The magnificent feud between Rita Ora and Calvin Harris is still ongoing. They have no shame! These two are trashing each other in public, and it’s so deliciously petty. They just can’t stop. To briefly recap, Rita and Calvin dated and made sweet music together for about 20 months. The good times ended in June, and Rita may have fallen into Justin Bieber’s tiny arms before or after the breakup. Calvin pretended everything was fine, but then he yanked half the songs from Rita’s upcoming album. This past weekend, Calvin refused to allow Rita to perform one of their songs, “I Will Never Let You Go,” at the TCAs. Rita was reportedly crushed to let down her teenage fans.
A whole lot has gone down in the past few days. Let’s do bulletpoints.
* Rita visited with Ryan Seacrest. Ryan asked if Calvin’s decision about the TCAs surprised her. Rita replied, “No. No, no, no. We put a lot of effort and work into the show. Every time we do a show, I rehearse about a month in advance, and, y’know … I could have got told a few weeks earlier! That would have been nice. It was a last minute change, but do you know what? We move on and we move forward.” (You can see the video here.)
* You know how Calvin is by now. Dude couldn’t resist vague tweeting his feelings in response to Rita’s interview with Seacrest.
(1) You’ll only know 1 side of the story RE Teen choice awards because I choose not to talk to the papers about every aspect of my personal life
(2) But just know I had a damn good reason.
[From Calvin “Bitter” Harris on Twitter]
Then Calvin tweeted a little “talk to the hand” emoji. This guy kills me. He needs to find a giant palm tree emoji to illuminate his marvelous shade-throwing skills.
* Rita did an interview with the 4Music show (via the Mail). Miquita Oliver asked whether Rita fancied Biebs. Rita responded, “Who doesn’t? I like how he’s evolved, he’s growing up, he’s doing his thing. I like his stance and how he carries himself.” This is Rita baiting Calvin, right? She’s totally throwing the hookup rumors in his face by talking about Swaggy hotness. Maybe she did hook up with him, or not. What’s most important is that she wants Calvin to think she rocked the cradle of love with Baby Biebs.
* Rita has teased a new single called “Poison,” which will hit out at one of her exes. Rita says it’s about an unhealthy relationship. Soooo … will this song be about Calvin or sock guru Rob Kardashian?
* Speaking of songs that trash exes: Kaiser and I were emailing about Ed Sheeran’s “Don’t.” The song is about a relationship between two artists. The dude is more into the girl, and he thinks the feelings are mutual. Then she cheats on him with some guy on the same hotel floor. Everyone thinks the song is about Ellie Goulding, but wouldn’t it be something if it was really about Rita? Sheeran, Ellie, and Rita are pretty tight together, or at least they were.
* Have you seen Rita and Iggy Azalea’s “Black Widow” video yet? The vid has a Kill Bill theme and stars Michael Madsen, who proves once again that he’ll do anything for money.
* Here’s some photos of Swaggy running down the street in Santa Monica while talking on the phone last week. He’d have an easier time at running if he pulled his damn pants up. Maybe Rita was on the phone? Hahaha.
Photos courtesy of Fame/Flynet & WENN
Her hair looks awful.
Yes it does! 🙁
Always does.
It’s official. Calvin Harris needs to grow up. Either he must say what happened or stop tweeting about it. This guy must be grateful he is even in the press these days because of Rita. Before, he was not very newsworthy, despite his success.
Grateful? The man is a famous prolific songwriter. It is Ora who should be grateful she gets any press at all.
ITA 100%, eliza.
+1000 to eliza
Never hear of him before this, so how prolific is he?
@ Tammy Calvin Harris is one of the best paid DJs in the world. Maybe you are not into that type of music.
@Tammy, you can Google him and see his song writing credits in far more detail than I could post on here.
All of that.
I have to agree with Eliza if you don’t know him it’s because he doesn’t court attention like she does. I have heard a few of her songs but it’s constantly in the press who she is banging and cheating on…we are all smart enough to know that is calculated on her part.
All I’m able to absorb from this is that this woman, who looks perhaps Latina or of mixed African heritage, has possibly at worst banged Baby Biebs or at the very least, given her own words about JB, admires him. Oh. My. God. I will never respect any woman that crawls into his crib bed. And to be a woman of color… given his racist and misogynist views…I’m so grossed out I can only imagine how CH feels. Ugh ugh GROSS.
