Taylor Swift Tortured Poets Department Album: Easter Eggs & Analysis

P. Claire Dodson, Catherine Mhloyi, Shauna Beni-Haynes, Cristina Sada
·27 min read
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Beth Garrabrant/Art treatment by Liz Coulbourn

Taylor Swift has officially brought The Tortured Poets Department, her 11th album, into the world — and the Teen Vogue group chat has thoughts. How does this album compare to her previous work? What's the balance of Aaron Dessner and Jack Antonoff productions? And is it really more about Matty Healy than Joe Alwyn?

In a prologue summary poem, Swift writes of the album, “At this hearing/I stand before my fellow members of the Tortured Poets Department/With a summary of my findings/A debrief, a detailed rewinding/For the purpose of warning/For the sake of reminding/As you might all unfortunately recall/I had been struck with a case of a restricted humanity/Which explains my plea here today of temporary insanity.”

Related: All the Celebs Taylor Swift Name Drops on Tortured Poets Department, From Charlie Puth to Patti Smith

Whew. We can only provide our humble analyses of the first 16 songs on TTPD, as we haven't yet made it to the double album Anthology version. (There's simply too much to take in at the moment.) From stand out tracks — looking at you, “Who's Afraid of Little Old Me?” — to production commentary and places for future shifts in sound, there's a lot to unpack.

Teen Vogue editors P. Claire Dodson, Cristina Sada, Catherine Mhloyi, Shauna Beni, and Mi-Anne Chan parked in a group chat and listened through The Tortured Poets Department album on Friday morning. Press play, and let's get into it.

P. Claire Dodson, Senior Culture Editor: this changes on an annual basis but i think my favorite taylor album era as a whole is.... reputation. what about y'all?

Catherine Mhloyi, Associate Manager, Creative Development: The concert didn’t depict the best of it but I’m a 1989 girlie

Shauna Beni, Commerce Editor: It’s going to be and I think always will be Fearless for me because… I’m just a lover girl

Claire: catherine we'll get there but TTPD is an album for the 1989 girlies imo

Cristina Sada, Research Editor: Shauna i too will always be a Fearless girlie! Omg but folklore did too much to my brain chemicals during 2020 to be ignored

1. FORTNIGHT (FEATURING POST MALONE)

Claire: this first line & the synths gave me a little head rush

Mi-Anne Chan, Senior Director of Video Programming & Creative Development: Yes very folklorian way to start the album to admit madness??????

Shauna: I feel myself bopping to the beat

Claire: lot of that on this album mi-anne!

Cristina: super midnights for me, omg

Mi-Anne: Posty sounds great in the backing vocal

Claire: transitioning out of the heavy synth era with some very heavy synths

Mi-Anne: I wasn’t sure what to expect but they compliment each other so well???

Cristina: was going to say, Post sounds super refreshing in the feature

Mi-Anne: Yes jack antonoff is antonoffing

Claire: between this and the cowboy carter song

Claire: he just fits right in

Catherine: Post Malone being featured in inevitably the biggest albums of the year has me feeling like they know something I don’t

Catherine: Anointed by both the queen and the princess of pop, he has now joined Kendrick Lamar in an elite class

Claire: she's kind of setting us in american suburbia — your wife waters flowers/good neighbor

Shauna: that^^

Mi-Anne: I love the is call and response duality thing they’re doing at the end?

Mi-Anne: I think this is a really strong first song though which I don’t always feel about her song 1 choices!

2. THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT

Claire: i was curious how she would artfully sing the words "tortured poets department" and she...kind of pulls it off

Mi-Anne Chan: Yeah she does. She’s good with rhythmic singing

Claire: patti smith girls rise up

Mi-Anne: The typewriter dig is so cold hahaha

Mi-Anne: We all know a b*tch with a typewriter

Cristina: Charlie Puth like 🧍‍♂️

Claire: just kids has turned out to be one of the most influentual texts on the past decade-ish of new artists, olivia rodrigo talked about it in an interview too

Mi-Anne: Honestly ppl are gonna clown her for the Charlie reference but I think it’s kinda soooo taylor it’s funny

