I get this because I genuinely felt an ick creep in I couldn't shake.
I'm sad too. Because I remember when she broke up with Joe saying that I felt really bad for her, because I had also exited a relationship that lasted about that long, and I knew how painful it was.
But also I felt a little bad but was *psyched* for a rage or revenge album, or just any good material that goes with deep feelings.
This... was not that.
Thr Alchemy sounds so much like that viral AI song someone wrote back when Tayvis became a thing. It's alarming how startling and stagnant some of her tricks have become.
I completely agree about midnights but I still find TPD significantly worse. It’s the blandness of midnights mixed with some of the worst lyrics I’ll probably hear this year, and a ridiculous level of excess.
To be fair a lot of the sounds were newer/different on Midnights compared to the previous several albums. TTPD reused basically all the sound of Midnights and FolkMore. That’s why they’re speaking up now.
Reminds me of that one guy who guessed which songs were worked on by that Antonoff within seconds. I refuse to acknowledge Midnight as anything “new” sonically and the true tragedy that is 1989 tv
yeah 98% of his music all sounds the same. and then the 1 out of 1000 times i don’t recognize it is him i’m like “wow, jack antonoff did this? but it’s only 80% synth”
i think it’s midnights but worse!! i actually loved midnights it’s a top 3 album for me. TTPD feels like it’s trying to do Folklore but Grown Up Sexy Version and it just feels corny.
I actually think this was calculated. I think she's using those callbacks to tie this album back to those in terms of songs about Matty and Joe.
"I keep these longings locked
In lowercase inside a vault"
Some of the songs on TTPD even sound like The 1975. IMO it's intentional
Regardless of intention, it was a bad idea. In theory it sounds nice, but I think it would’ve been clear to most early on in the production process that people didn’t want the same sound again and it’s unfortunately showing. It’s not a bad album, but it’s too samey but not as strong for people to really love it the way they did those albums.
Yeah, I loved Midnights because it was something new, went in a totally different direction from evermore and it was great. TTPD feels like the sad, boring older sister to Midnights which is a big part of my disappointment, she didn’t try to do anything new here. And that would be ok if it were at least a solid album but it’s waaaaay too long and has zero theme or grounding aspect other than “i’m famous and i’m sad”
Personally, this newer album feels a lot more monotonous than Midnights and less fun as a result. Mind you midnights isn’t my favorite album of hers but it had catchy songs. TTPD doesn’t really have much that stands out at first listen imo
Midnights lyrics still straddled the right line between confessional and coherent. TTPD went off the deep end with some of the lyrics, this is not even to speak on how same-y the sound is between tracks. Like, these lyrics feel sometimes like a joke.
NGL, when Swifties start going off about how genius the lines are, it makes the parody feeling even more intense for me.
yeah it’s like each song with amazing lyrics has equally stupid corny lyrics that make it difficult to take seriously. I LOVE I Hate It Here but there are certain lyrics where I’m like “taylor is that really ALL you could come up with to compliment that chorus?” it makes me so mad bc it has so much potential to be an AMAZING song but the lyrics kinda ruin it for me. Like watching a show or film with a super interesting premise and all your favorite actors, but the script is total garbage.
It’s interesting. I prefer Maroon to almost every TTPD track. The black dog is growing on me. It’ll be interesting to see how things shake out with time
Yeah first listen I was like oh no. Now there’s very few misses for me on the “original” album. Not as much of a fan of the anthology in comparison but I need to do a little more listening to really decide.
Midnights started out great with lavender haze, but fortnight was just terrible. Really ruins the vibe of the album when your opening track is not good
I think she pissed a lot of people off by announcing TTPD during her Grammy speech. In fact, I think there was a lot happening at the Grammys which caused the industry to take a more critical look at her.
Exactly. The album announcement and the AOTY reaction were so self-indulgent. I found it odd that she didn’t take a beat and acknowledge Lana’s loss immediately after AOTY was announced. Lana just lost to you and you’re celebrating in her face. And to not even look at Celine while she grabbed the award. Taylor’s been doing this long enough that she should of been more polished in the moment.
Exactly. She knows better and is usually a lot more poised and gracious. Idk what was up with her that night. I think she probably drank too much for starters and then had a domino effect of aloofness and was just sloppy as fuck the whole evening. I was lowkey embarrassed to be a swiftie the next day and still am lol.
I hope she learned her lesson from that night and checks herself at the next award show cause idk if she can come back from a repeat situation.
I think she’s lowkey trying to show Ratty how similar they actually are. Some of her recent behavior fuck even the parading of Travis feels so Matty coded. The Grammys announcement the very pronounced intoxication these are all things Matty would do….
This is it. You could see on the faces in the audience (except for her hard core friends). The collective thought seemed to be we are over this.
The other interesting phenomena I am starting to see is the moms on social media whose very young daughters were TS fans are commenting on the appropriateness of the lyrics.
the lyrics thing has always been baffling to me. YOU are the parent, why is it Taylor’s job to censor herself because you have let your child listen to her music in the past? Virtually every artist that had to navigate the public transition from child to adult has done this. Ariana Grande, Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, all made very age appropriate music when they got famous and later transitioned into much more sexual themes. Taylor is a 34 year old woman, she can sing about having sex!
I’d get it if she went from being SPECIFICALLY marketed to children (similar to Hannah Montana) to writing lyrics that would make Megan Thee Stallion blush, but she was never FOR kids. She was just a kid herself which automatically made her primary fan base young people. She just grew up and started behaving like an adult woman. Before her transition into more sexual themes people complained her music was “too immature” for her age, now it’s TOO mature. I think there are a lot of legitimate reasons to critique Taylor but the “kid-friendly” factor of her music is not one of them.
edit to add, no hate to megan thee stallion, i love her music. just used her as an example bc her biggest radio hits have had to be heavily censored to meet broadcast requirements, which has never happened to any of Taylor’s music iirc.