Kri – looks can be deceiving! She styles herself after RiRi but Rita Ora is 100% Albanian, which is eastern EUROPEAN.
Exactly, Eliza! The woman has been sleeping her way to the top and, out of his very own reasons, he just decided he wasn’t going to be a part of it.
Now, on to the next on her line.
Just because you haven’t heard of someone, doesn’t mean they don’t have weight in the industry behind the scenes. As a DJ and producer, he has been incredibly successful. DJs and producers have far more power in the current music industry than singers…they are the ones that create/write the hits. He has broken records for the number of his songs that have charted, and was the highest paid DJ in 2013, per Forbes.
I actually love that he’s doing this. I don’t know why people insist he needs to get over it. Obviously she did something that really damaged their relationship and he’s choked. The only time it comes into the press is when its from her camp. I don t think he lives or dies by it, he just defends his own honor.
“Rita Ora is 100% Albanian” = She’s actually a Kosovar Albanian. Which is next door but not 100 per cent albanian, and she grew up in the UK.
He earned about £18m last year along with that Avicii he doesn’t really need the limelight she probably does. Maybe he didn’t want his song at that awards show if it were VMA’s or Grsmmys might be different but No one really knows what happened. I hold a grudge so….
Shelley is right.
eliza, Calvin Harris might be the more successful one but Rita Ora is the more publicized one. Like her or not Rita was already getting a lot of media coverage before they become a couple. I like her and I like some of her songs, she has a good voice.
I like her voice and songs too. What she does in her personal life is her business.
I’d rather be more successful for my accomplishments than more publicized over who I slept with. At least I’ve heard Calvin Harris’ music on the radio.
I still have yet to hear a Rita Ora song, but I’ve heard tons of Calvin Harris songs on the radio.
He is less publicised by choice…. he isn’t a sad fame hungry media whore!
She’s publicised for all the wrong reasons. Crappy fashion choices and outraging exes she’s used to sleep her way to the top. I’d rather have Harris’ comparatively understated publicity for being good at something.
If she thinks it’s a positive being known for fried, trashy hair and being blasted by Socks Kardashian for being a two-timer on Twitter though, more power to her, I guess?
he has a right to refute the dirt being slung at him. he has enough class to not embarass her by releasing the details, so I’d say he’s a gentleman as well. she’s getting free publicity off of it, so I’d say she’s working it, no matter what front she puts up
Rita needed him more than he needed her. She’s an opportunistic pop artist with a non existent career. Calvin is very well known, RIta? Not so much.
There is something really off putting about bitchy men.
And women.
Agreed. Looks like Rita is at fault but he’s looking petty.
Is it “bitchy” to defend yourself after someone attacks your professionalism on live radio, though? I can see why he would feel the need to set the record straight.
I love the coat from the first pic, you can keep everything else … about the song … simple, who owns the rights? She did not get writing credit and what not … next time, draft a better contract hon!
Leather athletic shorts???????? *smdh*
Umm, any woman who proudly admits or even insinuates she has had The Biebs has some definite issues.
Hang on, he’s running for exercise in these pics? Oh how bizarre. Given the weird posture and leather shorts, I assumed he was late for something.
Is he running for exercise or… what? The guy in the tight jeans in front of him certainly doesn’t look like he was prepared for a workout. So confused.
She’s baiting Calvin, but bish has terrible taste in jump-offs. Who TF dates Rob Kardashian? Even if I knew no other details of their split, Rita’s dating history gets a side-eye from me! Calvin really should cool it to protect his reputation (and also, Rita doesn’t seem to be worth it–sounds like she’s a bridge burner), but if what we suspect is true, I do understand his feelings.
I almost* want to hug Bieber for giving us the only good gossip in an otherwise dull summer.
(*no I don’t)
What is it with the Biebs anyway? I’m starting to think he must be a really good lay. What if he really knows how to F#$k? End of the World.
At some point, Justin Bieber’s sagging diapers are going to be a fire hazard danger – he’ll be somewhere where the fire alarm will go off, crowds will stampede for the doors, he’ll trip on his droopy crotch, and get trampled.
But I digress. Calvin Harris comes off like a whiny brat in this song feud, but Rita Ora is the bigger loser if it’s true about Justin Bieber. Blech.