Mi-Anne: She loves like a hyperspecific “of the moment” reference

Claire: she's so wrong for thinking he needs a bigger career though, it has to be said

Claire: the lucy/jack line

Claire: she's cramming the words in there

Mi-Anne: She def was consuming Charlie puth vids with Joe in the pandemic

Mi-Anne: Seeing him flex his music skills and talking in bed together about how he should be bigger

Claire: though the word on the street is this is about matty @mi-anne

Mi-Anne: Wait whatttt

Mi-Anne: I can’t see Matty Healy declaring Charlie puth an underrated artist lol

Claire: oh really i absolutely can

Claire: he's a little troll!

Mi-Anne: Hahahhahahaha

Claire: i admire how much you have escaped the discourse on this album so far mi-anne

Mi-Anne: I like the swell at the end

Cristina: Instantly no Jack

Claire: they were both just high and spitballing lol

Mi-Anne: Hahahhaa im a swiftie but allegory of the cave version

3. MY BOY ONLY BREAKS HIS FAVORITE TOYS

Claire: one of two taylor-only writing credits!

Mi-Anne: Oooooh! What is the other??

Claire: who's afraid of little old me

Claire: the toy metaphor... do we think it's working

Mi-Anne: I love puzzle pieces in the dead of night

Cristina: Is it me or is she recycling a lot of the same melodic and rhythmic structure as other midnights songs? This reminds me of You’re On Your Own Kid

Mi-Anne: It’s so satisfying to hear

Shauna: i’m really loving the passion in it though

Claire: yeah i think that's true, i also hear a lot of 1989 on this one

Claire: i wish you would kinda vibe

Mi-Anne: I don’t love the metaphor but maybe it’s a call to how she’s been referred to as a doll a lot? Paper doll?

Mi-Anne: A stretch tho lol

Claire: haha yes

Claire: a thing to be played with and used up, she does like that sort of framing

Claire: from fans and lovers

Mi-Anne: Yeah I hear a lottttt of 1989

Catherine: Down beat of “My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys” is *chefs kiss* “Once I fix me, he’s gonna miss me” is going up there with the best bridge lines.

4. DOWN BAD

Claire: i love this one

Claire: i was skeptical about the title

Mi-Anne: I love down bad I thought I was gonna hate it bc again

Mi-Anne: Hyper specific slang of the moment

Claire: totally

Claire: i come back stronger than a 90s trend

Mi-Anne: But in 15 years we might look back on it so fondly being like
I remember where I was when I listened to it

Claire: down bad crying at the gym i will be singing that to myself for weeks

Shauna: crying at the gym!

Mi-Anne: I love teenage petulance

Mi-Anne: It might be my favorite lol

Claire: me tooo. teenage petulance is def a throughline in how she lets herself express feelings on this album

Cristina: Teenage petulance is kind of… and I love her so much… but its also kind of her thing? innit?

Cristina: Lol exactly like I thought I was going to hate Hits Different, but turned out it was the midnights GOAT. But that’s Aaron for you too. Let’s see if Down Bad pulls

Mi-Anne: Down bad absolutely pulls

Claire: she's gotten so confident with the “f*cks”

Mi-Anne: I know I love it

Claire: i almost believe them

Cristina: JAJAJAJ CLAIRE TE AMO

Claire: yeah i'm very bored with girlhood discourse generally but also i like that she preserves the "we can be petulant at any age" right

Claire: sometimes it works better than other times though

Cristina: She did have the much more elegant “I used to scream ferociously, anytime I wanted” in Folklore though

Mi-Anne: She wants to feel connected to things so badly. I relate

Cristina: maybe I’m more romantic

Claire: no that's one of the best uses of it cris!

