Taylor’s Tortured Melody
Swift goes for it lyrically on her new double album, to varying degrees of success, but it’s the melodies that truly shine on The Tortured Poets Department
Let’s get this part out of the way: I simply do not care about the minutiae of Taylor Swift’s romantic life. For some people, it has become a prerequisite to enjoying her music, and that’s their prerogative. But I became a Swift convert with the release of Folklore, so my stance on this shouldn’t be surprising, because while still personal, it is probably the album least drenched in the messy stank of man drama. The only energy I’ve ever expended caring about Swift’s relationships is when she became a brief broadcast fixture on Kansas City Chiefs games (and, therefore, the Super Bowl), and a lot of hardcore sports bros got big mad. It was hilarious. Especially because it was later reported that the average time Swift actually appeared on TV was far less than a minute per three hour plus game. Oh, the imposition!
Every review I’ve read of the new album mentions her recent and current romances. And I get it, the Matty Healy and the Joe Alwyn and the Travis Kelce of it all. Naturally, topics so embedded in the pop culture discourse playing out across our screens 24/7 are going to be used as framing devices for the album. They are the topics Swift is writing about, after all. She is mining her very public personal life — telling us how she feels, getting things off her chest — interpreting her heartbreak, butterfly love, and anger into three to four minute pop songs. That’s what artists do. But these are common human emotions, and I enjoy the music more when divorced from the sordid details. The personal being universal and all that.
And so I try to maintain that distance. Even so, I resent the fact that when I’m listening to The Tortured Poets Department, original (part one) and Anthology (part two), I catch myself thinking, “I wonder who this one’s about?” Sure, it can be fun to casually confer about some of the broad strokes when talking to other people who’ve listened to the album, but I just don’t feel the need to play the game of guessing which personal details apply to whom. I don’t need the Easter eggs, I just want to know if it’s good. And when it comes to Tortured Poets, much of it, in my opinion, is.
But let’s start with the most obvious glaring issue: the length. At 31 songs, spanning a double album of two hours and two minutes, there is just no way I’m ever going to see this project as an intentional, cohesive body of work. I’m never going to be able to carve out two hours and two minutes to sit down and listen attentively in one sitting. I envy those who can. There is just no way for me to glean a sense of flow from the project as a whole. When I woke up the Friday it was released (I’m much too old for midnight first listens) and saw that she had released an additional 15 songs at 2 AM, I was both pumped and daunted. I knew immediately I was going to have to make my own abbreviated playlist.
Though I loved both Folklore and Evermore, I did a similar thing with those albums — I called it called Everlore because I am clever and hilarious. And so my Tortured Poets playlist will be revealed at the end of this article. I read somewhere that this album is like a buffet rather than a 5 course meal: you actively pile your plate with everything you know you like instead of waiting to be served a nuanced, thought out, multi-course meal where everything compliments something that came before — where some parts of it are delicious while others are inedible, though you try to choke it down anyway. Some might consider this approach an affront to the artist, but come on; as with being in the trough line at Golden Corral, a man’s gotta prioritize. Maybe I’ll call my playlist The Tortured Poets Buffet.
Which brings me to the title. Swift did herself no favors for how people would perceive her lyrics by including the word “poets” in it. I have never thought of Swift as the most poetic lyricist — there are flourishes here and there (in the parts of her discography that I’m familiar with), but I also don’t think poetry is always her intention — though she’s always been a good songwriter, even when the songs weren’t my particular cup of tea. People who say she’s a bad songwriter are only publicizing their ignorance.
The thing about songwriters is they have a wild card that poets don’t: melody. You don’t have to be William Blake (or Dylan Thomas…wink wink) when it comes to lyrics if you can craft a memorable melody, a task Swift has definitively succeeded at many times over. Much has been made of some instances of clumsy lyricism on Tortured Poets, but I think people have forgotten that a clumsy lyric can be redeemed by a killer melody. A melody can baptize a clunky lyric every time, and even a downright bad one sometimes. Melody is salvation to the songwriter. Not everyone can be a wordsmith like John Prine or Joni Mitchell. Not everyone has to be. Did we forget how songs — especially pop songs — work?
