EDITOR’S NOTE: This post has been updated to reflect “evermore,” “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” (!!!) and “Red (Taylor’s Version)” (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!).
It had to happen eventually. We had to talk about Taylor Swift.
If you had asked me 10 years ago if I was a Taylor Swift fan, I would have said “enh.” If you asked me seven-ish years ago, I would have said, “I wear red lipstick every single day even though my lips are cracking off my face because it’s matte, what do YOU think?” If you had asked me four years ago, I would have said “I used to be?”
If you asked me today if I am a fan of Taylor Swift, I’d say, “Fuck it—yes.”
TBH, I brushed Taylor Swift off when she was a country star. I, being a white woman born in the year 1990, of course knew who she was, and knew her songs from when they crossed over to KISS 107 FM, but I didn’t seek out her early stuff.
Sometime between “Speak Now” and “Red,” or Taylor Lautner and Jake Gyllenhaal* in Taylor Time, I graduated high school, went off to college and went though my first real break up. And then it just happened: I was a Swiftie.
I’ve always defended and like Taylor primarily for her being a writer’s songwriter. I don’t know any other musician whose lyrics have hit me in the feels as hard as Taylor has at times. I understand the desire to want to wear your naturally big, curly hair stick straight and in a cute lob. She’s a wine bitch. She’s a year older than me (we’re December babies) and I related to her growing up as I was growing up. And: she’s a cat lady. A real one, not an annoying one that ModCloth tries to market to. I can tell by how she talks about them, how she Instagrams them, how she carries them around in little backpacks**, how she names them after humans.
Taylor Swift gets underestimated by music snobs for being a big pop star who wrote songs about boys and became a bazillionaire, for the Kanye thing, for her arrested development into feminism and politics, and, justgoingtosayit for being a woman.
My hot take: you’re allowed to write about whatever the fuck you want.
She sang about boys because she sang about relationships and that’s what was important to her at the time. If I was a diary person, I’m sure that the pages would’ve been flooded with boy drama during the same time as her***. Instead, I put my ugh-boys energy into the books I was writing.
Are young women not allowed to write about boys as if boys were kind of the center of the universe to them at one point, which, by the way, is because society pushes the notion of heterosexual relationships onto kids as soon as they have the puberty talk in fifth grade, basically, or even before then when you have, like, kindergarteners being told it’s “so cute” they have a boyfriend/girlfriend — so MAYBE we wouldn’t need to “write about boys” if our worth wasn’t constantly being measured by how “dateable” we are?
Anyway.
At one time, I full-on worshipped Taylor for her burns, her specifics, her that’s-definitely-about-Joe-Jonas-isms, because I was too quiet to be that confrontational and it sure looked to me like a well-spoken woman using a pen as power.
The problem with idolizing celebrities, of course, is that they aren’t perfect. I didn’t recognize Taylor’s problematic dip into white feminism at first, because I was just starting to learn about it and break out of the mold my own experiences had put me in.
As I tried to do the work into becoming a true feminist, into becoming a true ally for the LGBTQ+ community, for the Black community, I felt the friction with my love for Taylor Swift. Her girl squad**** was all hot models and rich white bitches. She stayed silent about women’s issues, gay rights, the freaking 2016 election. Meanwhile, I had finished Baby’s First Women’s Studies Class, was making friends with drastically different experiences than me, finally paying attention to how fucked up American politics are and voting for the first time (for Obama, obviously). I felt myself changing, the things that mattered to me changing. And although Taylor Swift gave me some E-tern-al Bops, it was frustrating to see someone at my age, with so much apparent power, do nothing.
I’ve grown more since then, I went through an angry feminist phase, and then the next level of that is realizing, like, everyone’s journey is different.
So, at almost 30 years old, I’m not going to fault Taylor Swift for posting photos flaunting her girlfriends at 23, because I do think there’s a time in your life where you really start to appreciate deep bonds with other women, and sometimes that is also at your annoyingly Instagrammable pool parties. Taylor doesn’t have sisters, like I do, so those bonds are strictly through friendships, and maybe she was feeling surrounded by “sisters” for the first time.
