James Corden thinks the summer is a time to jam to some boppy hits, a take that he shared during Wednesday’s “Late Late Show,” which offended guest John Legend.
“Whenever I turn the radio on now are like slow, boring ballads,” Corden said from behind his CBS late-show desk. “Do you know what I mean? Uh, I get it, ballads, ballads. I wanna roll down the windows, I wanna jam out. No one wants to hear some guy on his guitar crying about his girlfriend in the middle of the summer, it just feels wrong! Seriously, who would want to hear a ballad when you could listen to a great summer bop! They’re so bor–”
Then Legend came out from his dressing room backstage prematurely to cheers from the crowd to confront Corden: “Well I heard you been telling people that bops are better than ballads.”
“Yeah, because they are,” Corden fired back.
“I feel attacked,” Legend said. “It feels kinda personal, you know? For me, summer’s a time to slow things down, pop open a bottle of LVE wine and run a nice bath. Listen to sensual love songs.”
“Well that’s very specific,” Corden said, laughing that Legend plugged his own win. “I’m just saying, it’s summer, people like to have fun.”
Well then, Legend decided it was best to settle this with a summer ballads vs. bops riff-off, with the “no-brainer” part being who would take which genre.
Corden kicked things off with The Jonas Brothers’ “Sucker,” and John followed up with All-4-One’s “I Swear.” Then Corden belted out Billie Eilish’s “Bad Guy” and Legend sang his very own “All of Me.”
In the end, it was very clear Legend was the winner, but he was a gracious victor and ended the riff-off by singing Lewis Capaldi’s “Someone You Loved” with Corden.
Watch the clip above.