Producer Todd Rundgren Criticizes Taylor Swift: ‘The Apotheosis of Mediocrity’

Todd Rundgren has called Taylor Swift the “apotheosis of mediocrity” and suggested she “ruined music” in a new interview.

Speaking to Vulture, the veteran producer was asked which current artist he would spoof if he made a parody album, a nod to his work on Meat Loaf’s 1977 album Bat Out of Hell, which he has said he intended partly as a Bruce Springsteen send-up.

“Taylor Swift, of course. There’s an argument to be made that she ruined music,” he said. “It’s just that, to me, Taylor Swift is the apotheosis of mediocrity.”

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He went further later in the interview. “Taylor Swift doesn’t do anything particularly great except grow hair,” he said. “She’s not a great singer. She’s not a great songwriter. She’s not a great dancer.”

Rundgren praised Lady Gaga as a “real musician” and “classically trained piano player,” and floated a theory that female pop stars rose to dominance after young men shifted their spending to video games in the 1990s. It isn’t the first time he’s criticized Swift — he made similar comments on Rick Rubin’s Broken Record podcast in 2022.

Swift hasn’t responded. When The Life of a Showgirl drew mixed reactions on its release last year, she addressed the criticism on Apple Music’s The Zane Lowe Show.

“I have a lot of respect for people’s subjective opinions on art. I’m not the art police,” she said. “Everybody is allowed to feel exactly how they want.”

The comments land days after Swift released The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore, a deluxe edition of the 2025 album with four new tracks, led by “Patient Zero.” The original debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with the biggest sales week of the modern era, and Swift holds the record for the most No. 1 albums by a solo artist, along with four Album of the Year Grammys — more than anyone in history.