No introduction is needed here, you already know her. It’s Taylor Swift, who has the highest grossing tour by a woman of all time. Taylor Swift, one of the most acclaimed musicians of our generation. Taylor Swift, the Time person of the year for 2023. Taylor Swift, the person who is so popular that her tour was boosting the economies of cities she went to. But it’s also Taylor Swift, the hyper-capitalist. Taylor Swift, the “activist” that barely speaks out about anything. Taylor Swift, who doesn’t condemn fans when they send death threats to anyone in her life or that critiques her. Taylor Swift, whose private jet reportedly used over 8,000 tons of carbon emissions in 2022, which is equivalent to 1800 times the amount of a normal person. Taylor Swift is all of these things and so much more. She’s not the best person alive, but also not the worst.
My main goal I hope to accomplish with this discography is to understand the “Why”. Why does she have the largest and most dedicated fanbase in the world? Why do fans treat her as a savior to all their human emotions? The only way I can think to figure out why is to listen to what she’s known for, the music. While I haven’t heard all her music before this experiment, what I have heard can be anywhere from really great and middling at best. But if I want to understand why she’s accumulated this large fanbase, the only way for me to do that is through her music. So before anyone reads forward, a couple quick things. If you’re a huge Taylor Swift fan to the point where she can do no wrong, you might want to stop reading now. Lastly, before anyone asks, I am not doing the “Taylor Versions” of the albums. While I appreciate the reason behind why she’s doing it, they aren’t mainline Taylor Swift albums that will help me on this mission.
10. Reputation (2017)
Nah, I’m good with this one. But before we get completely into the negativity, let’s go over the positives. I always appreciate when artists decide to change their sound, so I truly do the change here. This project is full of extremely electronic pop songs that are unlike anything else she’s done up to this point. There are a couple good tracks, including “End Game” with Future and Ed Sheeran and “Gorgeous”, the latter of which is definitely my favorite on here! The bass and steel drum sounds add quite a bit to the already catchy chorus. As for the rest of the album, I can’t say it works. For example, let's look at the song, “I Did Something Bad”. She sounds fine on it, but everything about the production feels maximalist and dated. The EDM drop sounds like it’s from 2014, even though it came out in 2017. The little vocal chops after the chorus are grating. And just to add the cherry on top, why the hell does Taylor Swift have gun shots on her song?!? I don’t know who thought that would be a good idea, but it feels so forced. While I appreciate her trying some different sounds, the end results pale in comparison to what she usually does.
9. Fearless (2008)
I’m not sure what I’m missing with this one. It clearly sounds like she just took everything that was successful about the first one, and then brought it up another level, I just don’t think it makes as entertaining of an experience. The hits on here are still some of the best she’s ever done! “Love Story” and “You Belong With Me” still feel timeless and immediate! Just when we get to the deeper cuts, the album doesn’t do much for me. They just feel like attempted hits. There’s no overall feeling to the album either besides just a collection of tracks. For example, there’s a song where she’s talking about how she doesn’t want to breathe without her significant other, but then the very next song starts with her telling us she’s not bulletproof. Like, we know. You just got done with a song where you said you don’t want to live without this person, you’re clearly not bulletproof. But there are some good deep cuts though, “Fifteen” being my personal favorite. It shows Taylor starting to tell stories from the third person, which is where I think she shines the best! It looks at the mentality of a fifteen year old falling in love for the first time, but the omniscient point of view here adds so much to the track. The fact that she is only a few years older than fifteen allows her to still have recent memories to pull from. Overall, this is probably more of a hot take, but Fearless feels like one of her most manufactured, unfocused albums.
8. Taylor Swift (2006)
Especially considering she was only sixteen when the album came out, this is an acceptable pop country album. There are flashes of moments that work better than I would’ve expected from a sixteen year old, but there are also moments on here that sound painfully teenage. Her knack for a catchy melody shines through on a few songs here, including the upbeat “Picture to Burn”. It’s a song that is so far from my usual listening that I would usually dismiss it, and the song itself is a bit messy, but there’s no denying that chorus. When we get to the deeper songs on the tracklist, the album does start to fall apart. But if we remember again that this was made by someone who was learning to drive while she was writing this record, it’s not a bad start to a career.
