During a rare podcast appearance, Prince Harry is getting a crash course in pop culture after being asked about the lore between pop stars Taylor Swift and Charli XCX.
“This one’s heavy, Harry, because the other ones haven’t been,” Hasan Minhaj asked the Duke of Sussex, 41, during their joint Wednesday, October 29, podcast appearance on the comedian’s “Hasan Minhaj Doesn’t Know” show from Lemonada Media. “What do you think of this Charli XCX and Taylor Swift beef?”
Harry succinctly replied, “The what? Oh, no.”
Minhaj, 40, helped Harry out and offered a full breakdown of the history between Swift, 35, and Charli, 33.
Charli XCX Declines to Comment on Taylor Swift’s Rumored Diss Track
“Was Charli’s diss track even a diss track?” Minhaj told Harry, who seemingly had a blank expression on his face. “I mean, to me, ‘Sympathy Is a Knife’ was about something completely different, but then Taylor comes back and, I think, escalates it with the ‘Actually Romantic’ thing.”
Minhaj continued, “I’m kind of thinking to myself, ‘Is this fair or did Charli draw blood and Taylor had to respond?’ Sometimes I just think, ‘Where do we go from here?’”
While Harry did not offer his opinion on the apparent feud, fans have long presumed that Charli’s “Sympathy Is a Knife” was meant to be a dig at Swift when it was released in 2024.
“Don’t wanna see her backstage at my boyfriend’s show / Fingers crossed behind my back, I hope they break up quick,” she sings, which fans thought was a reference to Swift’s brief romance with Matty Healy, the bandmate of Charli’s now-husband, George Daniel. “‘Cause I couldn’t even be her if I tried / I’m opposite, I’m on the other side / I feel all these feelings I can’t control.”
Charli XCX Denies Referencing Taylor Swift in ‘Sympathy Is a Knife’
Charli later shut down the speculation, telling New York Magazine in August 2024 that the song wasn’t about Swift at all.
“That song is about me and my feelings and my anxiety and the way my brain creates narratives and stories in my head when I feel insecure and how I don’t want to be in those situations physically when I feel self-doubt,” Charli told the outlet. “Sometimes I’d look onstage and be like, ‘Oh, my God … I’m never going to play these rooms, ever.’ That made me feel jealous. I told Matty that. And George. They were both like, ‘Shut up. What are you talking about?’”
The next year, Swift released her song “Actually Romantic” on The Life of a Showgirl that her fans speculated served as a response to Charli’s track.
“I heard you call me boring Barbie when the coke’s got your brain / High-fived my ex and then said you’re glad he ghosted me,” Swift sings in the first verse. “Wrote me a song saying it makes you sick to see my face / Some people might be offended.”
Did Charli XCX Subtly Respond to Taylor Swift Song Rumors on ‘SNL’?
Swift, who rarely names her lyrical muses, offered brief insight into her songwriting inspiration during her Release Party of a Showgirl theatrical event earlier this month.
“The song ‘Actually Romantic’ is sort of a love letter to someone who hates you,” the 14-time Grammy winner said. “It’s, like, sometimes you don’t know that you’re a part of someone else’s stories, but you are. There can be this moment, where [it’s revealed] to you through things that they do that are very overt. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve started being, like, ‘Oh my God, you did so much with this. It’s flattering. I don’t hate you, and I don’t think about all this.’”
While speaking to Vanity Fair in an October profile, Charli declined to comment on Swift’s song.
