From classic-rock squabbles to hip-hop diss tracks and social media wars, here are the ridiculous, rancorous conflicts that have held us rapt.
Rolling Stone Jordan Runtagh
Creative differences, financial disputes, drug abuse, love triangles – in the music industry, the opportunities to butt heads are basically limitless. The bigger the star, the bigger the ego, and when two tangle, you get a supernova of spite and bile that holds the world in rapture, turning mature adults into spit-flecked children chanting “Fight, fight, fight!” in a circle at recess.
Pick a side, or simply spectate. No judgment.
Mariah Carey vs. Jennifer Lopez
Mariah Carey and Jennifer Lopez. Photos by Richard Corkery / NY Daily News Archive, Justin Goff UK Press via Getty.
When the tables were turned, Mimi was just as a brutal to the new diva on the block as Houston had been to her. During an interview with a German television network in 2000, when asked about J.Lo, she uttered the most effective four-word shutdown in history: “I don’t know her.” A master class in shade, the clip has since become deeply embedded in the DNA of Internet culture.
The feud’s origins remain a mystery, but Andy Cohen interrogated Lopez about it during a 2014 episode of Watch What Happens Live exchange. “I don’t have a feud against her at all. I know from back in the day that she’s said things about me that were not the greatest, but we have never met,” she said. “We don’t know each other. I think it’s kind of like from word of mouth or things that have happened in the past that I’m not really aware of, but I don’t know.” She then raised an olive branch, saying, “I would love to meet her and I would love to be friends with her. I think she’s incredibly talented and I’ve always been a fan of hers. ‘My All’ is one of my favorite songs of all time. It saddens me to hear anything that’s negative because I’m a fan.”
Some questioned Lopez’s sincerity in May 2015 at the Billboard Music Awards when, during Carey’s performance of “Infinity,” she was seen scrolling through her phone, seemingly ignoring the show. “I watched most of it,” she insisted during another appearance on WWHL in February 2016. “I may have looked down for one second and people were like, ‘Look at her! Look at her!'”
Lopez’s diplomacy faltered weeks later on The Wendy Williams Show, when the infamous “I don’t know her” comment was mentioned. “She does say that. She’s forgetful, I guess! We’ve met many times.” Carey, for one, didn’t deny it. “You know what? I’m very forgetful. Apparently I’m forgetful because I don’t remember the fact that it was just like, ‘Hi, I’m so and so,'” she later said.
Even after the better part of two decades, during which time Lopez has become a bona fide ubiquitous star in music, film and TV, Carey’s story didn’t change. When TMZ asked for her thoughts on J.Lo in 2016, her answer was the same: “I still don’t know her!”
