Despite revolutionizing the medium by introducing the concept of the visual album to the general public, Beyoncé notably did not create any music videos for either release in her ongoing Renaissance series (RENAISSANCE and COWBOY CARTER). Now, in a new interview, the Grammy-winning artist confirmed that fans shouldn’t be expecting to see new music videos from her any time soon.
“I thought it was important that during a time where all we see is visuals, that the world can focus on the voice,” she revealed to GQ. “The music is so rich in history and instrumentation. It takes months to digest, research, and understand. The music needed space to breathe on its own.”
Beyoncé has created some of the most iconic music videos of all time, from the choreography-focused “Single Ladies” to the unforgettable baseball bat swinging in “Hold Up.” Queen Bey is seeing the process a little differently these days, though.
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“Sometimes a visual can be a distraction from the quality of the voice and the music,” she continued. “The years of hard work and detail put into an album that takes over four years! The music is enough. The fans from all over the world became the visual. We all got the visual on tour.”
Elsewhere in the interview, she expanded on her point about the rich history of the music of her recent projects and dug into the title COWBOY CARTER, saying, “I wanted everyone to take a minute to research on the word cowboy…Up to a quarter of all cowboys were Black. These men faced a world that refused to see them as equal, yet they were the backbone of the cattle industry. The cowboy is a symbol of strength and aspiration in America.”
Earlier this week, in a shocking yet perhaps unsurprising snub, Beyoncé was excluded from the 2024 CMA nominations.
