In her new album, 'Red', Taylor Swift edges further away from country, and begins to sound like an adult, reaching for a new model of pop stardom, notes Jon Caramanica
Awe and amazement have been Taylor Swift's grammar for years now. Whether singing about love or heartbreak — there has been no third subject — Swift has excelled at capturing the fresh sting, as if arriving at a feeling for the first time. But Swift is 22 now, and certainly she has seen some things. For most of 'Red', her fourth album, that's not necessarily clear. Her growth is largely musical, not experiential.
There is a moment, though, on We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together — the album's lead single and, as it happens, her first No. 1 pop hit — where the cracks begin to show. At the bridge the song gives way to a conversation between Swift and friends in which she's recalling how she shut down a persistent ex who wouldn't stop calling.
"This is exhausting," she tells him, emphasising the middle syllable of the last word, like a car that's just run out of gas. There is something different in Swift's voice here: It's serious and deep, and also shrewd. She has been through this before. She sounds like an adult.
It's about time. Swift, now eight years removed from her debut single, has become one of the most important pop artists of the past decade. But her evolution has been purposefully slow, making sure not to leave behind any of the young women who hold her up as a paragon of beauty, talent and civility. That she did this as a country singer was both savvy and also, ultimately, limiting.
It was never a question of whether Swift would become a pure pop star; the only question was what sort. She's without precedent: not as a country star looking for something bigger, but as a pop singer trying hard to maintain an air of innocence. Any young woman who's tried to own similar space has done it by making choices — of subject matter, of outfits, of public melodrama — that Swift has gone out of her way to avoid.
Instead, Swift has had to find other ways of growing up. 'Red' is by any measure a transitional album, showing Swift grasping for what her next stage is going to be and trying to become a sort of pop superstar that currently doesn't exist. Released last week, 'Red' is her least steady album, with some of her most sheer songwriting. She is showing maturity less as an adult than as a strategist.
The most blatant stroke of pop engineering here is Swift's work with pop-production technicians Max Martin and Shellback, which would be the clear choice for any singer looking for a loud pop splash. But for Swift, who has generally kept her circle of collaborators tight and done just fine with that, it was almost as unlikely as her working with Vybz Kartel or Gucci Mane.
Each of the three songs written with Martin and Shellback feel like inside jokes about the squeaky-clean pop of eras past. We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together has a Disney-esque literalness, and 22 feels like cheeky '80s pop. I Knew You Were Trouble, one of the year's great pop songs, begins like a sock-hop anthem, with jaunty guitars. A dubstep wobble arrives about halfway through like a wrecking ball, changing the course, not just of the song, but also of Swift's career.
These are among the best songs on this album and a reminder of Swift's tenacity. As convincingly as she set out to make herself a country singer a decade ago, she's applying the same fortitude to much choppier waters and succeeding on her own terms. Although these songs have some of the attitude of pop-punk, they don't feel brash. And they show other kinds of growth as well. On I Knew You Were Trouble, maybe for the first time, Swift genuinely paints herself as culpable, an accessory to her own heartbreak. "I knew you were trouble when you walked in", she sings, "so shame on me now". Strikingly, though, each moment of pure pop breakthrough is tempered immediately afterward by a contemplative country moment. I Knew You Were Trouble is followed by All Too Well, and 22 is chased by I Almost Do, the song here that could most convincingly be delivered by a more traditional country singer. After We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together comes Stay Stay Stay, which features the most gratuitous mandolin on the album.
Swift has always been a pop star in a country context more than a country star; her trick was in arriving at a time where country could accept such a proposition. She had no direct competition, and the genre's borders were weakening. But as she ages, country is becoming more and more of a straitjacket, which means going the full Shania Twain isn't a real option. Twain had firm country bona fides from the beginning: Even as she exploded in popularity, she was still a genre favourite. But Swift's country membership has never been that firm.
New territory
Instead, she has to carve new territory: a nontransgressive, rose-coloured female pop megastar, the likes of which haven't been seen in decades. 'Red' is an album of wildly divergent moods and sounds, but it rarely undermines her core values, even if she is at the stage of her career where no one would look askance at her for doing so.
