Is Taylor Swift’s Honesty Too Much for Gym Bros?
Down Bad Crying at The Gym. I thought I had been the only one to revel in sweat and tears during a workout, Taylor Swift reassures me that she too has been prone to crying amongst the weights. Her honest lyricism in ‘Down Bad’ is comically relatable. The result of her alien love leaving her on this earth is a gymnasium tantrum- and perhaps these lyrics alone are enough to keep gym bros away from her latest creation.
Fleeting Affairs of the Heart
The Tortured Poets Department is a lighthouse for those lost at sea, pulled under by a situationship or a fleeting affair short in length, but long in misery. Swift has created albums dedicated to long-lasting relationships (Long Live Lover) and now with Tortured Poets, it seems that our Tortured Poet has been left bereft and reeling from an affair that lasted no longer than a fortnight. Finally! The master of songwriting has decided to raise awareness for those with long-lasting battle wounds induced by short squabbles with the heart. This type of relationship has been explored by SZA in her album "Ctrl," which delves into the insecurities triggered by a lover who was never fully present, and by Frank Ocean in "Blonde," which touches on the ambiguous yearnings of elusive connections. Swift’s take on the matter is passionate, vengeful and pained.
Swift’s emotional depth- weapon or curse?
Arguably, at the height of her fame, the commentary surrounding Swift has got loud in the past year. Instead of commenting on her dating life, they have come for Swift’s songwriting. This new album has provided Kanye Stans and music snobs alike with ammunition for Swift’s prose. Simply typing in ‘down bad’ on X results in thousands of comments: ‘Wow. How could someone ever be down bad for these lyrics/’Lyrical genius where…’/Swift makes music for deaf people how can this be called poetry?’. On the surface and first listen, Down Bad may sound like a voice note to a friend after having a rough time on the leg press after a breakup, yet there is humour to be found in this image of superstar Swift crying in the gym over a man her friends warned her about. Due to songwriting about such basic human experiences surrounding heartbreak, she is looked down on for not being insanely profound when it comes to her songwriting. In an Instagram post dedicated to the re-release of her album Red (Taylor’s Version) Swift said ‘In the lands of heartbreak, moments of strength, independence and devil-may-care rebellion are intricately woven together with grief, paralysing vulnerability and hopelessness’. Showcasing that writing songs about heartbreak is just as credible as writing songs about politics through this point alone, the emotional depth of Swift’s songwriting when it comes to falling in and out of love may be too much for the gym bro trying to run away from his feelings.
Miss Americana Storyline
Having entered the pop industry at age fourteen, Swift has functioned as a Hannah Montana-like figure for young people all over. Each album represents the passage of youth laid bare. Whether it is the worries of growing up on Speak Now or the heartbreak that comes with ending a relationship with someone you planned on marrying presented on Tortured Poets, her music has always been an accurate backing track to the benchmarks of the growing up experience from 15 onwards. Today we also have the likes of Olivia Rodrigo taking on this role of singing the woes and anxieties of the younger generation. Swift, however, has been recognised as the pioneer girl-next-door figure of youthful reassurance with a message that says ‘Don’t worry I can give you some sparkly relatable lyrics that say I have been there too!’ in the face of breakups and battling school bullies. She has used career setbacks to launch creative business endeavours, most notably with the re-records of her previous albums. She has used criticism as a weapon of self-branding (see the snake imagery of Reputation and the serial dater of Blank Space), and she has spearheaded the phenomenon of an ‘era’, not self-coined by Swift herself but pushed by a fandom obsessed with the different imagery, feeling and ‘look’ of each album. These are all attractive and appealing elements to an audience undergoing life setbacks and searching for a relatable figure to look up to and guide them towards the correct response within a situation. The gym bro who lambasts Swift as a serial dater made famous by Kanye West refuses to delve deeper into the story-telling process Swift takes listeners on, unearthed through her response to career setbacks and expectations through eras and re-records.
Fame as a lyrical weapon
Swift is notorious for using the pitfalls of fame as her lyrical inspiration. This has amassed both support and distaste. In Tortured Poets Swift morphs into a witch-like figure on track Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me? threatening to corrupt the youth with the ‘narcotics’ she puts into her songs, brewed in her ‘house with all the cobwebs’, and seems to always be ‘drunk on her own tears’. Taking down her critics and exploring how fame has come at a price, this song demonstrates Swift’s creative ability to draw on historical stereotypes and self-reflect on her own experiences of fame, using it as a creative weapon. Many interpret Swift’s commentaries on fame as complaints: how can a world-famous superstar with over nine houses compare their lived experience to someone residing within an asylum?’ In Swift’s own words, nothing makes her feel more alive, repeatedly reiterating that no matter what she goes through, she will always use songwriting as her cathartic weapon of choice. There is an underlying ‘she has no right to complain’ mentality that runs deep within this argument, and it comes as no surprise Swift will use her experiences with the paparazzi, body shamers, and dating critics as lyrical inspiration when all have continuously breathed down her neck ever since the age of fifteen. Swift’s prose on fame gives us a multi-faceted approach to being in the spotlight constantly, and it offers a contradictory perspective to our own interpretation of such.
Feeling Seen Has Never Sounded Better
One Swift lyric in particular never fails to impress me: now you hang from my lips like the Gardens of Babylon//with your boots beneath my bed, forever is the sweetest con. Her universal listenability is in her ability to take the most basic of heartbreaking experiences and make it sound beautifully tragic. There is a clear picture being painted by Swift’s fandom when it comes to the obsession with her music catalogue. Feeling seen. Being judged by your closest friends for your bad boy love interest whilst finally receiving an all-encompassing love that you fantasised about for years? Swift acts as a remedy for the youth. Her realistic lyrics partner the realities of rejection and heartbreak with dazzling and fantastical imagery. Like her or not, the obsession with Swift will remain for as long as people experience your classic-what-you-get-on-the-tin heartbreak in the world. What’s not to like about that?