essay about taylor swift music

Featured Topics

Featured series.

A series of random questions answered by Harvard experts.

Explore the Gazette

Read the latest.

This course changed how I see the world

That old ‘Gatsby’ magic, made new 

American Dream turned deadly

So what exactly makes taylor swift so great.

Taylor Swift performs during the “Eras” tour.

AP Photo/George Walker IV

Christina Pazzanese

Harvard Staff Writer

Experts weigh in on her fanbase loyalty, skills as songwriter, businesswoman as her albums, tours break financial, popularity records

Whether you’re a fan of Taylor Swift or not, it’s hard to deny the cultural and financial juggernaut the pop superstar has become this year. Her album “Midnights,” released in late 2022, was the year’s top-seller at 1.8 million copies, twice that of the second-biggest by Harry Styles. Her latest, “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version),” debuted in July at No. 1, giving Swift her 12th in the top spot, surpassing Barbra Streisand for the most No. 1 albums by a woman artist.

Swift’s 131-date “Eras” world tour, currently packing stadiums across the U.S., is on track to be the highest-grossing concert tour of all time, at $1.4 billion, when it ends next year. Analysts estimate the tour will also have a total economic impact from tour-related spending of $5 billion on host cities. Even the Federal Reserve noted the effect her tour is having on regional economies.

To better understand the Swift phenomenon, the Gazette asked some Harvard and Berklee College of Music faculty to assess her artistry, fan base, the tour’s economic impact, and her place in the industry. Interviews have been edited for clarity and length.

‘Very few people have her songwriting talent’ Stephanie Burt, poet and Donald P. and Katherine B. Loker Professor of English

Gazette: How good is Swift as a songwriter?

Burt: She has a terrific ear in terms of how words fit together. She has a sense both of writing songs that convey a feeling that can make you imagine this is the songwriter’s own feelings, like in “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” and a way of telling stories and creating characters. She can write songs that take place at one moment, and she can write songs where the successive verses give you a series of events, like in “Betty” or “Fifteen.”

She has a lot of different gifts as a songwriter, both at the macro level, how the song tells a story or presents an attitude, and at the micro level, how the vowels and consonants fit together, and she’s able to exercise that range, along with quite a lot of melodic gifts, and in a way that does not make her seem highbrow or alienate potential audience members. I would not be surprised to discover that her body of songwriting altogether had a larger number of words than any body of comparable hit songs by a comparable songwriter, except for someone like Bob Dylan.

One of the things that’s really remarkable for me about her is that harmonically, she’s not usually that interesting. It’s pretty normal pop chord progressions and pretty standard varieties of pop arrangement. Her great genius and her innovations and her brilliance as a songwriter is melodic and verbal. And, of course, she’s also very good at singing, which is not to be sneezed at. But she’s able to do that within the fairly tight constraints of existing, easily recognizable chord progressions and rhythmic setups.

She’s able to create verbal hooks, “I’m only 17. I don’t know anything, but I know I miss you.” They stick in your mind, and you spin stories out from them. That’s just being a good writer. She’s a celebrity with a complicated personal life that has been lived in the public eye for quite some time, and so, people speculate about the meanings of her songs, both because they are complex and meaningful works of art, and because some of them do speak to public facts about her life outside the songs.

“Fifteen,” which is a terrific song, gains resonance if you know that it’s about a real person and they’re still friends. But no one would care if it weren’t a brilliantly constructed song. Take something from “Speak Now”: It’s nice to know that “Dear John” is about John Mayer, who really had no business dating a 19-year-old, but it’s also a song about a pattern [of behavior], and it works in itself.

There’s all kinds of celebrity gossip about pop stars who maybe have her level of vocal talent and performing talent but happen not to have her level of songwriting talent. Very few people have her songwriting talent.

Gazette: Which songs would you count among your very favorites?

Burt: There’s so many good songs. I find the ones that speak to me the most are the ones whose topics are closest to my own life. I’m a queer lady. She writes wonderful songs about falling in love or falling out of love with various guys. Those are not, by and large, my favorites even though they’re some of her biggest hits. “Fifteen,” “Betty,” “seven,” “It’s Nice to Have a Friend.”

