Ask any music critic what they think of Taylor Swift's 11th studio album, The Tortured Poets Department, and those who are not afraid of being criticized might say something about its interminable length, its repetitive synth overlays, or its uninspired lyrics. The track “Imgonnagetyouback” sounds a lot like Olivia Rodrigo's “Get Him Back!” In the chorus, Swift sings that she hasn't decided yet whether “I'll be your wife or I'll break your bike.” Perhaps the lyrics are intended to be somewhat childish, but even the most novice editor should have pointed Swift towards a more obvious rhyme: “I'll be your wife or I'll ruin your life.”
But if you ask Swiftie what she thinks about this album, she might say it's her best work to date. Yes, it made more sense for her to use “imgonnagetyouback” to rhyme with “wife” and “life.” But those who are into Swift know to associate “imgonnagetyouback” with the 1975 song “Falling for you,” written by Swift's girlfriend, Matty Healy. In it, Healy sings, “I'm so excited for the night / All I need is my bike and your big house.” So Swift's mention of bikes in “imgonnagetyouback” is a deliberate creative decision, as is the lack of a space in the song's title. Some fans go further, claiming that the lack of space is compared not only to “Falling for you,” but also to the song “Blank Space” from Swift's own album, 1989. (1975, 1989 — there's a long list of years to keep track of here.) “In the Blank Space music video, Taylor Swift breaks things up and says, 'Cause I love the players. , you know you love the game,' he sings.'' (YouTube) User Miranda-ry9tf wrote a comment. “In imgonnagetyouback she says, 'We broke all the pieces, but you still want to play the game?' 'Blank Space,' released in 2014, is also a song about Healy. Swifties who have been down the rabbit hole might argue that by omitting the space from the title of her new song, she created a kind of ouroboros. writes the word “imgonnagetyouback” in a circle, and you will see that the “k” and “im” are next to each other. This may seem like a reach, but six songs later, in a song titled “thanK you aIMee,” Swift mentions a mysterious rival named Amy. She doesn't need Swiftie to figure out whose name the capital letters spell.
There has long been a disconnect between how music critics and Swift fans consume Taylor Swift's work, but never before has that gap been more stark. We saw that in 2014 when 1989 became the fastest-selling album in over a decade, but it wasn't reviewed on Pitchfork. (The following year, the music magazine reviewed Ryan Adams' 1989 cover album instead.) In 2017, Swift's Reputation was the year's best-selling album, but it received lackluster reviews and won a Grammy Award. So I was treated coldly. During the pandemic, Swift closed the gap in his acceptance by releasing the album Folklore, which was loved by critics and fans alike. (“Some have dreamed for years that Taylor would make an album like this, but no one ever dreamed it would be this great,” Rob Sheffield wrote in Rolling Stone. (He described it as Swift's “best album to date.”) But while critics came for “folk,” fans stopped for “legendary,” and that's what Swift did. This is the most appealing feature of the latest work. “The Tortured Poets Department” or “TTPD” is a true Rorschach test. Lukewarm music reviews tend to overlook the fact that Swift stopped selling “music” a long time ago. Instead, she has spent two decades building a foundation of fandom. It is filled with complex, sequential stories, contextualized through multiple perspectives throughout her 11 blockbuster films. She's not creating an independent album, but rather a musical franchise.
“TTPD” helped Swift break just about every streaming record imaginable. Upon release, the album became his most streamed album in a single day on Spotify, making Swift himself his most streamed artist in a single day. On the day of release, he was streamed 314.5 million times. Her second-highest Spotify debut of the year was Beyoncé's “Cowboy Carter,” with 76.6 million views. Ariana Grande's “Eternal Sunshine” came in fourth place with 59.1 million copies sold. “[Swift]That's on another level, let's start comparing Ariana to the likes of Olivia Rodrigo instead,” wrote a Grande fan account. I have written This poster may have the right idea. Why do we compare Swift to singer-songwriters like Grande and Beyoncé, and not to Bob Iger, the media executive who built Disney into a $200 billion company? Disney owns two of his biggest fan properties in existence: Star Wars and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Marvel villains include Thanos and Doctor Doom. Taylor Swift's villains include Scooter Braun and Kim Kardashian. (And now, maybe Healy too.)
Like the MCU, the Swiftverse is much more than a set of plotlines and characters. It's thousands of comments on an Instagram post, $332 million in extra funding for the NFL, a worldwide hoarding of bracelet beads, and the Fed wondering why inflation persists. is. In the Swiftverse, the music itself isn't the point, but the way it gets the point across. That doesn't mean music is irrelevant. It serves an important purpose. However, the purpose of this depends on whether you are an avid Swiftie or a casual listener. A common criticism of TTPD is that it references too many of Swift's past albums and lacks a stylistic evolution. Swifts understand that these Easter eggs add another dimension to songs and stories they thought they knew. At the opening of TTPD's song “So Long London,” devoted fans will recognize the pulsing sound similar to the effect used on “Call It What You Want” from the album Reputation. you will notice. About halfway through the song, there's also an “ah-ah” sound similar to part of the chorus of “Dress”, another “Reputation” track. On the other hand, it's natural for non-Swifties to think that the artist is unintentionally rehashing some of his older work by working with longtime collaborators Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dessner. That's true. On the other hand, it's kind of crazy to think that Swift can do anything without intending to. Assuming the “So Long London” callbacks are intentional, they cap off the beginning and end of Swift's six-year relationship with actor Joe Alwyn rather beautifully. Most musicians, and artists more generally, can only dream that their fans understand such subtleties. In Swift's case, it's ironic that these subtleties have led to her fiercest criticism.
Some of the cleverest callbacks on “TTPD” are not to Swift's older music but to Healy's. Fans found that Swift's “Guilty as Sin” worked eerily well as a musical overlay for her 1975 song “About You,” which is widely thought to be about Swift. . Skeptics note that both songs were produced by Antonoff, and argue that “Guilty as Sin” raises questions about whether Swift and Antonoff's collaboration has finally grown stale. will do. But for Swiftie, “Guilty as Sin” provides an answer. It ties together her two key pieces of the puzzle, giving fans an unraveling of the mystery that Swift's world is built upon: the identity of her muse, the uncertainty of whether it's “folklore” and its sequel. It makes you feel enchantingly close to. evermore” is based on real events. Following this train of thought, Swift and Healy's combined discography of over 350 songs leaves her with at least 22,194 different combinations of track-her-overlays for fans to engage in enthusiastically. Answer the biggest question “TTPD'' posed: Was Matty Healy the main character from the beginning?