In addition, one person’s cringe is another’s person’s “wow, she really went for it, mad respect,” and I could feel either way on any given day when it comes to some of the bolder couplets Swift pens here. A perfect example of this is the title track, which I take as somewhat of a thesis statement for the record, wherein Swift references Christopher Nolan’s favorite poet, Dylan Thomas, and the seemingly favorite badass rock-n-roll poet for many a young Hollywood actress, Patti Smith. Far from hoisting her name up with poetic greats, Swift is telling the person the song is addressed to that they (Swift and a presumable lover/ex-lover) are in fact not these people, they are not poets; they are, instead, a couple of “modern idiots.” Lest we expect line after line of high poetry in the songs about to unfurl, despite what the album’s title might suggest, she is here to set us straight.
Depending on the day, “You smoked then ate seven bars of chocolate” can induce eyerolls or adoration. “We declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist” will always get eyerolls from me (Isn’t he already huge?), though not enough to ruin a song containing as many cheery 80’s synth lines as this one. Those same synths redeem “Like a tattooed golden retriever” over repeated listens; the pang of cringe has morphed into thinking that’s a pretty funny way to describe a man with a hardened exterior who’s cuddly on the inside.
Another criticism leveled at the album is that it pretty much utilizes the same sounds as her last three, which is fair. The original 16 TTPD tracks, produced mostly by Jack Antonoff, lean heavily into Midnights while the Anthology, produced mostly by Aaron Dessner, leans heavily into Folklore/Evermore. I don’t think any of the production is bad; it’s slick, professional, for the most part understated, and for the most part quite good. But as it is yet another collaboration with Antonoff and Dessner, it can come off as a bit toothless if what you’re looking for is an ambitious change in musical direction. The record is clearly a collaboration between artists deep into a comfort zone of working with each other, which doesn’t mean the songs are bad or without merit, just that there probably aren’t many earth-shattering artistic statements to be found.
I try to put myself in Swift’s, Antonoff’s, or Dessner’s shoes (who am I kidding, definitely Dessner, who seems like a slightly nerdy and awkward fellow). If we as a trio have got two albums worth of songs we think are good and worthy for release while still driving in the lane we’ve been driving in for four years, why not go for it? There’s nothing wrong with coasting for a while. The money, I’m sure, also helps. Swift is young. She will make grand artistic statements when she’s good and ready. Maybe it’ll be with Antonoff and Dessner, maybe it won’t. For now, it’s full steam ahead down the same old road. We’ve seen this sunset a million times, but it’s still pretty.
But, if she’s asking me, I think it might be time to switch it up on the next album, just to see what happens. As a cautionary tale, I would offer up the example of the Avett Brothers, who, after working with Rick Rubin for 15 years over the course of six albums, have been making records half full of mediocre to cringey songs, with a few nuggets of gold scattered about, for going on several years now. Bands and artists will always have the diehards, but here’s the thing I suspect: everyone knows (even the diehards, deep down) when it’s time for an artist to try something new, even if the change is subtle. And when you stop trying new things for years on end, it’s just going to seem like you’re out of ideas, or at least that you don’t want to try any of them. And that’s when you become more of a capitalist than an artist.
But I’m here to talk about Swift’s current album.
I’m not sure why I felt the need to write about it. Perhaps I was getting a little tired of all the glib self-congratulatory dissing of the album on serious music fan/critic Twitter. A billionaire who puts all her drama out there on record for the world to see and then gamify is an easy target, sure. But Tortured Poets is not the disaster that some have made it out to be. Not even close, really. And Swift is far from the terrible songwriter that some otherwise smart people have loudly been claiming she has always been. Needless to say, the critical response to the album has been wild and varied.