Claire: also she loves a twin! she desperately wants a twin

5. SO LONG, LONDON

Mi-Anne: Very different intro for her

Cristina: OH GOD FINALLY AARON

Claire: literally

Cristina: SWEET RELIEF

Claire: i will forever respect jack for melodrama but the aaron work really pushes her

Mi-Anne: I stopped trying to make him laugh

Mi-Anne: Gives post mirrorball

Claire: the tie to you're losing me... cpr…

Mi-Anne: I’m pissed off I gave you all that youth for free

Mi-Anne: Cut me to my core

Mi-Anne: As someone recently out of a long ass relationship

Claire: is it giving away youth just to spend time with someone? can't it still be our youth

Claire: not to diminish her feelings (or yours mi-anne!!) i just wish it didn't have to be like that, where we can be ourselves and also have the partnership without losing

Mi-Anne: I think maybe two things can be true

Cristina: God, some melodic creativity here, finally

Claire: the youth line makes me sad in a way i dont know if i can articulate yet

Cristina: I love her, I love her so much, but she needs to realize she grows so much as an artist with Aaron Dessner

Cristina: This is so gorgeous

Shauna: i’m really feeling the vibe of this

Catherine: Ahhh 3 albums later, Taylor no longer fancies London Boys I guess

Cristina: Two graves, one gun. You’ll find someone. Interesting lack of assigning culpability

Shauna: very darkk

Claire: so long london feels pivotal

Cristina: For sure, it’s her Track 5

Cristina: It’s also the best song yet, imo

Claire: craft wise, the most interesting/forward-moving

Mi-Anne: “My friends said it isn’t right to be scared” also really hit me

Mi-Anne: Like tiptoeing around a partner

Mi-Anne: The quiet resentment. Feels like a sequel to tolerate it

Claire: mmmm so real

6. BUT DADDY I LOVE HIM

Claire: just to say... this song is one of her most deranged yet

Claire: it's a cynic's Love Story

Claire: "i'm having his baby no i'm not but you should see your faces" is really funny though

Shauna: yes I see Claire, I’m getting dark vibes haha

Claire: "stay away from her" !!!

Cristina: On principle I love the melody (particularly in the chorus!) but the drums and the mixing do not do it for me. Claire, you’re so right, like it needs to have more of a Fearless feeling and it just doesn’t quite have that drive!

Claire: vipers dressed in empath's clothing! b*tchin and moanin! these lyrics are wild

Cristina: JAJAJAJAJAJ sanctimoniously performing soliloquies i’ll never see omg

Cristina: Wow

Claire: love story is so pure and earnest and this is like “let me be IN LOVE with this BAD MAN it's ROMEO AND JULIET WHY DONT YOU GET IT????”

Shauna: LOLLLL

Shauna: wait that summed it up perfectly

Claire: and yet she is absolutely seeing them! @cris

Cristina: Someone’s talking directly to her fans!

Cristina: God I’d love this song on a different album but I’m such a country Taylor girl.

Claire: "time, doesn't it give some perspective?" when absolutely no time has passed, i love how much she leans into just feeling how she feels even though she's set up how temporary this love affair ends up being

7. FRESH OUT THE SLAMMER

Claire: okay a real tonal shift on fresh out the slammer

Cristina: crazy for real

Claire: your country wish has been semi granted cris

Claire: why did this verse kinda give me single soon cadence

Cristina: Doesn’t it have the same “get-it-off-my-chest” quality

Cristina: “Fresh-out-the-slammer”

Claire: oh absolutely

Shauna: handcuffed to the spell I was under….smooothh

Claire:

Claire: jack is very proud of this one

Catherine: “Too high a horse for a simple girl to rise above it” love that but also girllllllll

Claire: simple girl!!!

Claire: that stuck out to me too

Claire: she is but a girl

Cristina: she’s just a normal girl, we’re just regular men!

Claire: honestly i could take or leave FOTS

Cristina: yeah not a fan

Claire: open to it growing on me

How to listen to The Tortured Poets Department

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8. FLORIDA!!! (FEATURING FLORENCE AND THE MACHINE)

Cristina: FLORENCE WEEEELCH

Cristina: FLOOOORENCE WEEEEEELCH

Cristina: time for motherism

Claire: florida!!!

Claire: another example of collaborators challenging her!

