominations alone (13 and counting) is the stuff of legend.

But now that we have that out of the way: Girl, what are you thinking? Are you seriously coming for Queen Bey’s crown, mere days after she released the best-reviewed album of her career? Please, we ask kindly, get real.

After a very vocal swath of the internet quickly expressed similar sentiments directly to Warren, the songwriter followed up clarifying that this wasn’t meant to be a shady comment, just a curious one. But by that point, the damage was already done. (And, excuse us, but since when is the eyeroll emoji meant to evoke “curiosity”?)

Shade or not, it’s pretty clear that Warren was singling out one song in particular, “Alien Superstar.” A true standout, Renaissance‘s third track is a triumphant and proud ballroom anthem. It also lists—count’em—24 writers in its credits, the most individual names out of any song on the record.

This is, in part, because “Alien Superstar” samples and interpolates a few other songs, including Right Said Fred’s “I’m Too Sexy” and the club classic “Unique” from Danube Dance and Kim Cooper. To her credit, Warren did eventually acknowledge this, but, you know, the original tweet’s still up. So what gives?

Related: Who was Moi Renee, the late drag queen sampled on Beyoncé’s new album?

Among the “Alien Superstar” credits is frequent Bey collaborator The-Dream, who was involved as a producer and/or songwriter on nearly every cut of Renaissance. After seeing Warren’s tweet, he took it about himself to respond and give her a crash course on the history of sampling in music as an art form with distinct roots in Black culture:

In a response to The-Dream and in a later tweet, Warren claimed she meant “no disrepect,” but we still can’t get the bad taste of her original post out of our mouths. Someone with so many years of experience surely knows how sampling and accreditation works, so was she really just curious, or was she trying to imply that having so many songwriters credited delegitimizes the musicianship? And, again, that eyeroll emoji was suss.

Never one to let a wealthy celebrity off easy, Twitter has spent most of the day trolling Warren for her snarky question and weak backpedaling. So if you “Don’t Want To Miss A Thing,” take a look at a few of our favorite reactions below:

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