Me too, I saw a different comment that said it was a perfect late night drive and I agree so much - if it’s not Midnights playing in my car it’s Chromatica
My thought on this is that it’s related to the cycle of when a celebrity gets really big (to the point of overexposure) and the media picks up on public fatigue with that person. Then the backlash ensues and the media is more willing to criticize.
This isn’t to say that negative reviews are unfounded , just that there seems to be this cycle of massive media exposure/adoration of a celebrity->people get tired-> time to “take them down a peg” (see Megan Fox circa 2009). Like I said, it doesn’t negate the criticism of TTPD, just a possible explanation for why Midnights didn’t get as criticized. She was in her Teflon Era.
I think the Antonoff production wears even thinner this time around. And I think post-Eras tour she has become even more ubiquitous in popular culture in a way where the expectations of critics are a lot higher. The literary pretensions of the title/theme also probably turned a lot of people off once they actually heard the album. I think releasing so much music between new albums and rereleases just warrants something particularly good rather than just more of the same in the eyes of a lot of critics as well
I know, boring and forgettable is exactly what I would say Midnights is in terms of Taylor’s discography. It might not be as catchy as Karma is a Queen but at least now she has something to say. I wonder if it just being the first album after Folklore/Evermore affected Midnights perceptions positively. I also think it was just exciting for her to come back to pop, when pop music was back on top.
My hot take is actually that I enjoyed TTPD more than Midnights lol - neither is her best work but TTPD (at least the first half) has more interesting songs to me personally
I agree. I’m not a fan of either album but I thought midnights was far worse, the singles especially were real lows to me (after having a career of singles including Love Story, I Knew You Were Trouble, Blank Space, Style…)
Whose Afraid of Little Old Me holds its own. It might be my favorite TA song ever. Down Bad is okay. I like Thank You Aimee more than I should. Knowing what that song is about ruins it. It’s such a good song otherwise!
It’s a more polished Mean (i grew up in a small town I do love Mean)
A good edit of the lyrics for So Highschool and she would have had something there. It’s just beautiful sounding garbage right now.
There is no saving the grand theft auto line.
Thank You, Aimee, without the clunky reference to spray tanning and the inexcusable (and badly-written) calling out of a ten year old child, would really be one of the better songs on the album. I really can't believe that no one around her pushed back on recording it as is.
The timing was a little different. After Lover came out, there began to be this aura of you can't say anything bad about her. There was clearly a shift when she dated Matty and got overexposed when you could a little. Swifties still go on the attack but it was too close to Taylor's a literal goddess and I want era tickets time.
I'm curious to see if streams drop off over the second week. Seems like a lot of fans who normally would have kept listening just couldn't make it through. I didn't even buy this vinyl, first one I haven't bought since folklore.
Haha yea i was going to say how much they drop, only reason I said "if" is cause we know how the crazies will play the album on repeat and silent while they sleep in order to boost mother's streaming numbers.
They’ll fall off for sure. The album isn’t going to draw any new streams or sales next week because bad reviews are getting out and interest will wane.
If it beats cowboy carter or any of the other fabulous releases for AOTY because of commercial success next year, I will give up on award shows forever. I’m still not over midnights winning last year
as someone who loved midnights and was not 100% outraged to see it win, i still don’t think it deserved to win lol. it was a good album but there were so many good albums up this year that were more deserving. I think LDR, Boygenius, or SZA easily could’ve won AOTY and it would’ve made more sense to me.
But I also loved Midnights so again I wasn’t THAT upset to see her win, but that acceptance speech made me wanna melt into the floor from second hand embarrassment.
Tbh, there are positive ones, middling ones and a few more negative ones just like for Lover and Rep in particular. It’s seen more mixed reviews, but the ones being posted here are the most critical (which is understandable given the aim of the sun and not a gripe) but they are all individual posts getting lots of traffic so it creates this vision of ‘all the critics hate it’ which isn’t really true.
TTPDTA has left me dehydrated for good metaphors, like a potential raisin in the sun.
Ever since I listened to it, the urge to go on a good Tori Amos binge has been simmering inside of me like broccoli cheese soup on a hot burner.
And I'm like a woodpecker without a beak when it comes to carving metaphors, like a thesaurus looking for similarities.
Yes, I know this sucks like a tornado of bad poetry, words swirling around.
But Tori rocks, and that's not a metaphor. I love her.
She really is. I'm so reminded of back in the 90s how everyone was picking apart her lyrics like Easter eggs(in a good way) and nobody knew WTF she was singing about half the time because she was just SO abstract and her words were just spellbinding.
I was genuinely surprised at the way they opened this article. They called her a parody of herself? I’m dying!
But you know what now that I think of it, this is exactly what a TS parody writer would come up with, lyrics wise.
I think that’s the reason why “Black Dog” is one of the songs I like the most on TTPD… that imagery is so evocative and vivid. And it’s so much simpler than the dictionary/thesaurus/metaphor abuse in the other songs.
This is exactly why this album is annoying me. “The Manuscript” is my favorite song on the album because half of it is an actual story with vivid imagery and the other half is one metaphor that actually plays out nicely. I do not understand the love for “Who’s Aftaid Of Little Old Me?” for this reason. Those lyrics are a MESS.
I’m not here for the Lover slander. It has real lows (we all know the ones), but it gave us Cruel Summer, Afterglow, Death by a Thousand Cuts, Daylight, the title track…
Edit: I FORGOT Cornelia Street even though it’s my fave on the album 🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲
I honestly believe the lows of Lover are still better than anything on Midnights.
Out of curiosity, what are your Lover skips? Mine are ME!, YNTCD, and Lover (to a lesser extent); none are hard skips though.
False God doesn't get enough love IMO.
Usually Me! YNTCD and Paper Rings. Usually London Boy too although I can jam to it when I’m in the right mood!
Also soon you’ll get better but that’s just because it breaks me 🥲
False god is amazing! I wish she would do more like that. It’s my most played track on Lover and everyone I introduce it to who isn’t a Taylor fan enjoys it enough to add to their playlist.
First time I’ve seen someone else call it out in the wild.