I actually really like “The Last Great American Dynasty.” The two indie folk albums [“Folklore” and “Evermore”], almost everything on them is amazing. It’s so hard to sustain that level of success artistically while changing that much. Few can do it. “Nothing New” is amazing. “Anti-Hero,” which is the big hit from “Midnights,” is an absolutely fantastic and extraordinarily self-conscious song about being the kind of celebrity that she’s become.

4 albums in Billboard top 10

Taylor Swift is the only living artist to have four albums in the Billboard top 10 at the same time since Herb Alpert in 1966. Following his death in 2016, Prince had five albums in the top 10. (Swift is the only woman with four albums in the top 10 at the same time since the Billboard 200 was combined from its previously separate mono and stereo album charts into one all-encompassing list in August of 1963.)

Source: Billboard

‘Strong social and emotional bond that people feel with her’ Alexandra Gold , clinical fellow in psychology at MGH and Harvard Medical School

Gazette: Swift appears to have a devoted fan base who feel intensely connected to her and her music. Why is that?

GOLD: There is a strong social and emotional bond that people feel with her. And in general, when people become super fans or part of the fandom, it’s often because there’s something about the object of that fandom, the public figure or celebrity, that does connect back to their identity in some way. That’s often the link.

In the case of Taylor, there’s a couple of things going on. The first piece is relatability. Even though there’s aspects of her that maybe don’t feel very relatable — she’s a celebrity and lives a very different life from her fans — what she is singing about — the lyrical content as well as the emotions that underlie the lyrical content — are very relatable to a lot of people. There’s something that is very common to the human experience.

Another piece is a lot of Millennials, as well as Gen Z now, are fans of Taylor Swift. With the Millennials, a lot of people grew up alongside her. When they were having some of these first experiences, maybe with relationships or entering adulthood, she was doing that at the same time and singing about that. Her life story mapped onto their life story, in some way.

For Gen Z, during the pandemic, there was a lot of TikTok content about her, she was putting out many albums, so a new generation discovered her, and they’re also having similar experiences. Overall, she’s been really important for identity development and growth for a lot of people.

@taylorswift That’s my whole world 💕 #tstheerastour #swifttok ♬ So it goes x Miss Americana – 🪩

A third piece is aspirational. She is a role model. She is a great example of someone who sticks to their values and shows their fan base that they can reach their goals, whatever those might be. For instance, she’s claiming ownership of her work and has been successful in putting out re-recordings [of her older albums] and doing that despite barriers or obstacles that might be in the way. Seeing someone do something like that could be inspiring for a lot of young people.

And then, lastly, the fan community is a big part of this. People often form their identity around relationships not just with a celebrity, but also with other fans. The fan community that Taylor has around her, people meet their friends through it and people become part of something bigger than themselves. That is really important for them as they grow up and as they go through life.

Gazette: Swift has had to tell some fans to stop harassing people she once dated. Where’s the line between fan and fanatic?

GOLD: I think fandoms are, overall, very positive. That is an important message, that being a fan is a very positive thing. It’s important to be aware of when it’s interfering in other aspects of one’s life — not engaging in other areas that might be important, other relationships, whether time spent online is causing anxiety or stress or negative feelings for people. Trying to defend Taylor against other celebrities, for instance, that’s when it maybe goes into a category of “OK, let’s take a step back and think about what we can do to bring this back to a place where it feels more positive.” Recognize while this is a relationship that’s important to you, it’s not a friendship. And so, if someone starts to feel like there’s a two-way relationship when there’s no evidence that’s happening, that’s also something to be aware of.

‘The kinds of gains you see in an event like a Super Bowl’ Matthew Andrews , Edward S. Mason Senior Lecturer in International Development at Harvard Kennedy School

GAZETTE: You and some colleagues examined the effects on cities and regions hosting mega events. The total economic impact to host cities of Swift concerts on her current tour is expected to hit $5 billion. Does that sound plausible?

ANDREWS: Those numbers, I think, are completely accurate. I would be in agreement with those numbers because those are the kinds of gains you see in an event like a Super Bowl. The thing that is so amazing about the Taylor Swift concert, in particular, is that it goes from city to city, and you see the same kind of impact in city after city. You do see it with some other musicians, as well. But this is something that’s on a scale and a consistency that we haven’t really seen before.