Catherine: Bruh

Catherine: This collab should’ve happened sooner

Cristina: instantly elevating the material wowza

Cristina: that’s CRAZY

Claire: would like them to write more together

Shauna: awwwwww

Shauna: love this combo

Catherine: This is for the girls that love Clean

Claire: very lana line "is that a bad thing to say in a song"

Claire: i wanna see some unruly tiktok dances to this song

Cristina: Just the vocal quality Florence adds to this, and the harmonic interest she brings to a song… crazy. We have to say mother.

Mi-Anne: my friends also smell like weed and little babies

Shauna: I need to forget so take me to Floridaaaaaa

Mi-Anne: jack antonoff went off in this in a way that reminds me of 1989...maybe out of the woods?

Mi-Anne: i don't know if i like it lol

Cristina: Taylor’s singing like she did in Wonderland back in 2014

Mi-Anne: yeahhhh

Claire: ^^^

Catherine: Love Wonderland

9. GUILTY AS SIN?

Claire: i'm into this one

Claire: i love a fantasy! let's project more girls

Cristina: Another catholic-guilt reference to check off from Blondie bingo!

Claire: literally cris

Claire: i feel this one so hard as a christian youth group survivor

Mi-Anne: lots of vow/marriage/cradles references in this album thus far

Mi-Anne: which i like like feels like a good juxtaposition to teenage petulance

Mi-Anne: i like guilty as sin but it sounds like it could have been on midnights

Catherine: I wish Guilty as Sin was more instrumentally dynamic

Mi-Anne: yeah agree catherine

Cristina: it’s crazy cuz she isn’t even catholic, but she’ll talk about anointment oils later on too

Claire: yeah i see that

Catherine: Like I feel like it would be really good live with some extra emphasis

Cristina: “What if the way you hold me is actually what’s holy”…. If I speak.

Claire: i like this more rock sound we're getting into though

Claire: the slide guitar

Claire: also i did look up downtown lights by the blue nile

Claire: well documented favorite song of one matty healy

Mi-Anne: INTERESTING

10. WHO’S AFRAID OF LITTLE OLD ME?

Catherine: Giving “I asked the traffic lights if it’ll be alright”

Cristina: Yes

Claire: totally

Mi-Anne: i like the scream in the chorus i like when she lets herself go there

Mi-Anne: she's so perfect and polished and when she goes guttural like that it's so freeing

Claire: i am obsessed with this song

Shauna: me too!!

Claire: i fear i could write like 20 pages about it

Catherine: So far…. I love how this album combines the soulful lyrics/catchy melody style of 1989 with the fantastical melancholia and yearning of folklore but while returning to revealing autobiographical storytelling. I do wish there was more deviation from those albums to a point that they really couldn’t fit on either of them. Maybe leaning into more drums or electric guitar? Maybe some really drawn out high notes? Maybe some really shocking bold statements that kind of feel really out of pocket because that’s what I think about when I think of “tortured”

Claire: “if you wanted me dead you shouldve just said!”

Catherine: I do love that

Claire: anti-hero's more monstrous sibling

Catherine: She should’ve screamed it

Claire: YOU SHOULD BE classic taylor

Shauna: i was just going to say this reminds me of some throwback TS!

Claire: this is the other solo taylor writing credit as mentioned before

Catherine: WHO’S AFRAID OF LITTLE OL ME???!!!

Claire: it feels so good

Claire: this little mini bridge

Claire: but what if it is all about me?? so real

Cristina: But what if it IIIIIS

Cristina: real!

Claire: one thing i love about this song is it feels like it has 10 bridges

Claire: it just goes and goes and goes

Cristina: “You wouldn’t last an hour at the asylum where they raised me?" the CHRISTMAS TREE FARM?!

Claire: we should be afraid!! truer words never spoken about taylor

Cristina: I AM! Afraid! Currently!

Claire: "i am what i am cause you trained me" can we please discuss

Shauna: you caged me and then called me crazy!! smhh

Cristina: Gilded cage reference innit

Claire: do you think we made her like this or do you think she made herself like this and then we loved it too much and it got out of control

Claire: per that line in who's afraid

Cristina: It’s gotta be a mix of both, no?