Please let your scenario about Bieber come true…..
They both need to grow up and move on.
The song is **I Will Never Let You Down.
Rita is soooooooooooo shady. I’ll go with Calvin on this one.
+1
Ed Sheeran’s song is about Ellie Goulding and Niall Horan of One Direction.
I thought that was pretty obvious. It was a kind of big story a few months ago how they had all been partying at a hotel when Ed and Ellie had been dating and she snuck off to go hook up with Niall who is one of Ed’s good friends. It’s not about Rita
This is making HIM look bad! At this point it would be better for him to TELL what happened.
True. Unless it really was petty.
Calvin is failing to look at the big picture in the long run.
Artists may hesitate to work with him (especially if he will be sole writer & producer) because if they piss him off he might block them as well from performing the song.
Actually Rita’s team must-have massively screwed up on this one, because they clearly didn’t have all the rights properly secured to the songs in the first place. Had they done their jobs, Calvin would never have been able to pull the music.
^^ THIS. Although I agree that Calvin Harris is looking like a whiny little baby and it may be off-putting for other artists. And if he’s been this controlling of his work up to this point, he may have trouble doing so with future projects, because other artists will look at this cluster and say “no thanks, not without five pounds of legal documents spelling out MY rights.”
Song rights are a big deal for all artists. Its not something that’s kept to a handshake deal as song rights are a crucial part pf the album process for reasons such as this, as well as for financial reasons. I dont think this will have any affect on people wanting to work with Calvin – he’s so massively successful as a producer, and this was really a screw up on the part of Rita and her team. Granted, it may make some women think twice about sleeping with him for tracks without that mountain of paperwork.
I don’t think he runs that risk. There are certainly legal ways to cover that. It seems like she thought it was enough to be in a relationship with him to score some songs. It wasn’t a good plan.
I doubt it, I don’t think he would be petty enough to do this if he simply had a disagreement with another artist he was working with…this is what happens when you mix business and pleasure.
He really is. I don’t get anyone defending him of course he has the power and the right to give his songs to anyone he wants but he choose to mix business with pleasure. He knew who Rita was before he dated her and cheated too. I don’t think this scandal will hurt him because Rita isn’t well known and he as long as Calvin can have another hit he should be fine but if he goes on the decline wait for more bad stories to come out about him.
People are defending him because its cut and dried: its his work and he has the right to say who performs it or not. Its not like Rita couldn’t have gotten everything secured legally – which would have made Calvin unable to pull the rights. She screwed up.
I don’t know if other artists will really feel that way, because Rita didn’t just work with him, she dated him for almost 2 years. Plus, he has a GREAT track record with getting songs tons of air play and charting high. I think other artists will be more focused on his ability to produce a successful single (that makes them $$$) than his relationship dramas.
I think Arita Ora was being a smart, young woman for not trashing the Biebs. She knows that people don’t like him, but that has nothing to do with her career. If I’m a celeb I’m not going to publicly trash another celeb if they have not wronged me.whether she had a fling with Biebs or not, that’s her business, but there ‘a no need to throw Buebs under the bus because her ex is being vindictive and angry. Besides, it’s what he wants her to do. Don’t give him the satisfaction, Rita.
Totally agree. Well said.
Couldn’t name one song she’s done.
I don’t care about neither of them, but if he has the legal rights to the songs, her bad (actually her team’s bad) for not having protected herself. It’s his stuff he can do whatever he wants and well she can try to do something new this time on a real contract that doesn’t depend on the ups and downs of a relationship.
Both of them are looking like idiots, he moreso than her. If he is going to block it, give more ample time than he did. It is obvious it is something personal why he is doing it. Learn to separate personal from business.
Seeing things about these two in the press each day is downright boring and make things look petty.
Either way, quickest way to solve this is she needs to get a new song out there that isn’t written by him and if it does good, do that song.
They’re Calvin’s songs, he gets to make the decision where they’re used. It stinks for Rita, but it’s doubly her responsibility – both for supposedly cheating on Calvin, but also for not making sure that she had properly secured the rights to half her album. It’s a pretty big mistake on her part.
He’s still petty, regardless of who has rights to what. He decided, last minute, to say no to Rita performing the song they did together at TCA..
I don’t see it as all that petty. If some dude cheated on me, I’m not going to go out of my way to do him any favors after that. Why would I?