7. Midnights (2022)
Compared to what it came out after, Midnights is a disappointing listen. But if we look at the overall discography of Taylor Swift, this isn’t that different from most of her albums. This is another dive into synth pop from Swift, and yet again, to varying results. Songs like “Lavender Haze” and “Bejeweled” are pretty awesome synth pop tracks that could’ve been smashes! Once again, she tends to shine when the songs slow down, like on the Lana Del Rey-featured “Snow On The Beach”. The song “Sweet Nothing” is also a pretty good ballad that provides an emotional penultimate track to the album. Just yet again with seemingly all her albums, there is so much hit or miss on here. “Question…?” is ok at best, which is exactly what I would say about “Maroon” as well. The worst thing I can say about this album though is that it lacks identity. There’s nothing that separates this album from any other in her discography. Even when she was making similar sounding albums at the beginning, her songwriting and overall artistic evolution helps those sound different enough from each other. Midnights barely sounds different from any of her other synth-pop albums, so the point where if you gave me a deep cut on here and a deep cut from Lover or 1989, I’m not sure I’d be able to tell the difference. So while I do enjoy some tracks, it feels inessential to her discography unless you’re a fan of her other work.
6. Lover (2019)
After the lackluster reception that Reputation got, it’s not surprising that she went back to basics for her next album, Lover. While there are plenty of enjoyable tracks here, it just feels like she’s trying to gain back her critical acclaim. The sound of this album is a combination of everything she’s done, but almost none of the sounds are at their best on here. Lover functions as a grab bag for Taylor Swift fans. If you miss the acoustic, country-tinged ballads, then you can go to “Soon You’ll Get Better” that features The Chicks. If you want more straightforward pop songs, then you have songs like “Cruel Summer” and “Lover”. Or if you just want overall beautiful ballads, the song “It’s Nice To Have A Friend” is there for you! Besides there being quite a few tracks that are uninteresting, the main problem with this album are the singles. “Me” with Brendon Urie might be the worst song she’s ever made. The line, “Cause shade never made anybody less gay,” ruins an otherwise fine song in “You Need To Calm Down”. Not for the sentiment, obviously, but for how cringy it is to hear her say that. It’s like your grandparents trying to be supportive of LGBTQ+ rights, but they don’t know how to phrase it so they try to co-opt how young people talk and it comes out unnatural. Overall though, Lover did exactly what she wanted, which was to put out a widely agreeable album that her fanbase can get behind. Personally though, it’s enjoyable enough to get through the mediocrity to hear the tracks that are actually worth your time.
5. 1989 (2014)
This one is full of mountains and valleys. After the first three songs, I thought this might end up being her most critically underrated project, but things quickly went downhill. Still though, to start the project with three fantastic pop songs is a great start, even if “Blank Space” is still overplayed for me after hearing it on the radio constantly. After that though, this album is hit or miss at best. The high pitched vocals on “All You Had To Do Was Stay” are legitimately ear-grating to me, and “Shake It Off” has always been one of her worst hits. Lyrically, this album also fails in comparison to her previous stuff, and even drags down the occasional song. For example, the chorus and bridge on “Wildest Dreams” are one of the best on the album, if not her career, for the lyrics during the verses and pre-chorus are so cringy that I can’t listen to it. It could also be the delivery though, because even though the lines, “He’s so tall and handsome as hell. He’s so bad, but he does it so well” is a bit teenage for a twenty four year old to be singing, her seductive singing style it’s delivered in makes it so much worse. I understand how some people probably relate to this, but a lot of the lyrics here feel like they were written for people who are contestants on The Bachelor. Still though, it’s full of her best pure pop hits.
4. Speak Now (2010)
I appreciate how she changed sounds on this album. Well, slightly evolved is a better way of phrasing the differences here. Speak Now follows the same formula of polished country pop with writing from the perspective of a teenage girl that her first two albums did, there are just little things that she does differently here. For example, there are multiple songs on here that reach the six minute mark, which is completely new for her. Now, not every one of these songs needs to be that long, but they don’t feel stretched out for no reason either. The highlight of those long songs is obviously “Dear John”, an almost seven-minute long song about a nineteen year old girl being manipulated while dating an older man. It’s theorized to be about her relationship with John Mayer, but you could easily listen to this song without that information and it still makes complete sense. “Never Grow Up” is one of the most beautiful songs on her entire catalog! It’s moments like these where I start to understand the Taylor Swift hype. But let’s get into the main negative here, which is the length. The album starts to drag when we get to the last few songs, but I’m sure the people who like this genre more than me will like it more. Also, I don’t understand why “Enchanted” is the hit from the album, there are so many better songs on here. Overall though, this is a legitimately good album with some high highs!