And, yes, she lied about Kanye. That whole thing is a humongous mess, and I’m not going to unpack it here, because I have too many biases, the biggest one being unable to give one single shit about the Kardashians. (Don’t vote for Kanye.)
I’m also not going to be one to totally fault her for the belated feminism, or for her long bout of political silence. And, yes, I watched the Netflix documentary. It was too careful and reeked of being reel-by-reel approved by her and her PR team, but it made me sympathize with her in that she’s this humongous personality who never got to just be a person. I’m just a person, who got to go to college and learn new things through new people and new experiences and who is the woman I am today because of that. She got put in a box (a writes-about-boys box) and by the time society started waking up about some shit, she was too high on a pedestal to risk it. Is there an element of greed, of worrying about losing the “fame” and, TBH, the money? Sure. But I also think Taylor Swift is a fellow people-pleasing perfectionist with a Good Girl complex. And, unfortunately, the people she had to please weren’t the ones speaking out about things that needed said.
And, whatever. You can disagree! Other celebs spoke out. She’s been called out multiple times, she’s fucked up multiple times. Her 180 into Gay Ally is late, her voice in politics is late and she has a lot of walk to back up her talk. But if we’re not allowed to change, if we’re not allowed to grow, whether we are normies or global freaking superstars, then what the fuck is the point?
I’d say I started to fall out of full Taylor stanmanship***** right about “1989,” which I know is actual blasphemy, but we’ll get to that later. So, I was already losing interest, multiplied by the Kanye stuff, divided by her free fall out of the public’s approval, plus her disappearance until “Reputation.”
But, overall, I’m probably in too deep — I’m someone who will always listen to a new Taylor Swift album, out of curiosity and out of all the time I spent walking somewhere alone, or driving somewhere alone or being in my dorm room, alone, and listening to her songs somehow making me feel better. It’s loyalty, ‘til death or another collaboration with Brendon Urie do us part.
And now a list! Ish!
First, the Early Stuff We Have to Mention:
Not to skip over the ambition/talent it takes to get a literal country music record made when you are barely old enough to be allowed to drive a car, but the first album doesn’t do it for me.
“Fearless,” too, is something I listened to only after “You Belong with Me” wouldn’t stop playing on the radio. A few other callouts:
“Fifteen”
Back then I swore I was gonna marry him someday / but I realized some bigger dreams of mine / And Abigail gave everything she had to a boy who changed his mind / And we both cried
Make that all three of us crying, because damn.
“Forever & Always”
The final chorus (And it rrrAAINNS when you’re GONE) literally IS the turn it up meme for me.
EDITOR’S NOTE – TAYLOR’S VERSION: Okay, the rerecording of her entire library to take back her rights from a greedy, grimy-ass-looking white man? QUEEN SHIT. Absolute queen shit and I will listen to every millisecond of it. “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” hit first and it HIT. The bitch is dedicated to parentheses and making us feel shit. I loved “Forever & Always,” will go to my grave knowing all the words to “You Belong With Me” and cried listening to “Change” while I drove 25 minutes to clean out my desk after quitting my soul-sucking, toxic job.
Second, the Hell Yes:
AKA, the absolute pure excellence that is the middle of “Speak Now.”
“The Story of Us”
I’m standing alone in a crowded room and we’re not speaking / and I’m dying to know if it’s killing you like it’s killing me
Extremely me after I broke up with my high school boyfriend who was also my beginning of college boyfriend, but then I kept having to see him at mutual friends’ parties even though 30,000 people go to OU.
“Never Grow Up”
Here I am in my new apartment / in a big city / they just dropped me off / It’s so much colder than I thought it would be / so I tuck myself in and turn the nightlight on / I wish I’d never grown up
What, no, I am absolutely not tearing up listening to this song right now trying to remember the exact lyrics? I can’t even get into the rest of the song, there’s something in my eyes I need to go … wash out …
“Enchanted”
My favorite love song banger. The layers of Please don’t be in love with someone else / please don’t have someone waiting on you = !!!
Completely erasing from my brain the part about how this song was written for …. Owl fucking City.
“Better Than Revenge”
Yeah, yeah. It’s a mean girl song written before we all so obviously united and swore never to be mean to other girls, lol, but I don’t care, this song slaps.
