90.7 WPSR: Swiftie Saga

THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT

Madeline Degenhart — Fri, 26 Apr 2024 16:52:31 +0000

Fri, 26 Apr 2024 16:52:31 +0000 https://www.wpsrhd.com/blogs/swiftie-saga/post/the-tortured-poets-department/ o384-1525-662bdbcf2ab2a Madeline Degenhart Uncategorised Taylor Swift has done it yet again. Her 11th studio album THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT was released last Friday, April 19th, at midnight. The album featured 16 tracks with collaborations with Post Malone and Florence & The Machine.

For weeks leading up to the release, Swift played some mind games with her fans hinting that the number two would be significant on the day of the release. She is sneaky, but crazy Swifties found a way to decode this Easter egg. Swifties stayed up eagerly until 2 A.M. suspecting something to be released. They were right, and the second part of TTPD was released entitled The Anthology. It holds 15 more tracks making this double album have a whopping 31 tracks in total.

This album is truly something special. It gives listeners an opportunity to sympathize with Swift as she was experiencing her breakup with her ex-boyfriend of six years, Joe Alwyn, all while hosting the highest grossing tour of all time, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour. Swift remarks on this experience in her playful track 13, I Can Do It With a Broken Heart. This song is catchy and has relatable lyrics making it blow up on TikTok within hours of its release. The chorus lyric, “I cry a lot, but I am so productive. It’s an art,” has become a TikTok trend, and mothers, college/high school students, and nurses have joined in on posting to the sound. Eras Tour goers may feel a slight pang of guilt from the line, “All the pieces of me shattered as the crowd was chanting ‘More!’” Swift sings about faking a smile for her fans as she was experiencing some of the strongest feelings of sadness. This song is playful, catchy, and definitely a stand out track on TTPD.

Directly following I Can Do It With a Broken Heart, track 14 takes the cake for best bridge on the album in The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived. This song is suspected to be about Swift’s “summer fling,” Matty Healy. The first chorus of the song features the lyric, “And I don’t even want you back, I just want to know if rusting my sparkling summer was the goal,” and Swift certainly did have a sparkling summer because of her Eras Tour. The beat drops midway through the song, and Swift’s anger is heard through her diction and the power in her voice. She concludes the song with “And I’ll forget you, but I’ll never forgive the smallest man who ever lived.” Swift has officially classified the worst insult to ever tell a man, and I know Matty Healy is not liking the heat he is getting for this song.

In my opinion, the most important track in The Anthology is track 24, thanK you aIMee. You may be wondering, why are the letters, K, I, and M capitalized? Well, that spells out Kim. Yes, as in Kim Kardashian. Swift and Kardashian have been in conflict since 2016 when Kardashian posted a private phone call between Swift and her ex-husband, Kanye West. This song is the revenge that Swift has been looking for. She tells the story about a “bully from her hometown” which is obviously a disguise for Kardashian. A standout lyric is in the chorus, “Everyone knows my mother is a saintly woman, but she used to say she wished that you were dead.” This emphasizes just how brutal their feud was and is. Kim’s daughter, North, is very active on TikTok, and Swift makes a remark about her in the line, “And one day, your kid comes home singing a song that only us two is gonna know is about you.” Swiftie TikTokers have already made parodies of what that encounter could look like. This track displays Swift’s creativity in songwriting and storytelling and can be seen as “the last laugh” in this years-long dispute.

In all, this album is truly remarkable and a personal favorite of mine. It has certainly made my Top 5 Taylor Swift albums list. Next up, fans question if she will add a TTPD set to the European leg of the Eras Tour. The tour resumes in May, and ticket holders will just have to wait and see.

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Eras Tour Argentina

Madeline Degenhart — Thu, 16 Nov 2023 18:00:00 +0000

Taylor Swift opened her South American leg of her Eras Tour last weekend in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and there is so much to unpack. Thursday night, Swift opened her acoustic set by playing The Very First Night, a vault track from Red (Taylor’s Version), and Labyrinth from Midnights. Labyrinth brought a grin to Swift's face as she sang “I’m falling in love again.” This was the first show since she became public with Travis Kelce, the tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs. This pleased her fans beyond measure as in her past performances, Swift has been blank faced as she sang any song about her previous relationship with actor, Joe Alwyn. Swift had to postpone her Friday night show due to weather, but her Saturday night show was surely one for the books. During the acoustic section, Swift sang a mashup of Is It Over Now? and Out of the Woods which left all Swifties absolutely speechless. To top it off, she sang a piano version of End Game which fans speculate is a symbol for her relationship with Kelce: Their relationship is “End Game.” To finish the night strong, Swift sang, “Karma is the guy on the Chiefs coming straight home to me,” in her fan favorite song Karma from Midnights. Kelce was extremely bashful after hearing this, sharing a laugh with Swift’s dad, Scott. Swift closed off this city for her international tour on Sunday, and she will next be in Rio starting Saturday, November 18th. So far, the international leg of the Eras Tour is off to a monumental start, and Swifties are on the edge of their seats waiting to see what else Swift can bring to the table and when she will announce the re-recordings of Reputation and Taylor Swift.

The Love Triangle

Madeline Degenhart — Wed, 04 Oct 2023 19:30:00 +0000

Taylor Swift is notorious for her lyrical masterpiece albums and her genius storytelling. As a former AP Literature student and a loyal swiftie, I often find myself dissecting the meaning behind her metaphoric lyrics, especially in her album folklore. There are three songs on this album in which Swift has written a fictional love triangle between three teenagers, Betty, James, and Augustine.

The 14th track of folklore, betty, is in the perspective of James. James is a high school student who is in a relationship with Betty. In this song James is describing his guilt and regret he feels after cheating on her with an unnamed girl, but swifties have named her Augustine. James states, “The worst thing that I ever did was what I did to you.” This was before he blatantly states that he cheated, but during the bridge of the song he states, “She said ‘James get in, let’s drive,’ those days turned into nights slept next to her, but I dreamt of you all summer long.” Throughout the songs, James repeatedly states, “I’m only 17, I don’t know anything, but I know I miss you.” This shows James’ naivety and misunderstanding of these young girl’s feelings.

In the 8th track of folklore, august, Swift writes in the perspective of Augustine, the girl James cheats on Betty with that summer. Augustine opens the chorus stating “I can see us lost in the memory, August slipped away into a moment of time.” Augustine and James’ time together had them both immersed into the moment; they weren’t aware of the time. In the bridge of the song, Swift’s voice embodies the hurt and disappointment Augustine is feeling. She says “so much for summer love and saying us ‘cause you weren’t mine to lose.” This shows the sadness that Augustine feels when her and James’ relationship comes to an end. She didn’t want to just be a summer fling to James; she is a real person and has real feelings for James.

The 2nd track of folklore, cardigan, is in the perspective of Betty, James’ original girlfriend. This song describes Betty’s feelings and anger of being cheated on that summer. A lyric that really stands out is when Swift wrote, “a friend to all is a friend to none, chase two girls lose the one, when you are young they assume you know nothing.” By chasing both Betty and Augustine, James lost his first true love. This also ties back to James’ lyric in betty when he states that he’s only 17. Finally, Betty states that James “drew stars around [her] scars, but now [she’s] bleeding.” The care and comfort that James once provided has now been wiped away due to his disloyalty.

Taylor Swift’s use of metaphors and unique characterizations in these three songs has allowed me to truly love and understand these songs. It shows the unfortunate reality of teenage relationships which speaks to many of Swift’s young listeners.