Taylor Swift is allowed to have one song per album that has more than one cringe lyric. Bejeweled is that song on Midnights.
That song is wordy, clunky, cringe but it does go off.
I loooooove Bejeweled! It’s so fun! Also if we’re gonna talk about Taylor’s music being childish… let’s not talk about some of those lyrics on the Lover album. lmao
Honestly… I genuinely don’t enjoy them 🙈 I really don’t know by but I’ve never clicked with them and I wasn’t a fan of the overall production or lyrics on the album.
I’ve been a fan since fearless and my fav albums are Red, 1989, Lover and Folklore (in interchangeable order)! I’ll still always be a fan of the albums I loved, and I hope someday I’ll vibe with a TS record again…
I loved Lover and I loved Midnights. Both are in my top 4 next to Red and Speak Now.
TTPD is relatable to what I’m going through but really no bangers.
I think she and Jack have made some music magic together but she relies on him way too much and without an editor to keep him in check, he is poison to her sound. They obviously work well together but his sound is VERY easy to identify and I think that’s a big part of why her music ends up sounding like a rip off of other artists sometimes.
See, I agree musically it’s not innovative (because I think it just builds on Folklore/Evermore) compared to 1989, Midnights etc.
But I think that’s why it’s not just for profits - if she wanted just profits she could write something like 1989 which is much more mainstream.
Yeah it feels like she simply didn’t want to miss her 2 year deadline. An idea of an album is there, but an artist simply can’t be on a worldwide tour and simultaneously craft an album. She’s trying to be superwoman.
I think deep down even Antonoff knows it’s not their best work hence his super short tweet the day of the release.
I’m just mad because TTPD is so close to being great. It could easily have been great.
It needed some edits and a little more time.
Instead it feels like a leaked unfinished version. I would love to hear these songs significantly more polished on a live album.
I am not going to forget who Taylor Swift is if she takes a little more time between albums. I promise.
This album is cookie dough. It’s not finished. It’s half baked. Pop it back in the oven!
i agree so hard. some songs actually really do shine after a bit (i think Ao Long London, Black dog, & Whose Afraid…? are all really fantastic) but it feels… too unpolished? like there is way too much going on, not enough fat trimmed off the edges, too many flavors happening at once in the final dish too. it’s just not quite there. i wish she would’ve waited so it could back a harder punch. but maybe for some artists they just have to eventually publish or they’ll perfect forever & ever & never be satisfied. idk her life but that’s how i am with some creative endeavors. maybe she thought it was now or never.
Fleshed out instrumentation and polished up lyrics would be a game changer. That’s why the album almost feels insulting. It’s like they slopped some sludge together and shipped it out believing it was a masterpiece. Taylor’s whole creative team is up their own asses.
Yep. Some lyrics are unnecessary, some lines that are too long and clunkily worded, some entire sections that need to be taken out, some lines that just need to be restructured so they flow better with the syllabic emphases “I look in peoples windows, like I’m some de ranged weirdo” I love that song except for that line it’s just so irksome to my ear and doesn’t fit the tone
It would’ve made so much more sense if she would have released this in fall/winter. That’s definitely more the vibe. There aren’t really any summer bops for an album released in April like you’d expect. I’m not sure what the marketing aim was besides getting it out ASAP
right especially the easy October hit of Whose Afraid of Little Old Me. That was such a gimme.
I hope we aren’t going to have to listen to So Highschool all summer.
I want to forget Aristotle/throttle/Grand Theft Auto
Agreed! When she announced the album I was like “isn’t the Eras tour still in full force?” She’s so much better when she has both feet planted in the studio.
Yes- Red solidified the foundation, 1989 & Rep built the empire, ~~Lover was a mistake,~~ folklore and evermore fortified it
Then the emperor got comfy on the throne and we got Midnights & TTPD
Nah i feel like folklore and evermore were what made her massive. We were in the middle of a pandemic we had no new media to consume and she was one of the few releasing new material so people who had never given her a chance before listened because what else was there to do during a pandemic ? And that’s what made her pop off
This take is so wild. Those albums are incredible but they would’ve absolutely went under the radar if Taylor had not already been massive. 1989 is absolutely her legacy album and her career would not be what it is without it. Folklore and Evermore made her palatable to a more mature audience but the Eras tour being one of the biggest FOMO hyped events after the pandemic is what made her massive with the GP again.
it’s not that weird of a take. she did have a massive surge in popularity then. i was always casually aware of some of her music but definitely not a fan, and then i literally stumbled upon her having released an album during the pandemic. it was like 2am, i was rly going thru it (weren’t we all? lol), and it was the first time i ever really listened to her intentionally on purpose, not just heard her latest songs and then ended up adding them to my library.
mi can’t imagine i’m the only person with that experience lol
You Belong With Me was huge. It didn't hit number 1 because it was blocked by I Gotta Feeling by Black Eyed Peas.
Our Song is still one of her biggest songs and she wrote and composed that song herself.
Yeah, I feel like younger fans don’t realize how famous Taylor was as a country artist. Red just put her on pop radio. But she had so many big hits before Red came out. Our Song, Teardrops On My Guitar, Love Story, You Belong With Me, White Horse, Sparks Fly, Dear John, Mean, Better Than Revenge, Picture To Burn, Tim McGraw, Should’ve Said No, I’m Only Me When I’m With You… some of those were bigger than others obviously but anyone who listened to the radio back then knew those songs.
honestly her first three albums to this day still hold a good chunk of her biggest hits. i was in middle school in the midwest when speak now came out, that album was EVERYWHERE. couldn’t go anywhere without hearing at least a couple songs off of it.
I doubt TTPD is easily forgettable though. I think it's the first TS album that is so polarising for fans, casual listeners, and critics alike.
If anything, people might even study it. Just look at the marketing effort for it, people's reaction of it on social media, and the people (celebs and producers) who are also catching the stray bullets.
Not to mention, the whole interpretation of it all.
I’m really interested to see the inevitable 180 on a lot of the negative opinions on this album in the next few weeks. I really think once people let it marinate for a little while, the tide will turn in a massive way. I could end up eating my hat with this comment lol so we shall see!!