Paste published an anonymously written (due apparently to previous online death threats) review scoring the album a 3.6, which begins with an attempt at suicide humor that whiffs majorly, and also contains lines like, “The billionaire is having an identity crisis, but there are no social media apps for her to buy up. So she sings like Lana Del Rey and writes meta-self-referential songs about looking like Stevie Nicks.” I don’t think they like it.
Rob Sheffield’s fawning five-star feature review in Rolling Stone calls the album “stunning” and “wildly ambitious,” earning the coveted Instant Classic sticker. Sheffield, coincidentally, has a book about Swift coming out soon called Heartbreak is the National Anthem: How Taylor Swift Reinvented Pop Music. Obviously, he is an impartial listener.
Though I’d consider myself a “Swiftie” (mostly for simplicity’s sake), I don’t consider myself a diehard. But I don’t consider myself merely a casual fan either. Her last three albums have garnered heavy rotation on my music playing devices. I guess I’m somewhere in between. That’s the perspective I’m coming at the album from, and so depending on which day you ask me, I like about half of the songs on The Tortured Poets Department, and of those I really like about six or seven. I might even dub them “great songs.” I’ll try — keyword: try — to do a quick run-through.
Lead single “Fortnight,” with Post Malone on guest vocals (why does this man also insist on collaborating with Morgan Wallen?), is laden with subtle hooks and lathered in synths reminiscent of College and Electric Youth’s “A Real Hero” from the Drive soundtrack. It’s a relatively unflashy lead single, which makes me like it even more. Strong anti-banger banger vibes. The inclusion of Josh Charles and Ethan Hawke from every English major’s favorite movie, Dead Poets Society, in the music video is also nice touch. I’ve called this album The Tortured Poets Society a lot, and, frankly, I’m okay with that.
Contrasting physical fitness with emotional sadness, “Down Bad” was an instant favorite on my first listen. It’s got one of those choruses that just make you want to bounce. (If you know me, try not to picture that in your head. Thanks.) “So Long, London” is where we first see signs of the record easing into Folklore/Evermore territory, capping off a tragic love story with a passionate performance of the lines, “And I’m just getting color back into my face / I’m just mad as hell ’cause I loved this place.” The refrain “How much sad did you think I had?” may not be the highest form of poetry, but it sure packs a punch the way Swift sings it.
“Fresh Out the Slammer,” based on its title alone, induced quite the involuntary cringe before I heard it. But now, with the shimmery, almost western style guitar line twanging throughout, it’s one of my favorites. “loml” is the kind of heartbreaking piano ballad that Swift excels at when she wants to: loosely structured, lyrically detailed, and performed with an almost whispered restraint that is very emotionally affecting. “The Alchemy,” on the other hand, is a giddy love song, with its cheesy football references redeemed by the fact that Swift seems completely uninhibited in her use of them. Hey, love is fun and a little bit corny, right?
To my ears, the highest mark of Tortured Poets comes during a span of six tracks on the Anthology portion of the album. Starting with track 18, “imgonnagetyouback” could fit squarely between “Lavender Haze” and “Marooned” from Midnights, and contains one of the catchiest pre-chorus to chorus one-two punches on the album. “The Albatross” is an obvious musical retread of Evermore’s “Willow,” but who cares, it’s a great song contextualized perfectly in this sequence, and the way she sings and harmonizes “persona non grata” is lovely and poignant.
It’s amazing how one small part of a song can elevate it, and that’s exactly what happens on “Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus.” The duh-duh-dun duh-duh-dun piano and keyboard part running through this song holds a sneaky magic that works its way under your skin and pricks your heart. Continuing in the piano-driven vein, “How Did It End?” feels like a sister song to “loml,” but contains more instrumentation as it crescendoes. Look, I know it has lyrics about the ghost of a former lover and her “sitting in a tree / D-Y-I-N-G,” but somehow her and Dessner are able to make that seem endearingly, sweetly sad rather than obnoxiously embarrassing.