Swift’s 131-date “Eras” world tour, currently packing stadiums across the U.S., is on track to be the highest-grossing concert tour of all time. Pictured is a June show at Acrisure Stadium in Pittsburgh.

Benjamin B. Braun/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via AP

Gazette: Which industries typically benefit when a major concert tour or sporting event takes place?

ANDREWS: The main beneficiaries in the private sector are people involved in tourism and the support network around the entertainment industry, so it is going to be hotels, restaurants, tourism agencies. It’s going to be anything to do with transportation hubs. They are going to be the primary beneficiaries.

More like this

The business of being Beyoncé

Why do some bands rocket when others sputter out?

Prince as ‘knowing big brother’

Take those old records off the shelf

Why that song is stuck in your head

The costs to the public sector can be quite significant. And the cost for people in these areas who are not directly benefiting can be quite significant in terms of congestion, use of roads, just wear and tear, in terms of policing. This is a really important one — the cost of public order. Unless the government really thinks this through and charges for this as part of its permitting process, the government can end up on the short end after these kinds of events.

The other thing about these events that is increasingly attracting attention, from a public policy perspective, are climate change concerns. You have many, many people transporting themselves to a small area and a lot [are] coming through the air and through vehicles. This is something we worry about a lot more with prolonged mega events like a World Cup than with something like a Taylor Swift concert, but you do need to think about what those costs are.

‘Standing up for … rights and doing good business’ Ralph Jaccodine , assistant professor of music business/management, Berklee College of Music

GAZETTE: What are the factors that make Swift a successful performer from an industry perspective?

Jaccodine: First of all, if you’re going to talk about Taylor Swift, you’ve got to talk about the power of great songs. It all starts with the power of great songs. That’s why we’re still listening to The Beatles, and Bob Dylan, and Frank Sinatra. And like Bowie and Gaga and Dylan, she’s not afraid to stretch. She’s not afraid to bring her audience for a ride. We’ve seen her grow up in real life, from a young girl to a woman with power, and she’s owning it.

Number two, and this is really important: You’ve got to be great live. My students come to me and say, “We have 53 likes on this video, and we’re not selling tickets.” They don’t understand the power of going in front of people and blowing them away. In my business, as a manager, 80 percent of the income comes from live performances, so I want them to change lives live. I’m a massive Springsteen fan. I’m going to be seeing Springsteen at Gillette. I’ve seen him 12 times. I don’t need to see Bruce anymore. I’m an old guy, but I’m still going to rock concerts for artists to change my life. Taylor Swift’s songs, combined with how great she is live, is a powerful combination.

She’s always had a good team around her, smart people around her, good publicists, and good management. When you’re that good, you have the best in the industry. Her team is great: They build anticipation; they create a buzz about things. She’s imprinted her fans in such a way that they want everything about her. The day before a big stadium show, the T-shirt stand is open and there’s thousands of people in line. They hang on to every word of her social media posting, look at all the pictures. They share it; they talk about it; they have groups. That’s really hard to pull off.

GAZETTE: Has her advocacy for better artist compensation from streaming platforms and record labels and her fight to reclaim control of her back catalog made a difference?

Jaccodine:   Absolutely. First, in the awareness of these topics. The general music fan isn’t aware of streaming revenues or master rights or re-recording rights. They don’t know or really care, but she shines a light on all these things. She shines a light on management contracts and what labels are or what labels aren’t. The whole master recordings topic has been spotlighted by Taylor. She had the budget and the resources and the talent to re-record things. The whole exercise was done in public; the whole exercise was reported on. So now, students are studying that, and they’re questioning that for the first time.

I do know she’s empowered and imprinted serious numbers of people that are fans of music or musicians themselves because of her influence. I look at Rihanna; I look at Beyoncé; I look at Taylor Swift. These are the biggest artists on the planet. They’re all women that are empowering girls and standing up for their rights and doing good business. I love it; I love it.

Share this article

You might like.