That's because Swift is post-gatekeeper: Country radio no longer gets to define her, and pop radio has accepted her novel terms. Swift moves her own market, and Swift is patient.
This combination of calculation and instinct makes for a savvy musician, but does it make for an adult? Swift has been keeping adulthood at bay for as long as she's been singing. Even if she wanted to cling to her innocence, it's no longer an option. Reporters ask her about her love life — her current beau is rumoured to be Conor Kennedy, a grandson of Robert F Kennedy — even if they get nowhere. She's been interrogated so much about her signature wide-mouthed look of shock that, even if it were at one point authentic, it can never be again.
What's more, 'Red' is lighter on starry-eyed anthems than Swift's past albums. Almost everything here is corroded in some way. The title track is Swift's version of Alanis Morissette's Ironic, returning to a theme over and over again from different angles. The music is pure power country, but Swift's vocal is chirpy and thin. If she has a long-run limitation, it's her vocal range, which will never be husky, or dark or purpled. It's the reason even most of her kiss-offs sound as joyous as water-park rides.
It's also the reason why her shouts sound more petulant than rageful. For all of Swift's strategic obfuscation about the subjects of her songs, she's generally wonderful with minutiae. But some songs here feel less detailed and more rushed than her usual fare, seen through with a wide-angle lens rather than a magnifying glass. Still, her ear for the awkward and tentative rhythms of romantic bonding remains, especially on a pair of earthy duets — the haplessly romantic Everything Has Changed, with Ed Sheeran, and The Last Time, with Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol, which has residue of the dirge-y folk duo the Civil Wars and Safe & Sound, Swift's gummy contribution to the soundtrack of The Hunger Games.
Swift has come a long way from You Belong With Me, one of her biggest hits, in which she was the outsider throwing barbs at the more conventional, pretty, popular girl. "I'm listening to the kind of music she doesn't like," she sang, wearing her individuality as a badge of pride. But now that other girl, she listens to Taylor Swift. She might even be Taylor Swift.
Awe and amazement have been Taylor Swift's grammar for years now. Whether singing about love or heartbreak — there has been no third subject — Swift has excelled at capturing the fresh sting, as if arriving at a feeling for the first time. But Swift is 22 now, and certainly she has seen some things. For most of 'Red', her fourth album, that's not necessarily clear. Her growth is largely musical, not experiential.
There is a moment, though, on We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together — the album's lead single and, as it happens, her first No. 1 pop hit — where the cracks begin to show. At the bridge the song gives way to a conversation between Swift and friends in which she's recalling how she shut down a persistent ex who wouldn't stop calling.
"This is exhausting," she tells him, emphasising the middle syllable of the last word, like a car that's just run out of gas. There is something different in Swift's voice here: It's serious and deep, and also shrewd. She has been through this before. She sounds like an adult.
It's about time. Swift, now eight years removed from her debut single, has become one of the most important pop artists of the past decade. But her evolution has been purposefully slow, making sure not to leave behind any of the young women who hold her up as a paragon of beauty, talent and civility. That she did this as a country singer was both savvy and also, ultimately, limiting.
It was never a question of whether Swift would become a pure pop star; the only question was what sort. She's without precedent: not as a country star looking for something bigger, but as a pop singer trying hard to maintain an air of innocence. Any young woman who's tried to own similar space has done it by making choices — of subject matter, of outfits, of public melodrama — that Swift has gone out of her way to avoid.
Instead, Swift has had to find other ways of growing up. 'Red' is by any measure a transitional album, showing Swift grasping for what her next stage is going to be and trying to become a sort of pop superstar that currently doesn't exist. Released last week, 'Red' is her least steady album, with some of her most sheer songwriting. She is showing maturity less as an adult than as a strategist.
The most blatant stroke of pop engineering here is Swift's work with pop-production technicians Max Martin and Shellback, which would be the clear choice for any singer looking for a loud pop splash. But for Swift, who has generally kept her circle of collaborators tight and done just fine with that, it was almost as unlikely as her working with Vybz Kartel or Gucci Mane.
