Greatest Hits radio host Ken Bruce came under fire from Taylor Swift fans after he said he won't play her songs to his 3.8 million weekly listeners until she stops writing tracks about her exes.
The veteran broadcaster -- who announced in January 2023 his departure from BBC Radio 2 after over three decades -- recently opened up about why he won't play Swift's songs on his "PopMaster Quiz" show as he blasted the pop superstar's songwriting during a recent interview with the Mail on Sunday.
"All her songs are the same. I'll play her on my station when she writes something that isn't about her ex-boyfriends. Great radio songs have three beats, and then they're straight into the song, not these long intros that she does," Bruce said in an interview originally published in June.
He continued, "We're a '70s, '80s, and '90s radio show as our core audience is older."
The radio icon received backlash from Swifties online over his comments, which some deemed "misogynistic."
"Leave it to an old white man to be completely out of touch... shocker," one social media user commented.
Another fan questioned, "Why does an old man who knows nothing about music get to be a radio presenter[?]"
A third user brought Bruce's comments to the attention of his new radio station, writing: "@greatesthitsuk really disappointed to read this article. saying something so misogynistic so publicly is simply unacceptable.
Despite his refusal to play her songs in full, Bruce has played some snippets of Swift's songs on his radio show occasionally in order to maintain a variety of genres.
"For our audience, we do '70s, '80s and '90s music. We do early noughties and 2010s -- not very many -- but we expect people to know things from recent and current music, only the biggest names though," Bruce told the outlet.
Bruce recently won three awards -- best radio personality, radio show, and best daytime show -- at the TRIC (Television and Radio Industries Club) Awards in June.
After his wins, he seemingly took a jab at BBC Radio 2, telling The Sun that it was "a real privilege actually to have moved on and for people to make the noise and say, you know, you've done all right."
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