I don’t blame Calvin at all, really.
I agree he is petty. And I am kind of sick of people bringing up her cheating since he also slept with 5 other girls. It seemed like they either had an open relationship or they weren’t that serious. But it ended badly and he wants to punish her which makes him look kind of bad, I don’t feel sorry for Rita though.
All of that TOK. Why would I give a damn about what *you* want after you screwed me over? Pfft, I would’ve told her no too.
LOL…it’s still petty. I don’t care who cheated on who! They are both adults, not 15 year old high school kids. Grow the f*** up and move on. Would it be okay for someone to physically hurt another if they were screwed over or cheated on? Where do you some of you draw the line?
It’s one thing to tell her she can’t use the songs he wrote with or for her, he has the legal right to do that but to yank the song two days before the TCA’s were going to air and she had spent a month rehearsing for…is petty and foolish. He’s looking like a fool here, especially when he tweets about it and throws shade without giving details on what happened. And if he was also hooking up with other girls while they were together, how is he any better than her? I’m sorry, I have no use for vindictiveness or pettiness.
“Would it be okay for someone to physically hurt another if they were screwed over or cheated on? Where do you some of you draw the line?”
What? What are you talking about? Yeah, I think it’s safe to say I would draw the line at violence. Let’s not make giant leaps here.
My point was that I wouldn’t go out of my way to make life easy for someone who betrayed me… so NO I’m not gonna let my cheating ex make money off of MY song. I wouldn’t feel bad about it either.
If the genders were reversed would you really be spending this much time defending a cheater?
I have never heard anything about him cheating on her but apparently she cheated on him with many guys including Baby Bieber. She’s pretty gross, dude.
Again, petty or not, I don’t blame the guy one bit.
*shrugs* Guess I’m “petty” too.
I agree with Tammy. Calvin had a legal right to pull his song, but what was the point of pulling it 2 days before the show? How else was she supposed to explain why all of a sudden she’s not performing other than to tell the truth? Should she have faked an injury to cover for him? The TCA’s would have been a great opportunity to introduce the song to a large audience. It would have helped him too! He cut off his nose to spite his face. I think he should have let her perform that song & pulled the songs that weren’t released yet on her album & sold them to someone else if he really wanted to.
Tammy, that’s a ridiculous jump. He has all legal rights to the songs, he can say ‘yeah you can’t use them.’ whenever he wants, and that has absolutely nothing to do with accepting violence. That’s not even close to a parallel. It’s actually pretty disturbing that you suggest that the posters who agree that he did what he was allowed to do would be fine with domestic violence.
Now, can we just ask why she would spend a month preparing to perform a song that she had no apparent right to perform? Maybe she shouldn’t have wasted her time doing something she shouldn’t have done?
He does not owe us an explanation because he was fully within his rights to do it.
Also, I have not found a single article saying that he cheated. So, not sure where that information came from.
@ The Original Kitten & Erinn… I don’t think it is that much of a ridiculous jump because it kind of borders on emotional abuse. I’m going to yank half your songs from your upcoming album because you cheated and try to F*ck your career. Nice guy, there. I don’t care what his side of the story is, I don’t care if she cheated…he’s intentionally trying to destroy her career. First with pulling the songs off the album and now forcing her to cancel a performance.
I had an ex cheat on me & apparently to you guys, I was well within my rights to tow the jeep that was sitting in front of his house to mine because it was within my name (disregarding the fact he helped me pay for it) Now if I had towed the jeep, a reign of terror would have been unleashed on me & that is another story for another day. I also did not want to deal with his ass anymore & wanted him completely out of my life. So, I just took off the plates & he proceeded to scream at me on the phone for 3 hours. But I got rid of him…maybe Calvin could take a few pointers here…want Rita to shut up already…stop giving her a reason to talk about it. Leave her alone, stop screwing with her career because it shows you care buddy.
I did say Calvin Harris was allowed to take his songs back because her team apparently screwed up on that aspect of it. What I found petty was him saying Rita could not perform their song at the TCA awards. Are you going to suggest she rehearsed her performance for a month knowing she wasn’t going to be allowed to perform their song? His tweet suggests otherwise. He knew she was rehearsing to perform the song and decided 2 days before…no you can’t. That is where he is being vindictive and petty. He needs to grow up. He’s 30 years old, move on already. I don’t care if she cheated. I don’t. He’s being a jerk now.