Soon she’s gonna find stealing other peoples toys on the playground won’t make you any friends
Like, BURN.
Let’s hear the applause / Come on, show me how much better you are
WE ARE BURNING.
No amount of vintage dresses gives you dignity
I AM ASHES NOW.
Emily and I went to the Red tour the year I graduated college (and the same summer we saw One Direction’s Take Me Home tour… fuck, can we go back to 2013?), and we both wore red lipstick.
“22”
I can’t bring up “22” without mentioning that I was indeed 22 when this song came out. Sue me. But, also, Happy, free, confused and lonely at the same time is … a way to describe 22.
“All Too Well”
HERE WE GO.
I STILL don’t like Jake Gyllenhaal because of “All Too Well.” I do not care that he was in the last Spider-Man movie, it will NOT work on ME a loyal TAYLOR DEFENDANT. This is Taylor at her best and most finger-pointing, fuck-you specifics. The scarf. At Maggie’s the sister’s house. The plaid shirt days. The t-ball team stories. It sounds like Jake fucking Gyllenhaal SOMEONE wasn’t a great driver. But the kicker, for me, is:
You call me up again just to break me like a promise / so casually cruel in the name of being honest
Holy SHIT, Jake, DAMN.
One of my favorite lesser famous Taylor songs is the bonus track “The Moment I Knew,” which might AlSO be about that ABSOLUTE MANDEMON.
The reveal of And they’re all standing around me singing “Happy Birthday to you”
The ending of You called me later / And said “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it” / And I said “I’m sorry, too” / And that’s the moment I knew
I JUST. I’M. CAN WE PUT THIS MAN IN PRISON.
EDITOR’S NOTE – TAYLOR’S VERSION: The 10-minute version of “All Too Well” ……………………. help. Are you telling me this man had a keychain that said “Fuck the patriarchy”??? The tea about that scruffy beanie-wearing snake in this version is hot. The party scene with “some actress” asked her what happened. When she says he told her it might work except for the age gap and “it made me want to die” !!!!!!!!!! When she says this douche charmed her dad and then made her dad sad because she was sad when Jake Gyllengotohell skipped her birthday (“And he said it’s supposed to be fun, turning 21.”). GUTTED. Girl. GIRL. “Red” is — STILL — such a banger, top to bottom and no I am not biased by her choice to cast renowned Andrew Garfield impersonator Dylan O’Brien in the SHORT FILM. I CAN ONLY DIE SO MANY TIMES.
*deep breath*
Okay, anyway, so like I said, “1989” is when she started to lose me, even though everyone else worships at the altar of it?****** There are parts I like about it, and most of them are in the song and/or video for “Blank Space” (I’m a nightmare dressed like a daydream). There are other parts that have grown on me, like the obvious Harry Styles-ness of the “Out of the Woods” third verse and “Clean,” but, um, what exactly is happening on “I Wish You Would” / “How You Get the Girl” which I always confuse as the same song?
Third, the Needs to be Acknowledged:
“Reputation.”
Maybe “Reputation” is a necessary evil?
It is…not good…but I am shameless enough to admit I have grown to enjoy the They’re burning all the witches even if you aren’t one / So light me up / light me up / light me up go ahead and light me up in “I Did Something Bad,” and don’t exactly hate “Call It What You Want” and “New Year’s Day.”
Fourth, the Well Fine:
I’ll say it: there’s a corniness to “Lover” that I like. Mostly I was glad to hear it wasn’t as bad as “Reputation.”
“I Forgot That You Existed”
Could have done without the Drake reference, but the I forgot that you existed / And I thought that it would kill me but it didn’t and the It isn’t love, it isn’t hate, it’s just indifference hooked me, then the Would have been right there, front row / even if nobody came to your show sank me.
All I’m saying is I could have used this song in college.
“Lover” (not the Shawn Mendes version sorry Kayley)
He’s going to hate this, but there are parts of this song that I CANNOT HELP BUT RELATE to my relationship with Ryan. For one, we share a house in which we have both left up Christmas lights until January and let friends crash in the living room.
And I think the whole thing has an aura of, just like, the happiness of knowing that you’re with the Right One. She wrote this one for the LTRs.