Claire: she started with the coded messages and easter eggs and we ran with it

Shauna: I say both

Cristina: I think the cycle of overexposure has got to hurt

Claire: totally

Cristina: Like, think of what happened with Lover vs Folklore/Evermore

Cristina: Folk-More was so much risk because she didn’t think of the reward

Cristina: And it was so much better artistically for it

Cristina: But also no one was holding her hostage

Claire: yeah… the stories we choose to tell still reveal things about our worldview and peronality and experiences

Claire: folklore/evermore avoided the prescriptionist readings though to your point

Cristina: It felt for me like artistically true and then likely, once it got to production maybe walked back, but when it was written maybe it was very truthful

Claire: yes agreed!

Cristina: but like, midnights needed a tour, you know

Cristina: It NEEDED a tour

Cristina: And that hindered it a little

Mi-Anne: can i just say...i love jack so much but i really want her to work with some new producers

11. I CAN FIX HIM (NO REALLY I CAN)

Catherine: I fell asleep listening to I can fix him

Catherine: It’s so soothing

Catherine: I love how country it feels without hitting us over the head with it

Catherine: Concerned about how many of these are about Matty Healy

Mi-Anne: yeah i am also SO concerned about  how many of these are matty

Cristina: I do like the twang she adds, she sounds so young

Mi-Anne: i love it it brought me back to listening to debut and fearless

Catherine: Yes same fearless era realness

Catherine: White Horse

Claire: little short song.... is it shorter than now that we dont talk?

Claire: this one has the big admission that his jokes are “revolting and far too loud”

Catherine: Maybe? The 1989 vaults all seemed so short

Claire: i can fix him is the transition song of like... oh wait... this is kinda f*cked up and i'm out of my depth perhaps

Catherine: Also the admission that she KNEW he was this way. Went for it anyway and then had to do all the damage control…honest but also let’s do better

12. LOML

Cristina: God LOML so good

Cristina: Instantly much better

Claire: i love loml

Shauna: yes loml is so soft and soothing

Cristina: The right-sided piano, gorgeous instrumentals, beautiful melodies. All Aaron production.

Cristina: You can tell in one note it’s him.

Catherine: “You and I go from one kiss to getting married”

Mi-Anne: the most taylor line that was ever written

Claire: this is the most beautiful song on the album

Cristina: God this should’ve been track 5. So gorgeous. “Something counterfeit’s dead.“

Cristina: I love how you can tell instantly how she matches up with which of her producers by the quality of her voice

Catherine: This is so Matty Healy

Cristina: LOSS OF MY LIFE

Cristina: OH MY GOD

Cristina: DUDE

Cristina: DUUUUUUUUDE

Cristina: the reveal

Shauna: ooomgggg

Claire: it justifies the use of loml

Cristina: LOML being loss of my life not love of my life

Shauna: its not love?!

Claire: it's both love and loss

Shauna: wow!!

Cristina: It’s both, but her classic twist at the end is “Loss” instead of Love.

Claire: "mr steal your girl and make her cry" i love that line

Claire: the coward claimed he was a lion... cry

Catherine: I hope the latter half of the album will be less Matty

Claire: sad news for you

Cristina: So, re: the producers. I keep harping on about the Jack or Aaron of it all and, all respect to Jack, she’s done brilliant work with him in the past, but the sheer quality of the work she’s produced with Aaron lately makes it hard for me to go from the same Midnights-y sound to something as beautiful as LOML or So Long London. It’s crazy. Just even the balance in the piano, and the way any drums come in, but also the way she structures her melodies around his instrumentals is so much more Taylor, way more story-telling, less rhythmically constrained (Jack tends to rely a lot on sixteenth notes)

Claire: yeah i think that's fair assessment

13. I CAN DO IT WITH A BROKEN HEART

Claire: mastermind vibes

Cristina: Yup, same track in the background

Claire: this would be a fun eras tour add

Catherine: Because the tour footage def hits you over the head with the point immediately

Claire: right lmao

Claire: lights camera b*tch smile!!!

