And, before this, Einstein on the Fritz. 
Alan Jackson has taken swipes at rockers in general (“Don’t Rock the Jukebox,” which name-checks the Rolling Stones) and at pop artists and writers trying their hand at country music (“Gone Country”).
George Harrison’s cover of “Bye Bye Love” was understood to be a swipe at Eric Clapton for stealing his wife.
Every third song Taylor Swift writes is a scold of someone.
Paul played technically proficient drums on it.
Paul’s boring-ass drumming is exhibit A when some idiot needs to be schooled on Ringo’s immeasurable value to the group.
I grew up with Dire Straits, i owned all of their albums, went to see them in concert, and read a lot about them. I have never heard anything about Boy George as the inspiration for “Money for Nothing.”
In fact, Mark Knopfler himself was always very clear that the inspiration for the song was not a musical artist at all. The whole song is written from the point of view of a working-class furniture-store worker who is both admiring and also jealous of the music stars who appear on MTV. Knopfler said that some of the lines in the song are copied directly from conversation he overheard among the workers in a New York City store.
The only time i have ever heard anyone make a connection between the song and a specific musical act, it was the former Motley Crue member Nikki Sixx. Sixx claimed that Motley Crue was playing on the TVs in the NYC store when Knopfler got his inspiration, and that Motley Crue was therefore part of the inspiration for the song.
As far as i know, though, the only evidence for this is Sixx’s own imagination; Knopfler himself has never, to my knowledge, even addressed the claim, let alone confirmed it.
“Belleville Rendez-vous” was kind of a silly song from The Triplets of Belleville, but the animation that went with the song made fun of lots of celebrities in Paris in the 1930s, especially Josephine Baker and Django Reinhardt.
Richards also recorded “You Don’t Move Me” on his album Talk Is Cheap in 1988, which came out during his highly public feud with Jagger.
Robbie Fulks’ “Fuck This Town” includes a dig at 80s pop-country singer Ronnie Milsap.
An obscure band from Denver put out this profane, juvenile, and very funny dig at Morrisey.
Ben Folds’ song “Brainwascht” is a swipe back at his (ex?) friends Fleming McWilliams and John Mark Painter. Aka Fleming & John. I guess they wrote a not-too-nice song about him and his latest divorce.
Ben’d song: Google Play Music is no longer available
Fleming & John’s song: http://songmeanings.com/m/songs/view/3530822107859478544/
A band called Local H put out a song about 20 years ago called “If I Was Eddie Vedder, Would You Like Me Better?” Not exactly a dig, but…
I Dig Rock & Roll Music, by Peter, Paul and Mary, takes a swipe at the entire rock music genre of the time, with credible impressions of The Mama and The Papas, The Beatles and Donovan.
Psssst…post #32. 
John Cale’s lively Chickenshit was a slam at his former bassist and drummer ( the very interesting Joe Stefko ) over their walking out over the Croyden Chicken Incident.
Eminem’s “Without Me” has a few:
Chris Kirkpatrick you can get your ass kicked
Worse than them little Limp Bizkit bastards, and Moby
You can get stomped by Obie
You 36 year old bald headed fag blow me
You don’t know me, you’re too old, let go, its over
Nobody listens to techno
:smack: Missed it somehow.
I think they meant the country, not the state.
Exactly.
It’s been a very long time since I last heard it, but I think the “KoyaHotsyTotsy” dig was part of EOTF.
If Back in the USSR is a swipe the its a swipe at Chuck Berrys Back in the USA. Not the Beach Boys.
Who are you talking to, and how, that you take 20 minutes to tell them that this song is a Beach Boys reference? It is really well known that it is an homage to the Beach Boys doing Chuck Berry, very specifically. (Back in the USA?)
Do the people not believe that it is referring to the Beach Boys, or do they disagree that it is a take down, and that John wrote it? Because it isn’t a take down and john obviously didn’t write it. And I’m pretty sure that John loved Paul and the rest of the guys. You wouldn’t bother to write How do you sleep about someone you had contempt for. The other stories are just selling newspapers.
Nuff said.
The one that came to mind was the Foo Fighter’s “I’ll Stick Around”, which was obviously about Courtney Love. (Dave was pretty, “maybe, maybe not” about it for years and then eventually admitted that yeah, it’s about Courtney.)