There are worlds of difference between a precocious sixteen year old and a precious twenty year old.
Taylor’s third album (5th if you include the Christmas album and the deluxe Fearless) delivers a worldview much more difficult to buy into than her previous two and that’s a big problem not for her core constituency but for those who love her as a master pop stylist. There is no way in here for us.
Look at it this way: nobody loved “Forever And Always” because it was about Joe Jonas, we loved it for “It rains when you’re here and it rains when you’re gone”. Why should we love lugubrious bullshit like “Dear John”? The song stinks of an artist so big nobody can tell her what is not just a bad idea but also a bad song.
And there is a ton of them.
Not surprisingly, the two best songs, and both of them as great as anything Swift has ever written, are not about real relationships. They are both daydreams according to Taylor. In “Mine”, Taylor imagines a waiter who once served her has a long term marriage with her, “You made a rebel of a careless man’s careful daughter” rings like a chime on your heart: it is like there is a stretching long before she reaches it and she doesn’t need to express the thought.
Better still is “Speak Now”. Again, Taylor says she based it upon what her friend was feeling like doing at a wedding, so again there is no baggage. But there is a joyful romance in the mood. I think it is better than “Love Story”.
But that’s your lot.
“Back To December” is like that song the Simpson’s Milhouse’s dad sings to his wife before she turns him down. It makes you cringe. “Dear John” is the worst song of her career. And she followed it by DATING A MAN THE SAME AGE AS MAYER! does she have handlers??? Mayer should pay her cash money, Taylor singlehandedly resurrected his reputation. “Innocent” was a dog and an embarrassment oat the VMA’s and sucks on the album.
“Better Than Revenge” sounds like Paramore. “Last Kiss” is six minutes long. SIX MINUTES???? Will you sing faster, for fuck’s sake. It goes on and on and on and on….
The songs are all too long. Does nobody have any scissors? Two songs between 3 and 4 minutes. 8 between 4 and 5, 3 between 5 and 6. 2 between 6 and 7. Pop music functions best at 1:50 seconds. 5, 6 minutes: you lose your construction. It is boring but you can’t tell her that, Taylor is an egotistical little snot and a first rate hypocrite and all the hugs in the world can’t hide it.
I don’t believe her.
i think she is lying in her stories. I think she is a PR creation.
But I also think this will be a big hit (though not as big as Fearless -there are no more singles) because the core will lap it up. But if she doesn’t get her head on straight as opposed to CLAIMING she has her head on straight the follow up will dog.
Finally, Taylor is one of the best songwriters of her generation and she should act like it.