Following the release of Taylor Swift 1989 cut "Bad Blood" and her statement that it was about someone in the music industry—and not an ex-boyfriend rumors began to swirl that the pop star was referring to Katy Perry. But neither Taylor swift nor Katy Perry openly acknowledged the feud until 2017, when Perry went on The Late Show With James Corden and confirmed she did indeed have a rocky relationship with Swift.
Continue reading to find out the timeline of Swift and Perry's feud to reconciliation and friendship.
September 2014
The first indication of the silent dispute between Taylor and Perry occurred in 2014, when during an interview with Rolling Stone, Swift said her new song "Bad Blood" was about another woman in the music industry.
"For years, I was never sure if we were friends or not," Swift said in the interview. "She would come up to me at awards shows and say something and walk away, and I would think, 'Are we friends, or did she just give me the harshest insult of my life?'"
Swift explained to Rolling Stone that the artist "did something so horrible" and called her relationship with the unnamed singer akin to "straight-up enemies."
In response to this interview, Perry tweeted, "Watch out for the Regina George in sheep's clothing..." When she was later asked about the tweet, Perry said, "If somebody is trying to defame my character, you're going to hear about it.
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May 2015
In May 2015 in another interview with Telegraph, Swift said referred to this dispute again say; "I'm never going to talk about her in my interview. It's not going to happen." She went on to add that it was natural that she has "enemies."
"It's not real if someone appears to never have any issues with anyone," she explained. "I have my friends. I have enemies."
October 2015
In the fall of 2015, Swift's comments to Rolling Stone about "Bad Blood" surfaced once more in a different interview. When another reporter for GQ pointed out that even though she doesn't explicitly name names in her songs, Swift does allow the public to decide who she's targeting
In response to this Swift stated: I knew the song would be assigned to a person, and the easiest mark was someone who I didn't want to be labeled with this song. It was not a song about heartbreak. It was about the loss of friendship."
Swift went on to add, "So, I don't necessarily care who people think it's about. I just needed to divert them away from the easiest target. Listen to the song. It doesn't point to any one person or any one situation. But if you'd listened to my previous four albums, you would think this was about a guy who broke my heart. And nothing could be further from the truth. It was important to show that losing friendships can be just as damaging to a person as losing a romantic relationship."
July 2016
Another hint of their feud came to light in July after Swift's relationship with Scottish DJ Calvin Harris ended, it came out that Swift had actually co-written Harris' hit with Rihanna, "This Is What You Came For," under the pseudonym Nils Sjoberg.
In a series of now-deleted tweets, Harris seemed to address the timing of the reveal. "Hurtful to me at this point that her and her team would go so far out of their way to try and make ME look bad at this stage though," he wrote. In another tweet, he added, "I figure if you're happy in your new relationship, you should focus on that instead of trying to tear your ex bf down for something to do."
Harris then name dropped Perry saying "I know you're off tour and you need someone new to try and bury like Katy etc., but I'm not that guy, sorry. I won't allow it," he wrote. That day, after Harris' tweets went viral, Perry tweeted out a GIF of Hillary Clinton shrugging. She followed up by retweeting an old tweet from spring 2015, simply stating, "Time, the ultimate truth teller."
May 2017
After years of not openly acknowledging the fight between her and swift, in 2017 in an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Perry talked about her new album, Witness, and when asked whether it contains a response to Swift's "Bad Blood." She commented that the upcoming record is "very empowered" and that "there is no one thing that's calling out any one person."
She added: "One thing to note is: You can't mistake kindness for weakness and don't come for me. Anyone. Anyone. Anyone. Anyone. And that's not to any one person and don't quote me that it is, because it's not. It's not about that. Honestly, when women come together and they decide to unite, this world is going to be a better place. Period. End of story."
May 2017
Just a few days later, Perry again appeared on James Corden's Late Late Show in a Carpool Karaoke segment, and there she became more opened about the rumored dispute for the first time.
"That's true, there is a situation," she responded when Corden asked about her history with Swift. "Honestly, it's really like she started it and it's time for her to finish it."
During the show Perry confirmed that the cause of the feud was over back up dancers and revealed what actually transpired: "Okay, so there was like three backing dancers that went on tour with her tour, right? And they asked me before they went on tour if they could go, and I was like, 'Yeah, of course. I'm not on a record cycle and get the work, and she's great and all that. But I will be on a record cycle probably in about a year. So, be sure to put a 30-day contingency in your contract, so you can get out if you want to join me when I say I'm going back on,'" Perry said. "So that year came up, right? And I texted all of them because I'm very close with them and I said, 'Look, just FYI, I'm about to start. I want to put the word out there.' They said, 'Okay, well we're gonna go and talk to management about it.' And they did, and they got fired."
Perry claimed Swift never talked to her about the dancers despite her attempts. "But what I want to say is that I'm ready for that BS to be done," she said. "Now, there is the law of cause and effect. You do something, and there's gonna be a reaction, and trust me, daddy, there's gonna be a reaction. It's all about karma, right?... I think, personally, that women together, not divided, and none of this petty bulls---, women together will heal the world."
When Corden then asked: "Would it be enough to just receive a text from Taylor Swift that just said 'the beef is off the grill?'" Perry answered: "100 percent."
June 2019
After almost 5 years of dispute Perry and swift finally reconciled and perry documented their reconciliation on Instagram by posting a picture of a plate of cookies with "peace at last" written in frosting, captioning "it feels so good" while tagging Swift.
September 2019
Both of the entertainers talked about their rekindled friendship in separate interviews. Perry first went on The Ellen DeGeneres Show and told the audience that "it was actually just a misunderstanding."
While Swift had her first Rolling Stone cover story in five years, and she briefly spoke about her amity with Perry by bringing up a conversation the two had about their Zodiac signs. Saying they both were in a feud for so long due to miscommunication blaming it all on their zodiac signs.