RECORD REVIEW: TAYLOR SWIFT
By Lucas T Crane
The latest release from global superstar Taylor Swift, The Tortured Poets Department, came with a surprise. Swift released a sister album, The Anthology, and the two projects feature an ambitious 31 tracks. The project is the 11th original studio album by Swift since 2006. Whether you like her or love her, Swift has proven to be one of the more prolific artists in the last decade, and for the most part, the quality of her projects has been well-received both critically and commercially. Her last release, Midnights, saw Swift singing over alt-pop and synth-pop production with almost overbearing vocal mixing. In The Tortured Poets Department, Swift keeps some of those elements but improves on them with superior lyricism and a refreshing stream-of-consciousness delivery.
From the opening track, “Fortnight” featuring Post Malone, the themes of longing, failure and betrayal in dysfunctional relationships are displayed beautifully.
One of many impressive elements of The Tortured Poets Department is the cohesion and theming on the record. Each song feels like a vignette of a moment or thought process in Swift’s life, with connective tissue of spacey, dissociative and angelic soundscapes helping the record flow cut-to-cut like a massive hour-long song. The themes of lost love and dysfunctional relationships are anything but original. Swift herself has tackled these themes throughout her career. What is original is her delivery. The sound Swift chooses on this record strays from the typical pop fodder and instead patiently builds each track with confident openings. She introduces production elements and bold bridges that transition into epic outros, which prove to be transformative. On her previous record with the same producer, Jack Antonoff, the vocal mixing was echoing and glossy, which overshadowed her talent in most cases. Fortunately, the vocal mixing on The Tortured Poets Department isn’t nearly as overbearing, allowing Swift’s voice to shine through the ethereal production. The cadences and melodies Swift settles on, specifically on the bridges and hooks, create some of the more vocally impressive performances of her entire career.
The Tortured Poets Department and The Archive feature 31 songs, and while that is certainly a feast for the rabid fans Swift has cultivated, it is also the most obvious flaw of the project.
With a runtime of just over 2 hours, Swift is asking a lot if she expects everyone to commit to such a long listen. In the age of TikTok and short attention spans, keeping someone engaged for even a half hour takes a masterful approach. For the most part, Swift succeeds in providing dynamic sounds and thought-provoking lyricism. But there are moments on the record that feel unedited and overindulgent. For every four great tracks, there’s one that comes along feeling like an undercooked expansion of an idea that was already fully fleshed out in the previous cuts. If Swift were to trim the fat on The Tortured Poets Department, it almost certainly would have made for a more focused and comprehensive listen. Sometimes, less is more.
Throughout the entirety of the album, the element that stands above everything else is the metaphoric and intimate lyricism, along with the masterful hook writing.
From the opening track, Swift applies a symbolic stream-of-consciousness style that takes well-worn themes of tortured romance in pop music to dazzling heights. “My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys” is one of many conceptual tracks that visually paints the picture of being used and forgotten by a lover as a child getting sick of a once beloved doll. “But Daddy I Love Him” is a tune that harkens back to the love songs of Swift’s country pop youth but adds an almost Georgian-era vocabulary that feels like the song version of a Jane Austin novel. “Florida!!!” featuring Florence + The Machine relates the escapism of a vacation home in Florida to substance abuse. Throughout the massive 31-track double LP, Swift tactfully uses clever wordplay and cinematic lexicon to elevate each track to places a less talented artist couldn’t dream of. Another area where Swift’s writing shines is her long-honed ability to craft catchy and compelling hooks. No matter how depressing or somber the material may seem, without fail, Swift can transition into choruses that will induce a foot-tap from even the most cynical listeners.
The Tortured Poets Department is easily the most ambitious album of Taylor Swift’s career. That ambition does result in a few misses. But in the end, the record serves as an intimate diary written by one of the more talented artists of the last two decades. If you don’t like Taylor Swift, The Tortured Poets Department isn’t going to turn you into a fan, but the lyrical, vocal and hook-writing prowess on display should, at the very least, earn your respect.