Can’t Shake It Off: A Hater’s Song-By-Song Review of Taylor Swift’s 1989
Haters may, in fact, hate hate hate hate hate, but they may occasionally listen to your music.
“Hater” might be a bit strong. I dislike the music I’ve heard from Ms. Swift but, honestly, I’m not sure I’ve heard a full song of hers. I know there’s a song about people throwing rocks at shiny things and another about how she and a former romantic partner are never never never getting back together and one about how her life would suck without a specific person. That’s about the extent of my Swiftian knowledge.
The thing is, we’re in November and 1989 is the first ‘14 album to go platinum. People are shaking it off left and right. T. Swiftizzle (I’m assuming that’s what people call her) is all over the Buzzfeed causing white girls everywhere to cease being able to even. With music that is this powerful, I need to understand it or at least give it a fair shake.
I have the album queued up and I’m going to give a first-reaction review of each song as I listen to it. I hope to understand more about Taylor Swift at the end of this and, just maybe, learn something
about
myself.
Okay. On to the music:
Welcome To New York
Isn’t she from Nashville? Well, she does say in the song that “everybody here was someone else before”. I guess she’s including herself.
Umm… it’s not bad. She’s good at singing. I’m not sure about the Casio keyboard claps. I don’t see this replacing New York themes by Sinatra or Jay-Z anytime soon. This song would work well as the opening credits theme to a tween movie about a 14-year-old girl from Ohio who’s on a family vacation to New York and gets discovered while singing on a reality show that catapults her to fame and she forgets where she came from and has to choose between her friends and family or her newfound fame. Get the Disney channel on that.
Blank Space
Is she singing about “Starbucks lovers”? I think she needs to enunciate better.
Another song I can’t hate but have a hard time loving. It just kind of passed through me without leaving a mark. I feel like she’s trying hard to defend herself against tabloid accusations that label her as a maneater. Any song that makes me think about People magazine while listening to it probably isn’t ending up on any of my playlists.
Style
This is a good song. I like the beat and the chorus is super catchy. It’s one of those songs that has a really catchy hook surrounded by not much else, though. If it came on the radio, I would sing along to the first part of the chorus and then have no idea what the rest of the lyrics are, but it would still be a pleasant experience.
Out of the Woods
Good grief. She loves repeating herself.
The music feels like it could be really good in the right hands (it has an almost-M83 dreaminess), but, again, the lyrics are kind of unwieldy. The folksy references are just glaringly out-of-place in this context.
And repeats. So many repeats.
All You Had To Do Was Stay
Oh, look. She’s repeating herself again.
Not a bad song. I’m just having a hard time connecting with it.
I think the best part about this album so far is that I feel like I could put this on while I work and enjoy it as background music. The problem is, I don’t think it holds up beyond that. There’s not as much depth as I was expecting given her reputation as a brilliant songwriter.
Shake It Off
Well, she’s only repeating one word over and over this time, so I’ve got that going for me. I also discovered when Taylor does her low, sexy voice in the bridge that a song can trigger my gag reflex.
I’ve heard this song before because it’s EVERYWHERE. It’s impossible to miss. I think this song is 2014's Hollaback Girl: catchy beat, played everywhere, big cultural moment and forgotten in a year.
Also, any song whose sole purpose is to respond to “haters” that isn’t a rap song just sounds whiny. If Taylor Swift threatened to cap Katy Perry then this song might have gone over better.
I Wish You Would
These lyrics speak to me so much I have to copy them here:
I, I, I,
I wish, I wish, I
I, I, I,
I wish, I wish, I
WHY DO YOU KEEP REPEATING YOURSELF?!? Jeez. I know it’s a very common thing to do but she does it SO MUCH.
Ahem. Anyway, the song is probably on the lower end of my emerging SwiftSongScale. It felt like she was trying too hard to do a tongue-in-cheek ‘80's synth-pop reference. Again, the song just… kind of… happened. I literally just finished listening to it and I’m having a hard time remembering it.
Bad Blood
Okay, the intro/chorus to this song is great. I like that she just kept the beats and voices. I really wish she was brave enough to do that for the whole song. If she tightened up the song by 30 seconds to a minute and kept it a capella, I’d be on board.
It’s a pretty good song. Again, I could listen to the song all day and not remember a full verse, but it is a good song.
Wildest Dreams
Is this her Lana Del Rey impression? I don’t know if I like this song or if I just like that it reminds me of Lana Del Rey. LDR’s Ultraviolence was my favorite album for a while this year.
I like this song, but I’d rather just listen to the original artist she’s imitating.
How You Get The Girl
Is this the same album? I don’t get how this song fits next to the last one. Punchy acoustic guitars and twee vocals seem really out-of-place after the last brooding song.
I don’t get this song. I feel like if Kidz Bop does a cover, it would be virtually indistinguishable from the original.
This Love
Another good song. I feel like it would have worked better if she kept it simple and left out the big drums and synths that come in halfway through the song, but the result isn’t bad at all. This is one of the best songs on the album.
I Know Places
I feel like I’m taking crazy pills. Even if this song fits with the others on this album (and I’m not sure it does), it doesn’t belong here. I think I like the second half of the album better than the first half, but it’s hard to tell because in between all the songs I actually like are these out-of-place (and out-of-character) songs that I just can’t get behind. It’s jarring to go from sultry Lana Del Rey impression to poppy teen anthem to dreamy ballad to this extended rap song hook.
Clean
This is one of the good songs. I’m not a huge fan, but it’s definitely on the good side of the album. Umm… wow. I, again, can’t remember much of the song even though I just finished it.
It left me with a pleasant feeling. I guess that’s not a bad thing.
So, where does that leave us?
Well, pretty much right back where we started. I’m looking at the titles to the songs and trying to remember the hooks for them and I’m having a really hard time. It’s actually kind of concerning. I can’t even remember how many of these songs sound.
Did I actually listen to this album?
Did I just black out and dream about listening to this album?
I think I get it. This isn’t that kind of music. It’s designed in a lab to be perfectly catchy and easy to listen to but not necessarily to leave an impression. I’d keep this on in the car (even though I’d be hitting the skip button here and there).
The thing I dislike about this album the most is it feels like Taylor Swift is occupying space that should be shared by other, more-talented women. That isn’t her fault, of course, but it is hard to not hold it against this album. Those million sales she’s made would have been better spent going to female artists like Elle Varner, Cayetana, Lake Street Drive, Caroline Rose, Sia and, yes, Lana Del Rey. All those artists had amazing 2014 albums and (with the exceptions of Sia and LDR) aren’t going to see much more than a few, small Spotify royalty checks.
1989 is a pretty good album. I’d give it a 3/5. I can’t fault the music, but I can still be upset at what it represents. It represents the fact that a celebrity can do better financially with mediocre music than a starting artist can with their best work.