He pulled the song 2 days before that show ACCORDING TO HER.
She was told she can’t use the songs, not using prob implies any sort of perfomance too, so what’s the point of rehearsing them any way, she prob lied to make him look bad.
How is her career “screwed” exactly?
How can you possibly call not allowing someone to take something that is rightly yours, “emotional abuse”?
Emotional abuse is cheating on and betraying the person you are committed to.
Arrogance is expecting that person to do you favors after you treated them like sh*t.
“I don’t care if she cheated. I don’t. He’s being a jerk now.”
Yes you’ve made it very clear that you don’t have a problem with cheating, but I guess Calvin does. And what happened to Rita? Well I guess karma is just a big ol’ bitch.
Didn’t other reports say that he pulled the songs from her album in July? If so, why would she still be rehearsing them after she knew that she couldn’t have them?
I think we also have to think about what these songs are, what it means long term.
Songs are kind of like children, in that everyone (aka their people) involved will have to be in contact for many years, to make sure that royalties and licensing, etc. are handled properly. Payments multiple times a year. What he was giving to her was kind of like a Golden Goose. Not something that she’d perform once, but something she’d be making money off of for decades. Its not like he took back his favorite wall hanging, he took back an investment. I don’t think that is petty of him. It makes sense that he wouldn’t want to give something so valuable to someone he feels betrayed him.
Well… yes, Tammy. If the jeep was fully in your name, it’s technically within your rights to take. It’s registered to you. It’s by all technical terms, YOUR jeep, that he helped pay on.
“Now if I had towed the jeep, a reign of terror would have been unleashed on me & that is another story for another day” – that has nothing to do with it being your jeep. If you have a piece of shit ex, that doesn’t negate who owned the vehicle. If you were afraid of him, that’s a whole other issue.
And Rita obviously thought she’d get away with being able to perform the songs, which is why she practiced for a month. If she had been told before now (which it seems she had) that she didn’t have rights to the song, why would she spend all that time on something she wasn’t supposed to perform? Because she thought she could get away with it, and she probably didn’t think he’d stop her.
Some of you act like you know her and know what happened. It hasn’t even been confirmed that she cheated or that he didn’t. It’s just the conclusion that everyone is jumping to.
Who tries to perform a song live that they don’t have the rights to? Rita already knew that there were issues with the rights to his songs jeopardizing her whole album, and it was surprising to her that he didnt give permission to let her do the performance? And for all we know, he did say ‘no’ for a whileand they thought they could work around it. Because again, this is HER bad. You can’t just perform and release songs that you don’t have the rights to, amd who on earth thinks that their ex-boyfriend is going to be okay with doing it as a favor?
@The Original Kitten…..very big leap to suggest I don’t have a problem with cheating… I apparently do because I left an ex for that very reason. What I didn’t do, was act like a child afterward and engage him in any way, shape or form. It’s called being an adult and moving on. It’s why I left the jeep, that was registered in my name, sitting in front of his house. He did pay for the vehicle, well he borrowed money to buy it so he could sell it and help me with pay bills. I just had it registered in my name because he did not have a driver’s license. I did take the plates off it, though and cancelled the insurance. I did not have it towed because the guy was a violent jerk that had previously stalked to me the first time I left him.
I just have a problem with the way Calvin Harris is acting. Apparently it is okay for a 30 year old man to act like a child because he has been scorned. Her album was due to come out in September and he yanks the songs in July…yeah that’s not petty. Plus, he tweeted that he had a damn good reason why he would not allow her to perform the song at the TCA but doesn’t tweet the reason. Plus if she knew she wasn’t allowed to perform this song in July, why isn’t he saying that. He doesn’t need to get into details but he could have said, ” Rita knew that I was pulling the songs we had created together and also knew she could not perform them as well” instead of allowing the story to break the way it did. It makes him look childish. If she is lying to make him look bad, he should be releasing a statement to that effect, instead of saying there is another side to the TCA story.
Her management team screwed her. Maybe she thought that the relationship she had with him secured the songs, apparently it didn’t. Legally he has the right to do what he’s doing but I disagree with plenty of you that think it’s okay for him to do this because you assume she cheated or used him. Maybe she did. And hopefully, next time she will make sure she has secured her rights to songs before this happens again.