A photographer’s love letter to ‘Vision and Justice’

Fitzgerald’s masterpiece, now the inspiration for a new A.R.T. musical, never reads the same 

He just needs to pass the bar now. But blue-collar Conor’s life spirals after a tangled affair at old-money seaside enclave in Teddy Wayne’s literary thriller

More than a planetary fender-bender

New study finds Earth collided with dense interstellar cloud, possibly affecting life on planet

Bringing back a long extinct bird

Scientists sequence complete genome of bush moa, offering insights into its natural history, possible clues to evolution of flightless birds

Alzheimer’s disease indicators track with biological changes in brain, study finds

Researchers see self-reported memory loss may be early, preclinical warning

Three Years After reputation It's Time to Accept It As Taylor Swift's Best Album

Lost in an era of polarizing rhetoric, the star's bold departure was wrongly written off as a political fumble. That couldn't be further from the truth.

Hence, reputation didn’t really sell. (It’s her second lowest selling record, if you want to get all capitalist about it.) And yet, its critical reviews were glowing across the board. The New York Times ’ Jon Caramanica called it “bombastic, unexpected, sneakily potent.” Rolling Stone ’s Rob Sheffield called it “her most intimate album,” and Variety called it “maybe her best.” The album is not flimsy or cute like the follow-up Lover , and it’s more mature than Speak Now. It’s edgier than 1989 . It goes way harder than Folklore . Red , Fearless , and Taylor Swift are youthful, softer portraits of a country Taylor gone by ( Variety calls this “ dweeb-era Taylor ”). Today is the third anniversary of Taylor Swift’s reputation , and it’s time to revisit, appreciate, and hail it for what it is—her greatest record of all time—because we can consume it divorced from its 2017 context, with the perspective of the woman we now know Taylor Swift to be.

When reputation came out in 2017, Taylor Swift had, up until then, remained largely apolitical through perhaps the most politicized time in modern American history. During the 2016 election and beyond, she kept her politics to herself, not endorsing a candidate, presumably so as not to alienate any of her red-leaning fans. But her silence was really quite loud. Some in the media saw it as complacency, a failure to use her platform to denounce the evil of the Trump rhetoric ( The Guardian called Swift "a musical envoy for the president’s values" in 2017). Even worse, her silence was interpreted by some online as an approval of it, to the point where far-right white supremacists crowned her their Aryan goddess .

But instead of denouncing Trump or even the far-right neo-Nazis, Swift released this album—with a cover that one could connect to the President's hatred of the media. In the album's liner notes, she doubled down on her frustration with the media, stating that “When this album comes out, gossip blogs will scour the lyrics for the men they can attribute to each song, as if the inspiration for music is as simple and basic as a paternity test.” It was, by all accounts, a bad look.

At the time, in the thick of a dark time for American discourse, it was easy to draw a line between Taylor Swift and the right. In divisive, high-stakes times like the past four years have been, it's important to hold celebrities accountable, and for them to use their platforms with conviction. Silence is complicity. But it's the confidence Swift discovered on reputation that allowed her to break free of the demure, neutral, girlish persona that stifled her political voice for the first decade or so of her career. Taylor needed reputation, and the backlash to it, perhaps, to rouse her public political mobilization. A year after reputation , Swift endorsed her first political candidates—both local Tennessee Democrats—and since then, she's proudly fought for LGBTQ rights and denounced the evils of the Trump presidency. Taylor is now openly political on main and doesn’t care what Karlie Kloss’ husband’s brother’s in-laws or anyone else thinks. And with the hindsight of three years, divorcing reputation from the polarization of the early Trump years, it's easier to appreciate it for what it is: a bold and powerful album by an artist who's unafraid to challenge herself.

What should have been clear at the time is none of the music on reputation is political or specifically media-blasting at all, really. After years of very public shame, reputation is Taylor reclaiming her own narrative. It’s sexy and intimate and powerful in a way that none of its predecessors were or successors have been, and she tells you that herself on the title track—“I'm sorry, the old Taylor can’t come to the phone right now. Why? ‘Cause she’s dead!”. The album is a portrait of a liberated Taylor, representative of the beginning of a new era of agency for her, one of outspokenness and advocacy. It’s the first album Swift swears on, or references drinking alcohol, or real, physical intimacy. Musically, this is also true. reputation is straight pop music with blaring, bold inspiration from EDM and hip hop that we’d never heard from Taylor up until this point. (Shoutout to the King of My Heart Jack Antonoff.) reputation was a risk, a revolution, even, but it was one she bulldozed. And not just for herself, either. Rolling Stone asserts that “if Ariana, Billie, Halsey and others seem so effortlessly themselves, it’s in part because Swift worked so hard at speaking her truth and smiting her enemies.”