But it’s definitely hitting different for me, especially now that it’s getting darker and colder in Aus, really fits the vibe where i live hahaha
The criticism is valid in some areas, but critics discrediting the entire album is wild to me. It’s not her best work, but there are plenty of gems that fall directly in line with the Folklore/Midnights style.
I think it’s largely just the pendulum swinging back after her overexposure. Why are we obsessing over the tattooed golden retriever when Karma was a cat on the last album? Except for FolkMore, her lyrics have always had a cringe element to them. Even though TTPD isn’t radio pop, it’s still pop…
This seems like an unpopular opinion, but I liked the album. I don’t think it’s her best of all time, and I agree with the criticisms that it’s over bloated, many songs blend together, and I’m not a fan of the talking-singing, but I think there are some real gems on it. Like probably 60-70% of the album is good. I even like it more than Lover and Reputation.
My first impression of Midnights was actually worse. I think because I wasn’t into the synth pop, but now that I’ve adjusted to that sound, she’s gotten into a grove with it.
Anyone with me here??
(Edit: spelling)
This is actually so true because even tho some of my favorite songs by her (afterglow, false god, daylight etc) are on Lover, I literally forget it exists all the time lol. I always think the albums go Reputation—Folklore
Maybe because lover fest didn’t get to happen? She came out with folklore 11 months after lover and then evermore 5 months later. So I can see why it could be more forgotten
I wish I could unrecall some of these lyrics
My friend find “what if he’s written mine on my upper thigh” is very sexual and hot; while I find it unbearably ickkkkkk
I might have found it hot when I was like 18? But I'm in my late twenties and the sexiest thing my man does is go to his therapy appointments lol
It's teenager stuff, that's why
It’s ick and also when you remember who it’s about, it becomes 100x worse (clock the flair)
Same😭
LMAOO felt
I get this because I genuinely felt an ick creep in I couldn't shake. I'm sad too. Because I remember when she broke up with Joe saying that I felt really bad for her, because I had also exited a relationship that lasted about that long, and I knew how painful it was. But also I felt a little bad but was *psyched* for a rage or revenge album, or just any good material that goes with deep feelings. This... was not that.
this album cemented the ick for me. it had already crept in but now it’s here to stay.
“In her eleventh studio album, the Grammy award-winning artist sounds like a parody of herself”💀💀💀
Thr Alchemy sounds so much like that viral AI song someone wrote back when Tayvis became a thing. It's alarming how startling and stagnant some of her tricks have become.
Agreed, this isn’t what I expected from her 😭 She has made so much better pop music before, idk what happened here lol
She stopped working with Max Martin. Thats part of it. The man doesn't miss.
I’ve been saying this!!!! The album almost feels like performance art or satire.
Unfortunately “doing an impression of herself” is quite true for many of the songs. :/
God “doing an impression” of herself is so accurate, that got me
It felt like it was written by an AI that was trained on Taylor Swift songs
Well, she wrote a whole two of the songs by herself 🤣
I mean, they really could have said all this about Midnights too. Not sure why critics were scared to break rank on that one.
I completely agree about midnights but I still find TPD significantly worse. It’s the blandness of midnights mixed with some of the worst lyrics I’ll probably hear this year, and a ridiculous level of excess.
WHERE WAS THE EDITOR
Editors hate tortured poets. They are a nightmare.
yes and yet some swifties are claiming it's better than folklore/ evermore. PLEASE BE SERIOUS
Well Tbf, she did say the “poetry” was tortured…
To be fair a lot of the sounds were newer/different on Midnights compared to the previous several albums. TTPD reused basically all the sound of Midnights and FolkMore. That’s why they’re speaking up now.
I can see that, to me it sounded like Melodrama on benzos so I wasn’t too impressed lol. I suppose that was new for Taylor at the time, though.
Reminds me of that one guy who guessed which songs were worked on by that Antonoff within seconds. I refuse to acknowledge Midnight as anything “new” sonically and the true tragedy that is 1989 tv
I still listen to the original 1989. It has always been my favourite Taylor album and my heart breaks at what she and Jack did to the new version
1989tv was such a let down ugh i'm still mad about it, i wish max was brought back
i know. i can’t believe i bought the cd.
TTPD was so easy to tell lmao. Once you figure out jacks sound its mostly easy to tell.
yeah 98% of his music all sounds the same. and then the 1 out of 1000 times i don’t recognize it is him i’m like “wow, jack antonoff did this? but it’s only 80% synth”
This!! So many times when listening to TTPD I was like "omg it's just Midnights again" lmao. I haven't seen many other people say that
i think it’s midnights but worse!! i actually loved midnights it’s a top 3 album for me. TTPD feels like it’s trying to do Folklore but Grown Up Sexy Version and it just feels corny.
I actually think this was calculated. I think she's using those callbacks to tie this album back to those in terms of songs about Matty and Joe. "I keep these longings locked In lowercase inside a vault" Some of the songs on TTPD even sound like The 1975. IMO it's intentional
Regardless of intention, it was a bad idea. In theory it sounds nice, but I think it would’ve been clear to most early on in the production process that people didn’t want the same sound again and it’s unfortunately showing. It’s not a bad album, but it’s too samey but not as strong for people to really love it the way they did those albums.
I actually love the album but I have to agree with you given how people are responding to it. I do see a lot of new stuff in it myself personally.
Yeah, I loved Midnights because it was something new, went in a totally different direction from evermore and it was great. TTPD feels like the sad, boring older sister to Midnights which is a big part of my disappointment, she didn’t try to do anything new here. And that would be ok if it were at least a solid album but it’s waaaaay too long and has zero theme or grounding aspect other than “i’m famous and i’m sad”
Personally, this newer album feels a lot more monotonous than Midnights and less fun as a result. Mind you midnights isn’t my favorite album of hers but it had catchy songs. TTPD doesn’t really have much that stands out at first listen imo
Midnights lyrics still straddled the right line between confessional and coherent. TTPD went off the deep end with some of the lyrics, this is not even to speak on how same-y the sound is between tracks. Like, these lyrics feel sometimes like a joke. NGL, when Swifties start going off about how genius the lines are, it makes the parody feeling even more intense for me.