Cristina: Same sixteenth note drum beat hehhee

Claire: another great line

Cristina: I ACT LIKE ITS MY BIRTHDAAAAY

Claire: i'm so obsessed with him but he avoids me like the plaaaaaaague

Claire: i cry a lot but i am so productive — me at work

Catherine: “He said he’d love me all his life”…. “I’ll never walk Cornelia street again”

Shauna: LOL CLAIRE

Cristina: claire they dont let us bejeweled :(

Claire: so true

Claire: i love this one i cant help it

Catherine: Sounds like a single??? Maybe?

Claire: i wish!!!!

Claire: this is a better single than fortnight

Shauna: I like the beat and the quickness too

Claire: so fun

Cristina: “I’m miserable!!!”

Shauna: awww she said she’s miserable and no one even knows

14. THE SMALLEST MAN WHO EVER LIVED

Claire: brief euphoria and then the smallest man who ever lived.... so bleak

Claire: taylor stamping her foot to matty like you RUINED my summer

Shauna: dang going from i can do it with a broken heart to the smallest man threw me off

Claire: no agreed

Cristina: Exactly Shauna

Catherine: Smallest Man is so goood

Claire: what is this bridge reminding me of

Cristina: YESSSSSS THE BREAKDOWN

Cristina: THE INSTRUMENTALS

Claire: folklore/evermore? what is it?

Cristina: haunted a bit? With the violins? Ish?

Catherine: “You didn’t measure up in any measure of a man”

Claire: hmmm not what i'm thinking of but i hear it

Catherine: Also why does it also feel like an elaborate joke about him being short too

Claire: "you deserve prison" so funny

Claire: and small in other ways

Cristina: F*cking hell

Claire: it's a little exile-y? the bridge part

Catherine: “He said normal girls were boring”

Mi-Anne: normal girls were boring

Mi-Anne: fr

Claire: enter: girls girl discourse

15. THE ALCHEMY

Claire: i like the alchemy because leading up it's like hahah i hate you... unless...

Catherine: Lmao why couldn’t she release the other album like a week later

Claire: literally !!!

Claire: i cant even get into that one i'm so overwhelmed

Shauna: ^ me too

Catherine: Why 16 songs instead of 13 do you think?

Mi-Anne: Interesting. i hadn't realized

Claire: tbh it could have been 13

Claire: there are at least three songs we could cut

Catherine: I say this all the time but the art of editing is lost on this generation

Catherine: Movies and albums are too long

Claire: and she's so prolific so i'm sure it's hard but like... just give us the best

Mi-Anne: He jokes that “It's heroin, but this time with an E”

Claire: yuppp

Mi-Anne: it's soooooo gurlz

Mi-Anne: cant wait for it to be on a tshirt

Claire: she's not really subtle

Claire: never is

Catherine: Never

Claire: the alchemy is nice, i dont feel strongly but i feel like it could grow on me in a big way

16. CLARA BOW

Catherine: Hooked already

Catherine: Love the guitar

Claire: sameee

Claire: the latest in the lucky one/last great american dynasty lineage

Claire: the spotify graphic for this is so 2012 tumblr

Claire: this one scratches my brain nicely

Catherine: “no one in this small town thought I’d see the lights of Manhattan”

Catherine: Someday I’ll be living in a big ol city

Claire: she loves that arc

Claire: stevie nicks!!

Catherine: Icon

Claire: did we see she wrote a poem for taylor

Catherine: What???!!!!

Claire: it's on the physical album!

Claire: i dont hate the bridge but i think it would have been stronger if it was just clara bow, stevie, taylor and then end on the dazzling. she's over explaining the point

Catherine: Agreed

Catherine: “You look like Taylor Swift”

Mi-Anne: you look like an american singer!!!

Claire: thems the breaks like yes we get it fame is very hard

Claire: and i love songs about fame!

Claire: an interesting end point, i cant decide how much it feels like a manipulation

Catherine: Omg yes Claire

Catherine: Like her Instagram caption said some of the wounds were self inflicted but you also want us to really empathize with this objectively bad decision YOU made

Claire: and there's blame on all sides but…

24. thanK you aIMee

Claire: back in the schoolyard as metaphor

Cristina: “Theres a bronze spray-tan statue of you” BRUV

Cristina: Is this a reference to “If U Seek Amy?”