It is also without a doubt the most versatile album from Swift’s body of work. Not musically, perhaps, but we all know a Taylor Swift album is for first for feeling your feelings and second for actually listening to. Try emoting to Lover after you’ve been cheated on, or folklore while you’re giddy after a great third date, and let me know how that goes. But reputation ? The album can do it all. Put on “King of My Heart” when you’re falling in love, “Look What You Made Me Do” when you’re mad at your significant other. Any emotion your little heart can feel can be felt to Taylor Swift’s multifaceted masterpiece reputation. It’s underrated-ness is part of the appeal, too. We still get Swift’s emblematic perfect pop song formula and raw, head-over-heels vulnerability on bangers such as “Gorgeous,” “Dress,” “Delicate,” and “Getaway Car,” but these songs are undervalued classics in the canon of Taylor Swift. They don’t have the widespread recognition or over-radioplay of “Love Story” ( Fearless ) or “Welcome to New York,” ( 1989 ) but they are just as good, as classically Taylor as can be, if not a little lustier, a little dirtier than we’re used to. reputation is full of these sleeper hits.

It must be said, without pointing fingers at any one of our 15 children that we love equally, that there are weak points. Something about a rap verse, and Ed Sheeran, you say? Complete perfection is a myth. Miss Swift is only human, after all.

If you still aren’t convinced, let’s start here: toss on “Look What You Made Me Do” today, if for no reason but to celebrate sworn Swift nemesis Kanye West’s loss of the Presidential election (and Swift-endorsed Joe Biden’s win!). If you find yourself bobbing your head along, even slightly, start the album from the top. Just one reputation cover to cover listen, for its birthday! Take your time with it.

I’ll call Billboard to see what I can do about getting some charts rearranged.

@media(max-width: 73.75rem){.css-1ktbcds:before{margin-right:0.4375rem;color:#FF3A30;content:'_';display:inline-block;}}@media(min-width: 64rem){.css-1ktbcds:before{margin-right:0.5625rem;color:#FF3A30;content:'_';display:inline-block;}} Music

The Things We Don’t Say About Rap Music

21 Songs to Kick-start Your Pride Playlist

DIIV Brings Shoegaze for the Revolution

The Best Albums of 2024 (So Far)

Childish Gambino Is Back, Baby

Kings of Leon’s Caleb Followill Is Different Now

Four Hours with the Breakout Band of 2024

Drake and Kendrick Lamar’s Rap Beef, Explained

The Best Songs of 2024 (So Far)

With ‘TTPD,’ Taylor Swift Makes One for Herself

‘The Tortured Poets Department’ Lyrics Are Wild

• Manage Account

9 Ways Taylor Swift Has Changed the Music Business

Look what she made it do.

By Marc Schneider

Marc Schneider

• Share on Facebook
• Share to Flipboard
• Share on Pinterest
• + additional share options added
• Share on Tumblr
• Share on Reddit
• Share on LinkedIn
• Share on Whats App
• Send an Email
• Print this article
• Post a Comment

Taylor Swift ’s seismic impact on the music industry over the past 17 years since her debut isn’t limited to her unparalleled commercial success, but also encompasses her influence on everything from artists’ rights to smashing the traditional album release model to changing the conversation about song rights and ownership. She’s an advocate, a style icon, a marketing wiz, a prolific songwriter, a pusher of visual boundaries and a record-breaking road warrior. And she sells a ton of albums — including, as we’ve seen over the past couple of years, remakes of her old ones.

It’s rare to ascend to the pinnacle of pop stardom, as Swift has, and rarer still to impact the business so profoundly. Since the debut of her first album at age 16, Swift has shown a preternatural gift for engaging with her fans, inspiring the kind of devotion that leaves them to await each new song, album and merch release with bated breath — not to mention the kind of fervor that can crash Ticketmaster (and result in a Senate Judiciary hearing).

During Swift’s reign, she has used her untold influence to change seemingly every aspect of the music industry — from helping inspire a vinyl revolution, to motivating record labels to alter the way contracts are written , to changing the way concert tickets are bought and sold. And when it comes to the music itself, she’s navigated shifts in her sound with savvy and (for the most part) grace, retaining the base of devoted young fans who have grown up alongside her while expanding to new audiences through her embrace of everything from pop to trap to folk to hip-hop.