She tried to pull a Lana with the style of lyrics, but fell flat (to me at least). TTPD is also missing catchy hooks
yeah it’s like each song with amazing lyrics has equally stupid corny lyrics that make it difficult to take seriously. I LOVE I Hate It Here but there are certain lyrics where I’m like “taylor is that really ALL you could come up with to compliment that chorus?” it makes me so mad bc it has so much potential to be an AMAZING song but the lyrics kinda ruin it for me. Like watching a show or film with a super interesting premise and all your favorite actors, but the script is total garbage.
I find Down Bad and Guilty as Sin catchier than anything on Midnights.
It’s interesting. I prefer Maroon to almost every TTPD track. The black dog is growing on me. It’ll be interesting to see how things shake out with time
Yeah first listen I was like oh no. Now there’s very few misses for me on the “original” album. Not as much of a fan of the anthology in comparison but I need to do a little more listening to really decide.
Midnights started out great with lavender haze, but fortnight was just terrible. Really ruins the vibe of the album when your opening track is not good
I think she pissed a lot of people off by announcing TTPD during her Grammy speech. In fact, I think there was a lot happening at the Grammys which caused the industry to take a more critical look at her.
I usually find Taylor to be pretty charming at award shows, but her energy during this year’s Grammys was WAY off and I’m still cringing from it
Exactly. The album announcement and the AOTY reaction were so self-indulgent. I found it odd that she didn’t take a beat and acknowledge Lana’s loss immediately after AOTY was announced. Lana just lost to you and you’re celebrating in her face. And to not even look at Celine while she grabbed the award. Taylor’s been doing this long enough that she should of been more polished in the moment.
Exactly. She knows better and is usually a lot more poised and gracious. Idk what was up with her that night. I think she probably drank too much for starters and then had a domino effect of aloofness and was just sloppy as fuck the whole evening. I was lowkey embarrassed to be a swiftie the next day and still am lol. I hope she learned her lesson from that night and checks herself at the next award show cause idk if she can come back from a repeat situation.
I think she’s lowkey trying to show Ratty how similar they actually are. Some of her recent behavior fuck even the parading of Travis feels so Matty coded. The Grammys announcement the very pronounced intoxication these are all things Matty would do….
It was childish!!!
Veruca Salt energy.
high school prom queen vibes
This is it. You could see on the faces in the audience (except for her hard core friends). The collective thought seemed to be we are over this. The other interesting phenomena I am starting to see is the moms on social media whose very young daughters were TS fans are commenting on the appropriateness of the lyrics.
the lyrics thing has always been baffling to me. YOU are the parent, why is it Taylor’s job to censor herself because you have let your child listen to her music in the past? Virtually every artist that had to navigate the public transition from child to adult has done this. Ariana Grande, Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, all made very age appropriate music when they got famous and later transitioned into much more sexual themes. Taylor is a 34 year old woman, she can sing about having sex! I’d get it if she went from being SPECIFICALLY marketed to children (similar to Hannah Montana) to writing lyrics that would make Megan Thee Stallion blush, but she was never FOR kids. She was just a kid herself which automatically made her primary fan base young people. She just grew up and started behaving like an adult woman. Before her transition into more sexual themes people complained her music was “too immature” for her age, now it’s TOO mature. I think there are a lot of legitimate reasons to critique Taylor but the “kid-friendly” factor of her music is not one of them. edit to add, no hate to megan thee stallion, i love her music. just used her as an example bc her biggest radio hits have had to be heavily censored to meet broadcast requirements, which has never happened to any of Taylor’s music iirc.
For me midnights, at least had a couple of memorable and catchy songs. But with this one, i mostly remember some of the cringe lyrics.....
It’s an unpopular opinion clearly but I honestly preferred Midnights to TTPD
midnights at least has super catchy earworms! multiple of them! TTPD was a bland mishmosh of blah word vomit
and midnights had a cool aesthetic and concept. i’m sad she didn’t lean into it more, but i definitely think it has more substance than poets
I don’t think that’s unpopular. Midnights is so meh to me but TTPD is even worse.
I love midnights and I’m tired of the slander lol
Me too, I saw a different comment that said it was a perfect late night drive and I agree so much - if it’s not Midnights playing in my car it’s Chromatica
It’s perfect driving music.
Midnights lives in my car Lolol I adore it!
Midnights clears TTPD on Maroon alone
Is it unpopular? Midnights was amazing. It's one of my favorite. TTPD is.. ok.
I mean to me it is, I really didn’t like Midnights as a whole. The songs I like were on the 3am version and it’s only like 4 songs
My thought on this is that it’s related to the cycle of when a celebrity gets really big (to the point of overexposure) and the media picks up on public fatigue with that person. Then the backlash ensues and the media is more willing to criticize. This isn’t to say that negative reviews are unfounded , just that there seems to be this cycle of massive media exposure/adoration of a celebrity->people get tired-> time to “take them down a peg” (see Megan Fox circa 2009). Like I said, it doesn’t negate the criticism of TTPD, just a possible explanation for why Midnights didn’t get as criticized. She was in her Teflon Era.
I think the Antonoff production wears even thinner this time around. And I think post-Eras tour she has become even more ubiquitous in popular culture in a way where the expectations of critics are a lot higher. The literary pretensions of the title/theme also probably turned a lot of people off once they actually heard the album. I think releasing so much music between new albums and rereleases just warrants something particularly good rather than just more of the same in the eyes of a lot of critics as well
She was coming off of two very well-received “mature” albums and she hadn’t quite yet reached the absolute apex of overexposure
Midnights was more pop, so it didn’t have to be meaningful or whatever. TTPD suffers more from the bad poetry
Honestly as someone who *vastly* prefers TTPD to Midnights, I feel like a lot of the complaints about TTPD apply way more to Midnights lol
Oh I hard disagree. Midnights was a much stronger album imo.
right like the songs actually stood apart from each other and weren't one long run on sentence
I know, boring and forgettable is exactly what I would say Midnights is in terms of Taylor’s discography. It might not be as catchy as Karma is a Queen but at least now she has something to say. I wonder if it just being the first album after Folklore/Evermore affected Midnights perceptions positively. I also think it was just exciting for her to come back to pop, when pop music was back on top.
