Right Said Fred called Beyoncé arrogant for using an element of their song I’m Too Sexy without contacting them first.
Fred and Richard Fairbrass expressed their displeasure at the 2022 Broadcast Music Inc Awards in London, expressing surprise that the singer used their song in her Renaissance track Alien Superstar.
“Normally the artist approaches us but Beyoncé didn’t because she’s such an arrogant person,” they told The Sun. “She probably thought ‘come get me,’ so we heard about it after the fact, when you did.”
Previously, Drake and Taylor Swift had both used elements of the song, but reached out to the brothers first.
“To use our melody they need our permission, so they send us the demo and we approve it and if so, we get co-writing credit,” they said. “With this Beyoncé thing, there are 22 writers, it’s ridiculous, so you’d be getting around 40p. We think the reason this is happening is there’s so little money now in actual sellers like friends, golf partners, engineers, bookers and the guy who brings the coke, they all want a slice.
The couple also added that they were forced to let it go because they can’t have a conversation with someone who has “much more presence and power and money”.
In a statement, Beyoncé’s reps called their claims “erroneous and incredibly disparaging.”
“Permission was not only granted for its use, but they publicly expressed their gratitude for being on the album,” it read. “For their song, there was no use of sound recording, only the composition was used…this accusation is false.”
In July, the official Twitter account of Right Said Fred tweeted that it was “nice” to get a writing credit on the song.
After the release of Beyoncé’s seventh studio album, Kelis also expressed her displeasure with the use of Milkshake, calling it theft. “Nothing is ever what it seems, some people in this business have no soul or integrity and they have fooled everyone,” she wrote. As a result, Beyoncé removed the tween.
Robin S, whose song Show Me Love was used on Break My Soul, discovered her song had been sampled via her son but was pleased with the news. “It’s Robin S, and this message goes to Queen Bey herself, Beyoncé, to Jay-Z, to the whole crew,” she said in a TV interview. “Thank you so much for giving me my flowers while I’m still alive. I’m honored and can’t wait to see what else can happen.