Each of the three songs written with Martin and Shellback feel like inside jokes about the squeaky-clean pop of eras past. We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together has a Disney-esque literalness, and 22 feels like cheeky '80s pop. I Knew You Were Trouble, one of the year's great pop songs, begins like a sock-hop anthem, with jaunty guitars. A dubstep wobble arrives about halfway through like a wrecking ball, changing the course, not just of the song, but also of Swift's career.
These are among the best songs on this album and a reminder of Swift's tenacity. As convincingly as she set out to make herself a country singer a decade ago, she's applying the same fortitude to much choppier waters and succeeding on her own terms. Although these songs have some of the attitude of pop-punk, they don't feel brash. And they show other kinds of growth as well. On I Knew You Were Trouble, maybe for the first time, Swift genuinely paints herself as culpable, an accessory to her own heartbreak. "I knew you were trouble when you walked in", she sings, "so shame on me now". Strikingly, though, each moment of pure pop breakthrough is tempered immediately afterward by a contemplative country moment. I Knew You Were Trouble is followed by All Too Well, and 22 is chased by I Almost Do, the song here that could most convincingly be delivered by a more traditional country singer. After We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together comes Stay Stay Stay, which features the most gratuitous mandolin on the album.
Swift has always been a pop star in a country context more than a country star; her trick was in arriving at a time where country could accept such a proposition. She had no direct competition, and the genre's borders were weakening. But as she ages, country is becoming more and more of a straitjacket, which means going the full Shania Twain isn't a real option. Twain had firm country bona fides from the beginning: Even as she exploded in popularity, she was still a genre favourite. But Swift's country membership has never been that firm.
New territory
Instead, she has to carve new territory: a nontransgressive, rose-coloured female pop megastar, the likes of which haven't been seen in decades. 'Red' is an album of wildly divergent moods and sounds, but it rarely undermines her core values, even if she is at the stage of her career where no one would look askance at her for doing so.
That's because Swift is post-gatekeeper: Country radio no longer gets to define her, and pop radio has accepted her novel terms. Swift moves her own market, and Swift is patient.
This combination of calculation and instinct makes for a savvy musician, but does it make for an adult? Swift has been keeping adulthood at bay for as long as she's been singing. Even if she wanted to cling to her innocence, it's no longer an option. Reporters ask her about her love life — her current beau is rumoured to be Conor Kennedy, a grandson of Robert F Kennedy — even if they get nowhere. She's been interrogated so much about her signature wide-mouthed look of shock that, even if it were at one point authentic, it can never be again.
What's more, 'Red' is lighter on starry-eyed anthems than Swift's past albums. Almost everything here is corroded in some way. The title track is Swift's version of Alanis Morissette's Ironic, returning to a theme over and over again from different angles. The music is pure power country, but Swift's vocal is chirpy and thin. If she has a long-run limitation, it's her vocal range, which will never be husky, or dark or purpled. It's the reason even most of her kiss-offs sound as joyous as water-park rides.
It's also the reason why her shouts sound more petulant than rageful. For all of Swift's strategic obfuscation about the subjects of her songs, she's generally wonderful with minutiae. But some songs here feel less detailed and more rushed than her usual fare, seen through with a wide-angle lens rather than a magnifying glass. Still, her ear for the awkward and tentative rhythms of romantic bonding remains, especially on a pair of earthy duets — the haplessly romantic Everything Has Changed, with Ed Sheeran, and The Last Time, with Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol, which has residue of the dirge-y folk duo the Civil Wars and Safe & Sound, Swift's gummy contribution to the soundtrack of The Hunger Games.
Swift has come a long way from You Belong With Me, one of her biggest hits, in which she was the outsider throwing barbs at the more conventional, pretty, popular girl. "I'm listening to the kind of music she doesn't like," she sang, wearing her individuality as a badge of pride. But now that other girl, she listens to Taylor Swift. She might even be Taylor Swift.