Plus she had sex with Rob Kardashian…eww…what was Calvin Harris thinking?
@Tammy,
I don’t think her cheating or not cheating makes a difference or justifies anything. It’s pretty cut and dried: he has the rights to the songs. She recorded without obtaining official, legal use for her own album. She rehearsed a live performance for a song that she never really had the rights to perform live. I have no idea about his reasoning, but it’s his right to withhold his consent, and its her own fault for not only mixing business with pleasure but for also failing to secure her own business in the event of something going wrong. It’s her own business if she cheats or he cheats or whatever, but there”s no excuse for the sheer stupidity of not having legal rights to half your album this close to its release.
Funny how many of the guys she’s supposedly been involved with have implied that she cheated or used them in some way…Nick Jonas, James Arthur, Rob K, now Calvin Harris…Rich Hilfiger, you’re next I guess.
They’re both being immature about this. Calvin should just stop talking if he knows what’s good for him. This makes him look so petty. Rita seems childish too. At least she’s only 23, but he’s 30. He should know better. They’re obviously both hurt and are trying everything they can to hurt each another. Anyway, I saw the Black Widow video, I liked it. Rita did pretty good as an action star. It kind of suited her. I was surprised, but it worked.
This is a case of don’t sh!t where you eat. If she didn’t realize he had the upper hand in their working relationship that’s her own stupidity. I wouldn’t go out of my way to help someone who screwed me over.
I agree 100%!
Legally, if you don’t own the rights to a song, the legal owner can pull the plug whenever they want or as was initially reported in this case, as soon as they find out that you plan on performing their song. Let me put it this way: you know how a lot of singers like to do songs by other artists at a concert? The owner of the song can sue the singer for performing the song without permission and technically would be owed a percentage of the earnings. Mr. Harris is quite well-known for protecting his property (he’s known to be slightly less lethal about his copyrights than AOL is about the copyright to the “Happy Birthday” song), so I’d say that the only surprise to me is that Ms. Ora seems to have honestly thought he wouldn’t punish her for their bad break-up.
“you know how a lot of singers like to do songs by other artists at a concert? The owner of the song can sue the singer for performing the song without permission and technically would be owed a percentage of the earnings”
I don’t know if that is true. The original writer would be due a performance royalty, but it is my understanding they do not have to give permission for a cover. If you use the original recording, they do need to get permission.
That’s definitely not correct. When a person or business owns the rights to a song, it’s not a workaround to just re-record. The words and the melody are intellectual property, the question is just how protective someone is over their songs and how litigious someone is o the subject. Chances are a cover at a concert isn’t going to be worth suing. But using a song you don’t have rights to on an album, and making money off of it is definitely a big deal.
Am I alone in not knowing who these people, with the exception of the Beebs, even are? I suppose if they are on the Beebs’ level there is a reason I don’t know…
I only know who Rita Ora is because she dated Rob Kardashian…but I am with you on that one.
Why do some people assume she slept her way to the top? She was signed when she was 17 because she has an amazing voice. I would understand those rumors if she wasn’t talented, but she is. I guess it’s because of those tweets from Rob Kardashian. That’s what you get for dating a Kardashian, I suppose.
Not just those tweets from Rob but most of her exes, and four of them were in the music business, have implied she either used him for connections and/or cheated on him: one of the Jonas brothers, Bruno Mars, James Arthur, Rob K, now Calvin Harris. That’s an awful lot of coincidences.
At least Calvin hasn’t tried to punch Bieber… yet?
They are both pathetic. And I can’t stand the tactic where someone claims someone else did them wrong and proceeds to screw them over, but refuses to tell anyone what that thing was. Middle school garbage.
Having the right to do something doesn’t make it the right thing to do.
However, the person who looks worst here is Justin Bieber. Always Justin Bieber. Why does he even bother to wear pants? He’d look marginally less stupid if he just discarded them altogether.
So having recently heard “I Will Never Let You Down” and her hook on “Black Widow,” I’m suddenly surprised by Rita’s voice. I actually find it really pleasant?! Her PR machine has always been on overdrive but maybe they should just get some better songs for her…
I really don’t feel sorry for her and we don’t know why Calvin is acting this way so I will reserve my judgement. He is confident of his decision enough without having to blab to the press and indulge in a slagfest. He doesn’t even seem to care enough that he is made to look bitter.