Below, here are nine ways Taylor Swift has changed the music business.

She's a Champion of Artists' Rights

It’s easy to forget today, but for a nearly three-year stretch in the 2010s, Taylor Swift’s music was MIA on Spotify. That’s because the singer-songwriter — who had recently crossed over into pop megastardom with her massive album 1989 — pulled her catalog from the streaming service in November 2014 in protest over low royalty payouts for its “freemium” model. Just months prior, Swift had hinted at her displeasure in a Wall Street Journal op-ed in which she wrote, “Valuable things should be paid for. It’s my opinion that music should not be free.” Swift wouldn’t allow her music back on the service until June 2017.

That wasn’t the last time Swift flexed her industry power in the name of artist rights. In 2015, she threatened to keep 1989 off of Apple Music, which was then preparing to launch, over its decision not to pay royalties to artists during the streamer’s free three-month trial period. Apple made an about-face just one day later by announcing that it would pay those royalties after all. “When I woke up this morning and saw what Taylor had written, it really solidified that we needed a change,” tweeted Apple’s then-senior vp of internet services and software Eddy Cue. The company’s abrupt change of heart was a testament to Swift’s superstar clout, leveraged in service of artists at all levels. – Chris Eggertsen

She Mastered the Art of Taking Control

After the master recordings for her first six albums, along with her former label Big Machine Label Group, were sold to Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings in 2019, Swift announced that she would re-record the songs included in the sale to gain master ownership. In a Tumblr post, she called the sale to Braun, with whom she was not on good terms, a “worst case scenario.” A little over a year later, Braun sold Swift’s work to Shamrock Holdings. She moved forward with her plans to re-record all of her early albums, but it was a risky move — one that had basically never been done before on such a large scale. To do it would require incredible amounts of time and money from the already busy superstar to recreate her old work with precision — plus, there was no guarantee that fans would ditch the original recordings for her new ones.

But by the time her first Taylor’s Version album was released, there was no doubt the Swifties would have her back. Fearless (Taylor’s Version) debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart. A year after its release, it became even more clear that Swift’s plan was working. The original version of Fearless had earned just 242,000 equivalent album units that year, compared to the new Taylor’s Version of the album which earned 1 million equivalent album units in the same time period. Now, Swift is three albums into her quest to “regain the sense of pride [she] once had” in her old work, as she once put it on Twitter. All three of the re-releases out so far – Fearless (Taylor’s Version) , Red (Taylor’s Version) and Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) — have debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200. – Kristin Robinson

She Found a Way to Dominate Across Consumption Metrics

For several years in the 2010s, Taylor pulled her music from streaming services, fearing that the music’s free availability would cut into her physical sales. But in the 2020s, she found a way to have her cake and sell it too: 2022’s Midnights not only scored the third-largest-ever streaming week for an album with its 549.26 million on-demand U.S. official streams in its debut frame, but it also sold 1.14 million copies, including a record 575,000 on vinyl. She achieved this through inspired promotion and marketing that puts both a premium on streaming her new material early and often to be part of the conversation around it — and encouraging extra listens through surprise drops like the Midnights (3am Edition) , which arrived mere hours after the original set and added seven new tracks — as well as an emphasis on her albums as art objects and collector’s items, which have helped spur physical sales (of vinyl in particular) to commercial heights not seen in decades.

With different-colored LP variants and packaging containing fan-servicing easter eggs and bonus materials, Swifties will often buy multiple copies of the same Swift albums, both online through her web store and through major chain and independent record stores, where she’s encouraged in-person shopping by releasing a number of store exclusives. The result is perhaps the lone contemporary artist who can both stream as well as Drake and sell as well as an Adele, the exemplar for what commercial success as a recording artist looks like in 2023. – Andrew Unterberger