Also, whatever, there’s something I really like about the Swear to be overdramatic and trUUE!!*******
AND the You’ll save all your dirtiest jokes for me / and at every table, I’ll save you a seat because Ryan can be secretly a little sassy and it’s one of my favorite things about him, and he will probably have to sit at a lot of tables with me when I become a famous writer!
“The Man” tries too hard to be a girl bo$$ anthem, but because of where she is in her feminist awakening, I’ll give it to her. I both loathed and liked “Paper Rings” (The moon is high like your friends were the night that we first met / Went home and tried to stalk you on the Internet) after I came to accept that this is Taylor now.
The rest of the stuff… I can get through.
How does one “get through” whatever the actual hell is happening with “ME!” and “You Need to Calm Down,” you may ask? Well, if Taylor listened to Panic! at the Disco for the first time around the time I did, then I can’t fault a bitch for wanting to be in the same enclosed space with Brendon Urie. Not to say she used that time wisely, because , wow, that song.
And in YNTCD she says Taking shots at me like it’s Patron, to which this semi-frequent tequila shot taker can relate.
Fifth, the Return of the Stan:
And now we get to “folklore,” Taylor Swift’s version of “no pressure but you can totally use quarantine to make sourdough or make ART.”
First of all: I LOVE LOWERCASE. Other of all:
“the 1”
Okay Tay! A slow bop! Roaring 20s, rosé, the word “shit” used casually—all things I like!
“cardigan”
I usually DESPISE a lazy “Peter Pan” reference but if you think I’m not leaning hard into Tried to change the ending / Peter losing Wendy ….
I DO like a sad, rich bitch Gatsby-esque allusion, which Tay likes to do, too, so I can get behind the “the last great american dynasty.” (And the I had a marvelous time ruining everything.)
I haven’t honestly had time to digest the whole thing, but other quick standouts include MY QUEEN FINALLY DROPPING AN F-BOMB (“mad woman”).
And the Cold was the steel of my axe to grind / For the boys who broke my heart / Now I send their babies presents of “invisible string.” Our boy-crazy girl is FULL GROWN.
EDITOR’S NOTE – AND THEN THERE WAS “EVERMORE”
“evermore”
I loved “folklore” as a return to form and a perfect fall album™️ but when this bitch dropped “evermore”????
“willow” is good (except for the weird “90s trend” line …. it just feels weird and out of place on an album and from an artist who doesn’t usually make such direct pop culture references (except for her first song, literally called ‘Tim McGraw” but, you know)) but “champagne problems” (How evergreen our group of friends / don’t think we’ll say that word again) and “’tis the damn season” (the layered chorus is so good) are probably in my TSwift Top 15.
I do love the missing white woman syndrome anthem “no body, no crime” even though I still will not be forced to like Haim. I also like this particular line from “long story short” — Past me / I want to tell you not to get caught up in these petty things / Your nemeses will defeat themselves before you get a chance to swing. because @ Kanye.
–
I was planning a version of this post before she dropped the album, anyway, because Taylor Swift is too big a part of my pop cultured life to leave out of a blog I said was going to probably be about pop culture. And it’s so super lame, but it feels right that T.Swift would drop music that I actually like again at the same time that I’m trying to write more.
But you know what? As a FAN OF TAYLOR SWIFT. I’m into this. I do not like the woods, but I do want to shop for fall sweaters. I am inspired to go bug my cats. I’m going to buy a new thing of Fenty Uncenscored Stunna Lip Paint because the one I have is old and I am smarter about keeping lips moisturized now. I might even, maybe, forgive Jake Gyllenhaal.********
*UGH
**I know what you’re thinking, and I WISH.
***But obviously on a small-town-in-Ohio scale and absolutely no one wants to read that except whoever is reading this now, I guess.
****I haaaaAaate the terms “girl squad” and “squad goals.” Possibly linked to it sounding sport-y and my deep-seated hatred of sports (stay tuned).
*****Hello youths is this the noun version of the verb “stan.”
******Is this the one with the pink vinyl?
*******Which is why I don’t like the Shawn version, because, uh, why exactly did we replace this with a “Titanic” reference?
******** “HAHAHAHA, I can’t even say it with a straight face.” — Taylor Swift
hi, i’m holly. 