Cristina: like, the Britney song?

Claire: yeah i wondered that too

Mi-Anne: i think i really dont like the vocal production on this album lol

Mi-Anne: it's sooo forward in the mix

Cristina: Gotta be, Taylor used to have a Britney Spears poster on her bathroom wall lmao

Claire: i'm getting fatigue on taylor/kim... taylor so clearly won... let it die

Mi-Anne: yah i agree

Cristina: me too claire

Claire: she's like I WON and also you gave me PERSONAL GROWTH SO TAKE THAT

Catherine: Taylor loves to use adolescence as a theme when it comes to how people treat each other or love each other but it also paints this picture that feels black and white evocative of children who lack empathy because they haven’t learned how to empathize yet and the other kid is overly empathetic because they haven’t learned to be tough yet.

Cristina: She already made “Mad Woman”

Catherine: It’s really cute in some ways and other times it’s like you’re 34 babe

Cristina: when your fans treat you like you’re literally a 16 year old pookie tho

Claire: yeah i think she could try other metaphors! miss americana was great but we can move along... and i do also think that people of any age should be allowed to live messy adventurous lives

Catherine: “A song that only us two are gonna know is about you”

Cristina: Self-fulfilling prophecy when it comes to cultivating an audience innit

THE GROUP CHAT'S FINAL WORD

Claire: any final thoughts on the album as a whole?

Catherine: I like that it’s a solid journey. Even though some themes are repetitive it still kind of ebbs and flows and peaks with the high energy of “I Can Do it With a Broken Heart” and brings us back home again

Claire: agreed

Shauna: Overall, I don’t think this album will make it into my top three (will be doing a few more rounds of listening)… but it did have some hits on it for me. Loved who’s afraid of little old me + I can do it with a broken heart. The transitions between some of the songs left me feeling a bit overwhelmed/confused. But I’m glad we got bits and pieces of Fearless and Evermore vibes in there. I’m ready for TS to be happy hahaa

Claire: yeah my top three songs are who's afraid, broken heart, and loml

Catherine: It feels nostalgic of everything we love about Taylor bringing the early and the newer fans to a nice middle ground. But if you hate folkmore and 1989 this album is not for you

Claire: so true

Mi-Anne: so agree

Cristina: I think my thoughts are as I said above, that I think her voice is strongest when she allows herself her strongest collaborator, which is Aaron Dessner. He understands how to use and mix her voice in such a way that it doesn’t get muddied like I feel that it has been by midnights and the other Jack songs on this album. She sounds freer away from the synths too, when she’s not restrained by the trademark sixteenth notes, like in loml, so long london, and smallest man. Overall, solid, really like some of the more country twang in some of the songs heheh

Claire: I like what this reveals about where she could go next... continuing to experiment with more collaborators, rock sounds, etc

Mi-Anne: i like it but i think i need to digest it over a couple of weeks tbh, midnights was tough fr me to get into immediately because i felt like it was disjointed but the more i listened it made so much sense to me

Mi-Anne: and i'm wondering if ill feel the same about this one

Mi-Anne: but i often feel that way about taylor because of the lyrics

Claire: yeah she's throwing a lot at us at all times

Claire: and some of it is great and some of it could be edited down

Claire: and some of it is wildly funny, i love when taylor is funny or trying to be funny

Mi-Anne: agree, i did feel like some of these songs felt TOO similar to midnights

Mi-Anne: i LOVE when taylor tries to be funny. i love that we had sexy babies and now we have little babies

Catherine: This album was about getting it ALL out and she really did, it’s hard to keep up! It makes me feel like the next album will come from an extremely blank slate because all there was to say has been said

Mi-Anne: yes it's SO hard to keep up

Claire: and re-contextualizes midnights as the true Joe breakup album

Claire: especially the 3 am tracks

Mi-Anne: yes you're so right

Mi-Anne: but like she's saying tortured poets is HER not necessarily just a dig at joe and matty?

Claire: valid!

Claire: and with that... i leave you all to go cry at the gym or cry and be productive, the only two options for our one wild and precious lives

Originally Appeared on Teen Vogue

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