Since rising in 2006 with a tear-stained six string, Taylor Swift has seesawed by public opinion maybe greater than every other twenty first century artist. In 2024, she’s landed as a monolithic drive in popular culture with an unavoidable, omnipresent drive permeating each aspect of each day life. There are reporters appointed solely to cowl her exploits, and College modules devoted to dissecting her lyrics, to not point out that her title is completely etched onto the web’s trending matters. Whereas the remainder of the music business grapples with an accelerated popular culture panorama and tirelessly makes an attempt to orchestrate significant, viral moments, Swift stays unscathed — all the time on the epicentre of infinite discourse and by some means every day pushing the boundaries of celeb.
So, when she introduced the forthcoming launch of ‘The Tortured Poets Division’ on the Grammys earlier this 12 months – whereas gathering the Album Of The Yr prize for 2022’s ‘Midnights’ – it gave the impression to be met with an audible eye roll from a room filled with artists maybe jaded by competing for scraps of consideration in a media sphere wholly dominated by Swift. And, after releasing 10 information (together with reside albums and re-recordings) in 4 years, this frustration from her friends appears to affix the primary splinters in her public opinion, deepening with each new typo-riddled, brand-partnered Easter Egg that has dropped within the run as much as launch.
Maybe Swift was tempting destiny with this one. Above all else in her profession, Swift has all the time discovered acclaim by her lyricism, and comparisons have gleefully been made between herself and The Bard. Talking in February, she says that “I’ve by no means had an album the place I wanted songwriting greater than I wanted it on [TTPD]”. It’s stunning, then, that ‘The Tortured Poets Division’ delivers a few of her most cringe-inducing traces but.
The title monitor alone boasts the worst on the file, even when it’s a stab at sarcasm. “You smoked then ate seven bars of chocolate / We declared Charlie Puth needs to be a much bigger artist,” precedes the clunky “I scratch your head, you go to sleep like a tattooed Golden Retriever.” Elsewhere, on ‘Down Unhealthy’ she’s unceremoniously “crying on the gymnasium”, and ‘Florida!!!’, an in any other case cathartic, Southern gothic-imbued collaboration with Florence Welch is marred by the road: “My pals all odor like weed or little infants”.
Most weird, although, is ‘However Daddy I Love Him’, which seemingly exists as her response to the backlash in opposition to her transient relationship with The 1975 frontman Matty Healy. Their fleeting romance, which appears to be the muse for a lot of the file, triggered an explosive response from her fanbase who have been distraught at Swift’s public affiliation to the singer, given his slew of controversial feedback (a number of of which centred round her soon-to-be collaborator Ice Spice).
Swift has traditionally used her lyrics to claim her narrative. On ‘Converse Now’ (2010) she took the primary of many goals at Kanye West following his stage invasion on the 2009 MTV VMAs, and far of ‘Popularity’ (2017) got here for the social media haters. Intriguingly, on ‘However Daddy I Love Him’, she seems to sort out the individuals who declare to have her finest pursuits at coronary heart: “These folks solely elevate you to cage you”, she sings, including “God save probably the most judgemental creeps/Who say they need what’s finest for me”.
Annoyed lyrics permeate the remainder of the file, which operates as a knottier, if inferior, sequel to ‘Midnights’. However whereas the aforementioned shone in its ecstatic embrace of freedom with the frantic, false optimism of somebody freshly out of a long-term relationship, ‘The Tortured Poets Division’ sees the mud settle and the distress creep in. There are inevitably parallels with 2019’s ‘Lover’, an album that appeared assured in a secure, lasting love. Right here, the saccharine optimism of ‘Lover’’s ‘London Boy’ dissipates on ‘So Lengthy London’, the place she laments “I left all I knew/You left me on the home by the Heath”.
Musically, it’s an album principally devoid of any noticeable stylistic shift or evolution. ‘Fortnight’, a Cigarettes After Intercourse-esque quantity that includes Publish Malone hints at an fascinating course for Swift, and ‘I Can Repair Him (No Actually I Can)’ introduces intriguing parts of nation and western. But it surely principally descends right into a monochromatic palette, current in the identical Jack Antonoff-branded synth pop as ‘Midnights’, but struggling to seize any of its brightness.
‘I Can Do It With A Damaged Coronary heart’ highlights her unrelenting work ethic that doesn’t falter amid private tragedy. However, it appears poised for web virality than something extra substantial, given its restrained verses that plod alongside earlier than catapulting right into a euphoric, Carly Rae Jepsen-indebted pop refrain. Lyrics like “I’m so depressed I act prefer it’s my birthday on a regular basis” are virtually too obviously clearly written to be lip-synced into an iPhone 13 entrance digicam.
‘The Tortured Poets Division’ finally ends up chasing its personal tail with frenzied makes an attempt to reply to critics regardless of Swift’s present stature. Nearer ‘Clara Bow’ presents some respite, highlighting the inevitable lifecycle of younger feminine stars who’re raised up as shinier, improved variations of their predecessors solely to get replaced by the identical system years later. Although Swift herself appears resistant to the machine-churn of pop stars — now sustaining a larger relevance than ever almost twenty years into her profession — it’s one of many album’s most poignant and finest moments.
In the end this file lacks the genuinely fascinating shifts which have punctuated Swift’s profession up to now, from the lyrical excellence on her superior breakup album ‘Pink’ to ‘1989’’s pivot to high-octane pop. Even ‘Folklore’ and ‘Evermore’, maybe her most dynamic works up to now, got here out of a have to show herself as a songwriter.
It’s peculiar then, that on the pinnacle of her success and acclaim, that is the file Swift chooses to make. Now appearing as pop’s simple ruler, maybe it’s simply that she merely has nothing else to show. In any case, it’s certain to shift crate a great deal of barely diverse vinyl pressings, and can unlikely dampen the upcoming European leg of record-busting The Eras tour. It’s why the lyrical themes of victimhood that when aided her picture come off as more and more jarring in the present day. On ‘However Daddy I Love Him’ she positions herself as a “easy woman” on the mercy of “too excessive a horse” from her naysayers, but it surely grates in opposition to a panorama that usually declares her exempt from criticism.
Swift appears to be in tireless pursuit for superstardom, but the detrimental public opinion it could actually include irks her, and it’s a drained theme now plaguing her discography and leaving little room for the poignant lyrical observations she excels at. It’s why the pitfalls that mire her eleventh studio album are all of the extra disappointing — she’s confirmed time and time once more she will do higher. To a Melbourne viewers of her Eras Tour, Swift mentioned that ‘The Tortured Poets Division’ got here from a “want” to write down. It’s simply that possibly we didn’t want to listen to it.
Particulars
- Launch date: April 19, 2024
- Document label: Taylor Swift