With the abundance of nonsensical beefs in music brought to you by your favorite hip hop blogs, you've probably thought you've seen it all. (The alleged Ne-Yo vs. Chris Brown was the worst of the worst). This one has to top them all, as I've yet to see a beef between a blues singer, a contemporary artist, and a politician. Seemingly for no reason at all, Jamesetta Dawkins called out both Beyonce AND President Obama for the former's performance of "At Last" at the Inauguration Ball. She went on the tirade during her concert in Seattle, which is linked here. The audio is kind of low, but if you can't hear she says, "You guys know your president, right? The one with the big ears? He ain't my president." She then goes on to threaten Beyonce; "...that woman he had singing for him, singing my song, she gonna get her ass whipped...I can't stand Beyonce, she had no business up there...singing a song that I've been singing forever."
A few issues I have with this... I'm not sure why Obama was dragged into this; I know it was his idea, but I think you need a better reason than that to defect from the Union. I know the main reason for this is that she was offended that she wasn't asked to perform "her" song, but this crosses the line into the realm of absurdity. It almost seems like one of the (many) last ditch efforts by a rapper with a dying career to get back into the limelight, by throwing shots at whoever is currently on top, especially since only a few months ago Etta James was in love with Beyonce even before her role in the film Cadillac Records. Last but not least, the song isn't even hers... I could understand someone feeling so strongly about something that they created, but the song was actually written in the 1940s for a movie called Orchestra Wives, performed by The Glenn Miller Orchestra, and sung by Ray Eberle and Patricia Friday. One might argue that Etta James is the one who popularized it, however Miller's version reached a higher position on the Billboard Pop Charts than Etta's.
All that being said she does have some legitimate points, namely that Beyonce had no business being up there singing that song. Although that particular statement is rather harsh, I agree that just because you play Etta James in a movie means doesn't necessarily mean that you can just perform "At Last" all willy-nilly. I can see how she would be insulted. For the sake of this statement, imagine that Ray Charles were still alive, but Jamie Foxx received top billing to perform "Georgia on My Mind," keeping in mind that Charles didn't write/perform THAT song first, either. The real issue here, however, has less to do with respect and more to do with James's fear of being forgotten. To a diva like herself, I assume it feels like a slap in the face for someone else to perform her song while she's still alive and able to sing well. Personally, I think it would have been hot if they performed together; maybe Beyonce sings the first verse, then Etta James comes out of nowhere to sing the second. It would have been just as good, and everyone would (presumably) be happy; it's just unfortunate that she lashed out this way at someone who actually idolizes her. I wish Etta James would have realized that there are much, MUCH worse people who could have been performing the song; Beyonce is one of the few contemporary artists that can do it justice. And at the end of the day, just be happy it didn't get sampled by Hurricane Chris...yet.