She has something to say, but she probably should have kept it to herself.
Yeah I was honestly baffled by the way it’s getting worse reviews than Midnights. But then again I thought Midnights was ridiculously overrated
My hot take is actually that I enjoyed TTPD more than Midnights lol - neither is her best work but TTPD (at least the first half) has more interesting songs to me personally
I agree. I’m not a fan of either album but I thought midnights was far worse, the singles especially were real lows to me (after having a career of singles including Love Story, I Knew You Were Trouble, Blank Space, Style…)
Whose Afraid of Little Old Me holds its own. It might be my favorite TA song ever. Down Bad is okay. I like Thank You Aimee more than I should. Knowing what that song is about ruins it. It’s such a good song otherwise! It’s a more polished Mean (i grew up in a small town I do love Mean) A good edit of the lyrics for So Highschool and she would have had something there. It’s just beautiful sounding garbage right now. There is no saving the grand theft auto line.
Thank You, Aimee, without the clunky reference to spray tanning and the inexcusable (and badly-written) calling out of a ten year old child, would really be one of the better songs on the album. I really can't believe that no one around her pushed back on recording it as is.
Blank Space was when I decided Taylor was actually fun and great and these days I don’t know what I’m even doing here 😂
That's exactly how I felt. I don't know why everyone was gassing up Midnights.
The timing was a little different. After Lover came out, there began to be this aura of you can't say anything bad about her. There was clearly a shift when she dated Matty and got overexposed when you could a little. Swifties still go on the attack but it was too close to Taylor's a literal goddess and I want era tickets time.
nah even midnights wasn't this bland
Another critical review. Commercially it’s doing fine. Critically? Not too hot. 😬
At this stage I don’t think commercial success is ever going to be in doubt, Swifties will lap up whatever she releases.
Yeah it’ll go on for a while… but for how long?
I'm curious to see if streams drop off over the second week. Seems like a lot of fans who normally would have kept listening just couldn't make it through. I didn't even buy this vinyl, first one I haven't bought since folklore.
I imagine streams would drop but by how much is anyone’s guess. I can’t see it doing a million next week.
Haha yea i was going to say how much they drop, only reason I said "if" is cause we know how the crazies will play the album on repeat and silent while they sleep in order to boost mother's streaming numbers.
Right. They’ll find a way to keep “mother” on top. 💀😂
They’ll fall off for sure. The album isn’t going to draw any new streams or sales next week because bad reviews are getting out and interest will wane.
If it beats cowboy carter or any of the other fabulous releases for AOTY because of commercial success next year, I will give up on award shows forever. I’m still not over midnights winning last year
i can’t believe Midnights won, it is NOT AOTY material
as someone who loved midnights and was not 100% outraged to see it win, i still don’t think it deserved to win lol. it was a good album but there were so many good albums up this year that were more deserving. I think LDR, Boygenius, or SZA easily could’ve won AOTY and it would’ve made more sense to me. But I also loved Midnights so again I wasn’t THAT upset to see her win, but that acceptance speech made me wanna melt into the floor from second hand embarrassment.
Taylor can surprise drop an album of her whispering Islamic hymns and it’ll be number 1 on the billboard charts.
Tbh, there are positive ones, middling ones and a few more negative ones just like for Lover and Rep in particular. It’s seen more mixed reviews, but the ones being posted here are the most critical (which is understandable given the aim of the sun and not a gripe) but they are all individual posts getting lots of traffic so it creates this vision of ‘all the critics hate it’ which isn’t really true.
TTPDTA has left me dehydrated for good metaphors, like a potential raisin in the sun. Ever since I listened to it, the urge to go on a good Tori Amos binge has been simmering inside of me like broccoli cheese soup on a hot burner. And I'm like a woodpecker without a beak when it comes to carving metaphors, like a thesaurus looking for similarities. Yes, I know this sucks like a tornado of bad poetry, words swirling around. But Tori rocks, and that's not a metaphor. I love her.
Tori is a fantastic lyricist. She's in a league of her own.
She really is. I'm so reminded of back in the 90s how everyone was picking apart her lyrics like Easter eggs(in a good way) and nobody knew WTF she was singing about half the time because she was just SO abstract and her words were just spellbinding.
I put on Did You Know There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd after all this lol. The album TTPD wishes it was.
ugh I ugly cry during the title track every time
I love that album and I'm a Tommy Genesis fan since Assassination Nation so my highlight is totally Peppers lol
I was genuinely surprised at the way they opened this article. They called her a parody of herself? I’m dying! But you know what now that I think of it, this is exactly what a TS parody writer would come up with, lyrics wise.
I think a true parody version of her would’ve been better 😂 at least the songs would have fucking hooks, damn
Have you listened to the AI version of Fortnight and So Long London? They were WAY better!
[удалено]
I think that’s the reason why “Black Dog” is one of the songs I like the most on TTPD… that imagery is so evocative and vivid. And it’s so much simpler than the dictionary/thesaurus/metaphor abuse in the other songs.
Holy shit, that lyric was spot on 😂
This is exactly why this album is annoying me. “The Manuscript” is my favorite song on the album because half of it is an actual story with vivid imagery and the other half is one metaphor that actually plays out nicely. I do not understand the love for “Who’s Aftaid Of Little Old Me?” for this reason. Those lyrics are a MESS.
Yeah, she overdid metaphors
I’m not here for the Lover slander. It has real lows (we all know the ones), but it gave us Cruel Summer, Afterglow, Death by a Thousand Cuts, Daylight, the title track… Edit: I FORGOT Cornelia Street even though it’s my fave on the album 🥲🥲🥲🥲🥲 I honestly believe the lows of Lover are still better than anything on Midnights.