My affinity for the eternally chiming sounds of indie rock make “So High School” an early contender for my favorite song on the album. When the opening guitar chords ring out, one would be forgiven for thinking it wasn’t a Swift song. In typical Taylor fashion, there are some lyrics where she unabashedly goes for it here (“Truth, dare, spin bottles / You know how to ball / I know Aristotle” and “Touch me while your bros play / Grand Theft Auto”), but with such nostalgic sonic vibes and references to the pop culture zeitgeist I lived through during my high school years (American Pie was…formative), I can’t help but love it.
Go-for-it lyrics like “Tell me something awful / Like you are a poet trapped inside the body / of a finance guy” abound as well in the final song of this six-jam stretch, “I Hate It Here.” But, as with so many other Swift songs, when the chorus hits, its simple melodic brilliance works its way into your brain and puts down roots. It’s impossible to get it out of your head. Much has been made about the lyric, “We would pick a decade / We wished we could live in instead of this / I’d say the 1830s but without all the racists and getting married off for / the highest bid.” A little clunky? Absolutely. But isn’t imaginatively wishing to go back in time — while specifically wishing to excise two of the most vile evils that defined that time — a good thing? I can see how some can’t get past this one, but at the very least, she pulls off the vocal phrasing.
After that immaculate six song run (and the more I listen to it, the more I think about it, it truly is a perfect little EP buried inside this monster collection), there are a few more I enjoy. The acoustic and pretty “The Prophecy” contains, in this humble writer’s opinion, some pretty great lyrics, including, “And it was written / I got cursed like Eve got bitten.” And again, super catchy vocal melodies throughout. Piano ballad “Peter” revolves around the refrain, plaintively sung by Swift, “You said you were gonna grow up / Then you were gonna come find me.” Finally, “The Bolter,” — somewhat reminiscent of “Betty,” my least favorite song from Folklore — is again redeemed by a catchier-than-it-has-any-right-to-be chorus.
16 songs out of 31–52%. That’s a little over an hour of new music that I think is pretty stinkin’ good. Not too shabby. If Swift would have pared her creation down a little, it could have been a classic. Of course, everyone’s mileage will vary, and releasing 31 songs when 16 would have certainly done seems like she’s begging for people to curate their own playlists. As it stands, while right now Tortured Poets’ gleam seems to have dimmed ever so slightly since the first few days of its release (I say that as 30 of the 31 songs take up residence in the Billboard Hot 100), I think it’s going to grow on a lot of people in the coming months. It might become its own sort of cult classic.
Currently, according to review aggregator Metacritic.com, this is her lowest rated album since Reputation, with Part 1 of the TTPD achieving a 76 and the Part 2 Anthology a 69. By comparison, when she was on a heater from 2020 to 2023, Midnights and Evermore both received an 85, and Folklore an 88. Lover garnered a 79 in 2019. The aforementioned Reputation, seemingly her most controversial and divisive album, could only pull a 71 in 2017, though I know that album has its ardent defenders (in the interest of full disclosure, I have never listened to it all the way through). Clearly, critics, some of whom are ridiculous and some of whom make valuable and indispensable contributions to the musical discourse, think it’s her weakest album in years. That seems to be the overall consensus of the fanbase as well.
But I have a feeling, as time goes on, this record will become more appreciated. I like it more each time I listen to it, particularly the songs mentioned above. I wonder how I’ll feel about it six months from now. And I wonder if perhaps what Rob Sheffield wrote in Rolling Stone was correct: this project is wildly ambitious. Maybe it’s ambitious because it’s risky. Swift is risking artistic overexposure, cultural oversaturation, and lyrical overconfidence that she had to know she was going to take some flack for. But maybe that’s the point. Carpe diem. Maybe she’s seizing her day — going for it, not caring what people think. And maybe there’s poetry in that.
Top 16 Tortured Poets Tracks (changing daily):
- Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus
- Down Bad
- So High School
- The Albatross
- Fresh Out The Slammer
- I Hate It Here
- imgonnagetyouback
- So Long London
- The Prophecy
- Fortnight
- loml
- How Did It End?
- The Tortured Poets Department
- The Alchemy
- Peter
- The Bolter
