Overall: Taylor Swift
This month I listened to all of Taylor Swift’s studio albums. I went chronologically from Taylor Swift to Midnights, sharing thoughts on my Instagram story for each. I only lost one friend throughout the journey, so I’d say my opinions were generally well-received. I found the majority of her discography good, some of it bad, and some of it great, with more great than bad moments. Red was my favorite album, and Lover was my least (too long). I enjoyed Fearless, 1989, folklore, and Midnights — the others I probably won’t listen to again. I admired Taylor Swift’s willingness to experiment with new genres throughout the various “eras” of her career, though her worst moments came when those attempts mis-landed (“Bad Blood,” RnB/Hip Hop deliveries on Reputation, “Look What You Made Me Do”). My impression early on was that Taylor Swift is objectively musically talented, something which feels reductive to state, but that a lot of people seem to want to deny. I failed to see the angle for “musical genius” — another argument I hear a little too often and find only slightly less objectionable than its opposite — though I will admit, if you gave me the choice between listening to a Taylor Swift record and a Jacob Collier record, I would choose Taylor Swift most days. I suppose there’s some “wisdom in crowds,” sort of genius one could argue. But I’m not sure that holds up. “Millions of people listen to Taylor Swift, you can’t say she’s bad,” I told a friend once. “Millions of people voted for Donald Trump,” he replied.
Taylor Swift is more divisive than pineapples on pizza. Some people think if you defend her, you’re racist. Others think if you say that, you’re misogynistic. Some people think if you listen to her, you have no taste. Others think if you don’t, you’re out of touch. While I made my album-to-album voyage, there was a war happening on Twitter over her and Matty Healy. I made a disclaimer early on saying “I won’t be reviewing Taylor Swift, the human being.” Still, it was hard not to feel like a bit of an Uncle Tom, praising that woman’s lyrics while folks on Twitter wrote ten-part threads on why she doesn’t care about black folk. It’s a bit complicated, the way I feel about all of that. I don’t really believe that Taylor Swift doesn’t care about black people, but if she said she cared about black people, I don’t think I’d believe that either. I also find it difficult sometimes, when people online go after Taylor Swift, to tell who cares about black folk, and who hates women, and who just enjoys having something to do after work. I like to be able to tell the difference between those things before I let strangers influence my life from the internet. The Swift/Healy thing looked like something multi-layered to me — rooted in some racist stuff, and some sexist stuff, and Twitter’s role as reality’s factually inaccurate but riveting biopic — and I never read an opinion that took all of those factors into account. Nothing in her personal life strikes me as concretely severe to the point that it should affect people’s relationship with her music, but I also understand her personal life has sold some of that music, so it’s difficult.
Taylor Swift is as musically controversial as she is socially. Some people look at Taylor Swift and see a performer celebrated like Michael Jackson who isn’t on Bruno Mars’ level. Others hear singing that is good, but not outstanding to the point that it would turn your head at a bar on a Friday night. She is an exceptional lyricist — she has a particular gift for storytelling — but she’s not delivering Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Kendrick Lamar quality. A lot of the time listening to her, I couldn’t figure out why I was bored. I’m a twenty-seven-year-old black man, I think it’s safe to assume I wasn’t 19-year-old Taylor Swift’s imagined listener (aside from that one song where she told Kanye he’d grow up one day) but I don’t believe “this isn’t meant for you” is a useful defense of art. “Great art makes you care,” a friend said to me recently. And that made me think, great art does make you care. And it especially should when you, like…want to care. Maybe it isn’t fair to judge art by how many nonbelievers it converts, but I think it is fair to say great art shouldn’t rely on relatability in measuring its greatness. I have no idea what Nai Palm of Hiatus Kaiyote is singing about, ever, but I love Choose Your Weapon. Though I suppose that’s because Hiatus Kaiyote’s music is based in chord progressions I relate to — musical motifs that draw from the gospel songs that I heard growing up in a black church. And I love that music because I am predisposed to what it’s trying to do, and it’s doing that very well. I got the impression most of Taylor Swift’s songs were doing what they set out to do lyrically, and I suppose that success outweighs the musical limitation for some folks, in the same way some songs have music so exceptional, I don’t care very much about the lyrics, so long as they don’t distract. Taylor Swift’s songs often felt like the music was there to fit the lyrics, more-so than hold its own merit — and so if you’re a lyric person, I suppose that’s fine, but I’m not one, so most of her albums felt too long to me, like they ran out of things to say musically, and then kept going for eight more tracks.