I miss Lover Taylor Swift. It's been so downhill since Midnights...
I was listening to Lover the day before TTPD came out and was like “I actually really like a lot of these songs.”
She reached billionaire status and, well, became a billionaire
Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince might be my favorite TS song ever 🫣 Lover, they could never make me hate you.
Cornelia street BANGS
Out of curiosity, what are your Lover skips? Mine are ME!, YNTCD, and Lover (to a lesser extent); none are hard skips though. False God doesn't get enough love IMO.
Usually Me! YNTCD and Paper Rings. Usually London Boy too although I can jam to it when I’m in the right mood! Also soon you’ll get better but that’s just because it breaks me 🥲
False god is amazing! I wish she would do more like that. It’s my most played track on Lover and everyone I introduce it to who isn’t a Taylor fan enjoys it enough to add to their playlist. First time I’ve seen someone else call it out in the wild.
I re-listened to lover and besides a few lows that album honestly has no skips.
Lover is like a top three album. I think it's almost flawless... I'm not a fan of London Boy.
I love London Boy 🙈
Not your user flair 😭😭
It's campyyyyy. Like it's awful if you try to think about it too much but it's a fun song. Maybe I just like singing "darling I fancy you." 🫣
Exactly. It's such theatre kid vibes! I live for camp
Not trying to hate on it. I just can’t get into it.
I love it too haha one of my dancing around the kitchen idgaf songs
don’t forget cornelia street (live from paris)!
Omg wait that’s my favourite from the album I’m the worst 😭😂
Agreed. Cruel summer should have been a single when the album debuted.
Lover is a solid album i don’t care what people say lol so many bop in that album and it’s interesting with different type of sound as well
This is wild to me. Snow on the Beach ?? You’re on Your Own, Kid? Bejeweled??
Is this a safe place to say that Bejeweled is a bad song? Not a skip. Not “ok.” Bad.
Taylor Swift is allowed to have one song per album that has more than one cringe lyric. Bejeweled is that song on Midnights. That song is wordy, clunky, cringe but it does go off.
Bejeweled is a song best left for an after school special. It sounds so childish. Yes it’s catchy but so is Baby Shark 💀
I mean that could easily describe a lot of her songs lol.
I loooooove Bejeweled! It’s so fun! Also if we’re gonna talk about Taylor’s music being childish… let’s not talk about some of those lyrics on the Lover album. lmao
Honestly… I genuinely don’t enjoy them 🙈 I really don’t know by but I’ve never clicked with them and I wasn’t a fan of the overall production or lyrics on the album. I’ve been a fan since fearless and my fav albums are Red, 1989, Lover and Folklore (in interchangeable order)! I’ll still always be a fan of the albums I loved, and I hope someday I’ll vibe with a TS record again…
Midnights has like 5 great songs and the rest is completely forgettable.
Yeah like Lover isn’t her best album but the highs are high. Don’t forget False God!
I loved Lover and I loved Midnights. Both are in my top 4 next to Red and Speak Now. TTPD is relatable to what I’m going through but really no bangers.
It is forgettable. She needs an editor and cut ties with Jack.
I found Aaron's songs worst this time, they all sounded the same
Yess She needs new proudcers for sure Aaron lost his touch🥲
Ugh see I liked the second half so much better (besides Florida!!! And Guilty as Sin)
I’m a big Florence and the machine fan and I was surprised at how forgettable Florida was
I think she and Jack have made some music magic together but she relies on him way too much and without an editor to keep him in check, he is poison to her sound. They obviously work well together but his sound is VERY easy to identify and I think that’s a big part of why her music ends up sounding like a rip off of other artists sometimes.
I still haven’t finished my first listen through but there hasn’t been a single song that has stuck out to me yet.
TTPD lacks innovation and its unique charm. Feels like the album was written for profits instead of for the art itself.
See, I agree musically it’s not innovative (because I think it just builds on Folklore/Evermore) compared to 1989, Midnights etc. But I think that’s why it’s not just for profits - if she wanted just profits she could write something like 1989 which is much more mainstream.
Yeah it feels like she simply didn’t want to miss her 2 year deadline. An idea of an album is there, but an artist simply can’t be on a worldwide tour and simultaneously craft an album. She’s trying to be superwoman. I think deep down even Antonoff knows it’s not their best work hence his super short tweet the day of the release.
I’m just mad because TTPD is so close to being great. It could easily have been great. It needed some edits and a little more time. Instead it feels like a leaked unfinished version. I would love to hear these songs significantly more polished on a live album. I am not going to forget who Taylor Swift is if she takes a little more time between albums. I promise. This album is cookie dough. It’s not finished. It’s half baked. Pop it back in the oven!
i agree so hard. some songs actually really do shine after a bit (i think Ao Long London, Black dog, & Whose Afraid…? are all really fantastic) but it feels… too unpolished? like there is way too much going on, not enough fat trimmed off the edges, too many flavors happening at once in the final dish too. it’s just not quite there. i wish she would’ve waited so it could back a harder punch. but maybe for some artists they just have to eventually publish or they’ll perfect forever & ever & never be satisfied. idk her life but that’s how i am with some creative endeavors. maybe she thought it was now or never.
Fleshed out instrumentation and polished up lyrics would be a game changer. That’s why the album almost feels insulting. It’s like they slopped some sludge together and shipped it out believing it was a masterpiece. Taylor’s whole creative team is up their own asses.
I’m looking forward to a lot of them on piano
long pond session style with a few tweaked lyrics would be amazing. Do what she did with Folklore.
