The Tortured Poets Department, Taylor Swift’s 11th studio album is out. And every song is under scrutiny. Fan theories have taken over the internet, picking every lyric apart and putting it in the larger puzzle that Swift has created of her persona. In the songs lie fragments of her personality, and her fans can’t wait to discover the new pieces.
This is not a music review. So we’ll wrap up TTPD here—it doesn’t have a pop song with the potential of being 2024’s summer anthem. It’s a low-key production, bordering on alt-pop and rock.
But just as fans run to stream the songs, and find easter eggs, ‘haters’ have also stormed the internet to find lyrics that are not that impressive. Some of the lines, picked out of context, and being panned are: “We declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist”, and “Gazing at me starry-eyed in your Jehovah’s Witness Suit”.
But don’t come after a fanbase or a pop star because they’re beyond your taste. Not enjoying mainstream things doesn’t make you cool or unique. Disliking Swift is a choice, but undermining her success or belittling her fans reeks of sexism.
Swift is not only the most popular pop star of our times, she is also the most popular writer of our times. Perhaps the only living person more popular than her is Shah Rukh Khan.
She is an average singer. Her magic lies in how she connects to her audience, and the story she has built, packaged, and sold about herself. And in a world where English pop music lyrics are getting shallower, Swift exemplifies how important it is to produce songs that are relatable to the audience.
Also read: Everything Taylor Swift touches turns platinum. But she’s so distinctly uncool
By the women, for the women, of the women
From when girls were secretly writing the lyrics of Swift’s break-out hit Love Story (2008) on PowerPoint presentations in school computer labs, we have been made to feel inferior for liking the singer-songwriter. For a while, it was a trend to ‘come out’ as a Swift fan—just because she produced music that appealed to young girls.
I belong to a generation that has grown up with Swift. For the past two decades, Swift has been articulating our needs, desires, dreams and insecurities. We have listened to You Belong With Me as teens clandestinely on our Nokia phones, instead of blasting it on speakers because we were shamed for it. As a lot of us enter our late 20s and early 30s, we have more mature songs that go beyond romance in Folklore (2020), Evermore (2020) and Midnights (2022).
She also has a tendency to reach out to fans with her personal story. Attaching her battles to larger causes. She was able to successfully re-record and sell her albums after record executive Scooter Braun refused to release her masters to her. It was possible because her fans were personally involved in her battle and rooting for her victory.
The re-recordings, dubbed Taylor’s Version, have helped new generations to connect with her music, ballooning her fanbase to unimaginable levels.
But she’s perhaps the only artist that one has to still offer a ‘reason’ for liking. Strictly talking about American pop stars, if someone says they like Harry Styles or The Weeknd or Miley Cyrus or Ariana Grande or Beyonce, nobody will bat an eye. But god forbid you express your love for Swift publicly. You’ll be met with side-eyes, sniggers, or comments like “Oh. I have never heard a song by Taylor Swift.” (Are we supposed to feel sorry for you?)
This largely has to do with the fact that Swift, in her demeanour or conversation, has never tried to appeal to men. Her songs are not overtly sexual, nor are her concerts, her dressing, or her make-up. And because a woman is singing, writing, and performing for other women, many insist that she’s an inferior artist.
Also read: Why should Salman Khan fanboys have all the fun? Let Swifties run wild
Master of strategy
The legend of a pop or a rockstar is often built around the pain in their life. They need to look like they’re ‘tortured’, act as outliers, if not outlaws, and produce a song that becomes part of global culture for decades.
Swift defies this image of a popstar. She calls herself a ‘mastermind’ in a song on the 2022 album Midnights. And her marketing strategy, well-thought-out and executed in a more engaging way than any other artist has been able to crack, surely reflects the self-proclaimed title.
There are those who call her ‘uncool’ or dismiss her because of her lack of spontaneity. But she doesn’t become less of an artist because she’s strategic and lucid.
During the promotion of 1989 (Taylor’s Version), released last year, Swift put together a puzzle, with the help of Google. Fans were asked to solve 33 million puzzles to open Swift’s ‘vault’—which would reveal the names of the new songs included in the re-recorded version of the album. The puzzles were solved within 24 hours.
Swift might not have the personality to give spontaneous answers like Miley Cyrus or perform as Cyrus did at this year’s Grammys–but she’s tapped into a whole other niche.
The popstar dropped two consecutive ‘surprise’ albums in 2020 that completely shifted her sound from mainstream pop to alt/folk genre. Does that not take spontaneity, to put out albums with zero marketing? And these albums came at a time when Swift was not the megastar she is today—Folklore and Evermore played an important role in cementing Swift’s global popularity.
Even the release of TTPD had an element of surprise. Instead of the previously announced 15-song album. She released two albums of 31 songs titled Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology.
Like it or not, Swift in all her collected temper and personality is the most lyrically gifted and risk-taking artist we have today in the West. Not everyone has the patience to listen to songs that have lyrics as beautiful and evolved as “You showed me colours you know I can’t see with anyone else” (Illicit Affairs) or “You kept me like a secret but I kept you like an oath” (All Too Well [TV]).
But this doesn’t give anyone a reason to belittle Swifties. Remember, these same women lifted the US economy simply by attending Swift’s Eras Tour.
Even the success of The Beatles was in large part thanks to women.
Views are personal.
(Edited by Theres Sudeep)