There were moments in Taylor Swift’s music that did make me care. More moments than I’d expected to find. The song “A Perfectly Good Heart’” off her debut. “Love Story” off Fearless. “Love Story” is beautifully written and produced — the arrangement, particularly the drum arrangement, does a lot to give the lyrical story sonic plot points. It made me feel things. “seven” (folklore) is a beautiful piece of music, it can stand amongst the great folk songs. “Red,” “Lavender Haze,” “Karma,” “Death By A Thousand Cuts,” “Mine” — all songs I’ll probably listen to for the rest of my life. My typical taste involves jazz harmonies, live instrumentation, lyrics that aren’t social media-pandering, and funk-influenced rhythms. When I listen, I’m mostly listening for moments that surprise my ear. I grew up with gospel music, RnB, and classic hits of the 60s, 70s, and 80s. I also love 2000s pop hits, like “The Reason,” and “Complicated,” and “Since You’ve Been Gone” and stuff like that. I like music that creates and resolves tension in unconventional ways, and most of Taylor Swift’s music did not do that, but some of it did. Waiting for the next chord in many of her songs felt like hearing a “why did the chicken cross the road?” joke, knowing that the punchline would be “to get to the other side” or something like that. Just not very musically “clever.” But I don’t think it’s fair when people say that’s all of it. I do think a fair critique is to say it’s the majority.
The shift in her sound that came with 1989 shook me to my core. It was the album equivalent of a chord outside the key. That record surprised my ear, not really as a stand-alone, but in the context of the records that came before it. Taylor Swift changed sonic direction in a perfect way at the perfect time, and I think that to evaluate Taylor Swift’s creative merit and how she’s sustained her success so long, one has to look at the fact that she never lingers in a sound for longer than two albums. The most fun part about listening to all of her records was wondering what the next one would sound like. I love the band Vulfpeck, they are musician’s musicians whose creative value you’re unlikely to hear artists question, but I’ve stopped wondering what the next Vulfpeck record will sound like, because the answer has been the same for the past six albums. Big Thief is another band who has a wonderful sound, but that’s their sound, and the next sonic trip is likely only taking slight deviations from its last one. Hiatus Kaiyote as well. It’s much cooler to say you like any of those three bands than to say you like Taylor Swift, but I think that in truth, Taylor Swift is taking bigger creative risks, album to album, and her success is a result of that risk-taking. I have no idea what her next record will sound like, so I’m going to listen to find out. I hope Taylor Swift’s career inspires artists to follow her example in genre exploration, and inspires the powers that be to let them.
After listening to each album, I would read its Wikipedia page. I would read about how Taylor Swift promoted records by inviting fans to listen at her house, and leaving Easter Eggs in the liner notes, and stuff like that. Taylor Swift has a marketing vision that will probably be studied in schools for generations to come. It’s actually kind of beautiful. I wonder why we despise it so much? There’s something tragic about a marketing genius who is so good at what she does, that the success of her brilliance causes people to resent that very brilliance. She’s convinced all these people they know what’s going on in her personal life in a way that makes them pay closer attention to her art, and if any of them took the time to acknowledge the beauty of the illusion, they would get angry that it’s an illusion. I think Taylor Swift is a marketing genius who happens to be a musician, and I think if we all accepted that rather than try and justify the most popular music as being of the highest quality, or that only music of the highest quality should be the most popular, the conversation around her could get a little less intolerable.
I think Taylor Swift will hold a place in music history similar to Elvis. I personally find Taylor Swift to be a more interesting artist, maybe some halfway point between Elvis and the Beatles. At this point, she could change popular music, just like they did, if she wanted to. If her next album were an experimental, jazz-influenced soul record — the world would get into experimental, jazz-influenced, soul records. I would love to hear that. But honestly, I’m excited to hear whatever she does next. I think I’m mostly grateful that the biggest artist in the world is one who is so consistently creatively curious.
My rank of her albums:
1. Red
2. 1989
3. folklore
4. Midnights
5. Fearless
6. Evermore
7. Taylor Swift
8. Speak Now
9. Reputation
10. Lover