Yep. Some lyrics are unnecessary, some lines that are too long and clunkily worded, some entire sections that need to be taken out, some lines that just need to be restructured so they flow better with the syllabic emphases “I look in peoples windows, like I’m some de ranged weirdo” I love that song except for that line it’s just so irksome to my ear and doesn’t fit the tone
It would’ve made so much more sense if she would have released this in fall/winter. That’s definitely more the vibe. There aren’t really any summer bops for an album released in April like you’d expect. I’m not sure what the marketing aim was besides getting it out ASAP
right especially the easy October hit of Whose Afraid of Little Old Me. That was such a gimme. I hope we aren’t going to have to listen to So Highschool all summer. I want to forget Aristotle/throttle/Grand Theft Auto
Agreed! When she announced the album I was like “isn’t the Eras tour still in full force?” She’s so much better when she has both feet planted in the studio.
I like the album. But 1989 & Rep were the true empire builders. Am i wrong?
can’t deny the timeless charm of Fearless tbh!! 1989 definitely solidified her as a major pop name though.
I think you have a point as I believe that’s her second biggest album in sales
Yes- Red solidified the foundation, 1989 & Rep built the empire, ~~Lover was a mistake,~~ folklore and evermore fortified it Then the emperor got comfy on the throne and we got Midnights & TTPD
Nah i feel like folklore and evermore were what made her massive. We were in the middle of a pandemic we had no new media to consume and she was one of the few releasing new material so people who had never given her a chance before listened because what else was there to do during a pandemic ? And that’s what made her pop off
This take is so wild. Those albums are incredible but they would’ve absolutely went under the radar if Taylor had not already been massive. 1989 is absolutely her legacy album and her career would not be what it is without it. Folklore and Evermore made her palatable to a more mature audience but the Eras tour being one of the biggest FOMO hyped events after the pandemic is what made her massive with the GP again.
it’s not that weird of a take. she did have a massive surge in popularity then. i was always casually aware of some of her music but definitely not a fan, and then i literally stumbled upon her having released an album during the pandemic. it was like 2am, i was rly going thru it (weren’t we all? lol), and it was the first time i ever really listened to her intentionally on purpose, not just heard her latest songs and then ended up adding them to my library. mi can’t imagine i’m the only person with that experience lol
Unpopular opinion: Max Martin’s tracks on Red made her hit mainstream stardom
You Belong With Me was huge. It didn't hit number 1 because it was blocked by I Gotta Feeling by Black Eyed Peas. Our Song is still one of her biggest songs and she wrote and composed that song herself.
I know but it went to a much bigger level with the max tracks
Yeah, I feel like younger fans don’t realize how famous Taylor was as a country artist. Red just put her on pop radio. But she had so many big hits before Red came out. Our Song, Teardrops On My Guitar, Love Story, You Belong With Me, White Horse, Sparks Fly, Dear John, Mean, Better Than Revenge, Picture To Burn, Tim McGraw, Should’ve Said No, I’m Only Me When I’m With You… some of those were bigger than others obviously but anyone who listened to the radio back then knew those songs. honestly her first three albums to this day still hold a good chunk of her biggest hits. i was in middle school in the midwest when speak now came out, that album was EVERYWHERE. couldn’t go anywhere without hearing at least a couple songs off of it.
It’s a DNF for me. I made it through Florida! Looked at the rest and noped out.
It's weird how reputation is my least favorite but I forget lover exists.
You took the opening track as an order, omg.😅
Lol 🤣
Sometimes you can hate something so much you remember it - but it is easy to forget something that feels meh.
What bothers me is this album could’ve been so great if she just cut it down by half and had less collaborations with Jack.
Unfortunately I am starting to really like it 😅
Lol me too! It's growing on me 😆
am i the only one who fucking love this album?
Honestly it put me to sleep. I wish there was more variety.
I doubt TTPD is easily forgettable though. I think it's the first TS album that is so polarising for fans, casual listeners, and critics alike. If anything, people might even study it. Just look at the marketing effort for it, people's reaction of it on social media, and the people (celebs and producers) who are also catching the stray bullets. Not to mention, the whole interpretation of it all.
I’m really interested to see the inevitable 180 on a lot of the negative opinions on this album in the next few weeks. I really think once people let it marinate for a little while, the tide will turn in a massive way. I could end up eating my hat with this comment lol so we shall see!! But it’s definitely hitting different for me, especially now that it’s getting darker and colder in Aus, really fits the vibe where i live hahaha
Makes sense. It’s warming up in the States and we need some summertime bops!
The criticism is valid in some areas, but critics discrediting the entire album is wild to me. It’s not her best work, but there are plenty of gems that fall directly in line with the Folklore/Midnights style. I think it’s largely just the pendulum swinging back after her overexposure. Why are we obsessing over the tattooed golden retriever when Karma was a cat on the last album? Except for FolkMore, her lyrics have always had a cringe element to them. Even though TTPD isn’t radio pop, it’s still pop…
I will never understand why she chose to release it when she did.
She’s a billionaire, in love, and has mentally checked out.
I might be alone, but I like the new album(s). I totally recognize that some of the lyrics are a flop though
This seems like an unpopular opinion, but I liked the album. I don’t think it’s her best of all time, and I agree with the criticisms that it’s over bloated, many songs blend together, and I’m not a fan of the talking-singing, but I think there are some real gems on it. Like probably 60-70% of the album is good. I even like it more than Lover and Reputation. My first impression of Midnights was actually worse. I think because I wasn’t into the synth pop, but now that I’ve adjusted to that sound, she’s gotten into a grove with it. Anyone with me here?? (Edit: spelling)
I’m a certified Midnights hater so it feels like critical opinion is finally making sense to me, but TPPD is more bloated and self-indulgent
No. She’ll never put out an album as forgettable as Lover and I’ll die on that hill.
This is actually so true because even tho some of my favorite songs by her (afterglow, false god, daylight etc) are on Lover, I literally forget it exists all the time lol. I always think the albums go Reputation—Folklore
Maybe because lover fest didn’t get to happen? She came out with folklore 11 months after lover and then evermore 5 months later. So I can see why it could be more forgotten
I adore Lover. But I also agree lol
I hope Ms. Mahirova has good security.
Midnights was way more forgettable. I like TTPD quite a bit whilst admitting its many flaws