3. Red (2012)
Again, don’t kill me here fans. I do enjoy this album overall, and it does have its spots where I get the hype. “State of Grace” is one of her best opening tracks! It’s an effortless pop-rock track that shows her sound evolving beautifully. “All Too Well” is heralded as one of her best songs, and I see why! It’s a gorgeous ballad about reminiscing on a failed relationship. Even if I don’t personally relate to the lyrics, everything about the song is done to perfection and so much so that I feel like I can see the story playing out in front of me. The hits here have also aged surprisingly well, which I was not expecting for a track with a dubstep drop like, “I Knew You Were Trouble”. There are deeper cuts that I ended up enjoying, like the bluegrass-y “Stay Stay Stay” and the country-rock anthem “Holy Ground”, but there are also a lot of just ok moments here. Songs like “The Last Time” with Gary Lightbody and “Everything Has Changed” with Ed Sheeran are both by the numbers pop duets that go in one ear and out the other, which can also be said for “Starlight” and “Treacherous”. It’s yet another album that had potential to be really great, but is bogged down with unnecessary tracks that add nothing to the album.
2. Folklore (2020)
Maybe it’s just me, but this album and number one are both significantly higher than anything else she’s ever made. I was hoping that going through her catalog would help me find something else on the level of these two albums, but I guess not. In second, we have Folklore! This album has plenty of her best ever songs! “The Last Great American Dynasty” is probably my favorite song of hers, from a lyrical standpoint. It tells the story of Rebekah Harkness and how Swift eventually ended up owning the same home as her. Swift looks at the differences and similarities between the two and how they are portrayed in the media. It is then immediately followed by the most sonically beautiful track in her discography, “Exile” with Bon Iver. A big part of why it’s so beautiful is Bon Iver’s vocals, but the way they harmonize and go back and forth during the last couple minutes is chill-inducing. Now, this album is still far from perfect. There are about three or four tracks that aren’t needed, but still, everything about this album feels like a level up from her previous material.
1. Evermore (2020)
This is the one. It takes the classic pop country songwriting and puts a more mature, folk-influenced feeling to it. A big thing about this one is she’s also writing in third person a lot more. She is telling stories that she’s created, and it leads to fantastic results. The obvious example here is “No Body, No Crime” with HAIM. The song is about one of the HAIM sisters being cheated on and then murdered by her cheating husband, and then Taylor and the other two sisters get their revenge on him. Now, this obviously didn’t happen, all three HAIM sisters are alive and Taylor didn’t murder anyone. But, the narrative jere is much more gripping than most of her younger material about real life experiences. Even when the subject matter isn’t something out of a television show, she can still make it just as intriguing. The perfect example for this is “Champagne Problems”, where she tells the story of a woman turning down a marriage proposal from her longtime boyfriend. The narrative ends with the lines, "’She would've made such a lovely bride, what a shame she's fucked in the head,’ they said. But you'll find the real thing instead. She'll patch up your tapestry that I shred,” which is such a beautiful way to sum everything up. The album isn’t perfect, as the second half tends to slow down a bit too much, but it’s still my favorite of her albums and I don’t understand how people don’t think it’s one of her best.
What Did We Learn?
Well, was this discography worth it? Even though there aren’t any other full albums that I will probably continue to listen to outside of her 2020 work, I still think it was worth it. It allowed me to more fully understand the artistry of the biggest artist of this generation. As for figuring out the “Why,” I’m not 100% sure I completely understand. Her way of writing seems like it is very relatable to young women in relationships. She often writes about very universal emotions that many people relate to. The thing that I was hoping for is that extra something that these “biggest artists of a generation” tend to have. For example, other artists that I think of that were undoubtedly the biggest of their generation are Michael Jackson and The Beatles. But when you dig into the deeper songs from these artists, there are genuinely revolutionary and highly artistic things there. Michael Jackson may not have written the music himself most of the time, but he single-handedly broke the color barrier when it came to music videos. Abbey Road may have “Come Together” and “Here Comes The Sun” (amazing pop songs), but the second half of the album is a 20-minute long segway through ten different tracks that all blend together. And we don’t even need to go into Sgt. Pepper’s and what that did for music. When I look at Taylor’s discography, I don’t see anything that she’s doing artistically that is creating a new or innovating a current facet of the music industry. The only thing I can think of is the whole “Taylor’s Versions” idea, but that idea wouldn’t work for almost anyone else that doesn’t have a huge cult-like fanbase. I hope that she can eventually do something boundary pushing, but there’s no tangible reason for her to do so.
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