She Changed the Way Artists Look at Engaging With Fans

Remember the old days when artists walled themselves off from fans, preferring enigmatic over approachable? Taylor dispensed with all that early in her career, becoming one of the first major acts to not just use social media as a messaging tool but as a way to directly communicate with fans. She extended that sense of intimacy and connection on platforms like Twitter and Instagram to IRL situations as well, like with personalized gifts and letters to members of the Swiftie community, secret listening parties at her house for upcoming album releases and meet-and-greets during her sold-out tours. And who can forget that time she invited hundreds of fans into her house for baking and dancing? Taylor’s mastery of engagement also involves surprising the hell out of fans with unexpected new music (see: Folklore ) — all the better in her quest to prevent leaks — and holding various contests allowing fans to engage in direct ways with promotional campaigns. This is all to say that Taylor’s devotion to Swifties (and theirs to her) has changed the way artists prioritize fan engagement and has laid solid the groundwork for other acts to build meaningful connections with their own supporters. – Marc Schneider

She's a Tour-de-force

Taylor’s dominance of the touring industry goes back more than a decade: when Swift’s acceptance speech was famously interrupted by Kanye West at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, Swift was in the middle of her sophomore Fearless tour, performing in front of 1.2 million fans across the United States, U.K and Australia, earning $66 million in ticket sales. In 2010, at the age of 21, Swift headlined her first stadium show at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass. and has returned every tour since, including three stops in May 2023 on her Eras Tour, for a record 13 concerts at the stadium that’s long been home to the New England Patriots.

Swift would go on to cross the $100 million mark in 2011 with her Speak Now Tour and generate an impressive $150 million with the help of longtime promoter and family friend Louis Messina from the Messina Touring Group, and go on to generate $250 million in sales for her 2014-2015 1989 World Tour. The success of each tour was proof of just how much fans valued Swift’s music, and the “Blank Space” singer wasn’t the only one noticing. Scalpers were also watching and looking for easy opportunities to make a quick buck, buying up affordable tickets meant for fans and flipping them on the secondary market. For her 2017 Reputation Tour, Swift would pilot a new technology developed by Ticketmaster aimed at keeping tickets out of the hands of scalpers. – Dave Brooks

She Prompted Major Ticketing Reforms

Scalpers love Taylor almost as much as her fans, and it’s that pesky truth that has planted her at the center of many of the concert industry’s reforms and strategies over the years to conjure a more fair marketplace. Long before the infamous crash of her Eras Tour ticket presale, which has prompted dozens of Federal and state bills and a high-profile Senate grilling of some of the touring world’s top execs, Swift synced up with Ticketmaster on strategies to minimize scalping. Before 2018’s Reputation Tour, she partnered with Ticketmaster’s then-new Verified Fan program to create SwiftTix, which had fans register in advance for an opportunity to buy tickets during the presale, with their place in line partially boosted by purchasing fan merch and posting about the tour online. Additionally, Swift and her team have employed dynamic pricing, where ticket prices fluctuated based on demand.

Today, securing advance registration for an opportunity to buy tickets, along with seat-by-seat pricing based on market demand, have become staples of most high-demand tours. The war on bots, scalpers and random technical issues — see the recent snafu in France — clearly isn’t over, but Taylor’s on the frontlines. – MS

She Showed an Artist Can Change (Genres) 

It’s worth noting that Taylor was never just a country artist. Though her 2006 self-titled album was released and marketed as a country record, the set was decidedly pop-leaning, adhering to a template set by Nashville forebears like Shania Twain and Faith Hill. She continued on that trajectory with Fearless , Speak Now and Red — the latter of which was noted as a transitional record, prepping fans for her turn to full-bore pop on 2014’s 1989 . With the possible exception of the then-divisive Reputation — which pulled from electropop, trap and even hip-hop and has since undergone something of a re-evaluation — Swift’s fanbase only seemed to swell with each evolution. On her back-to-back pandemic albums, Folklore and Evermore , Swift experimented with an indie folk/rock sound that served to broaden her fanbase to more alternative-minded audiences. The result is a discography that seems to hold space for nearly every kind of listener — no doubt helping her career-spanning Eras Tour become arguably the must-see blockbuster of the year. – CE

She's an Elite Marketer

Throughout the easy-to-delineate phases of her music career — country, pop, folk and re-recordings — Taylor and her team have flexed their brand and marketing prowess in too many ways to count (or explain in a listicle blurb). She understands her audience and has cultivated an iron-clad personal brand through her genuine connection with them. With each transition in sound and vibe (like going from the youthful pop of 1989 to the angry pop of Reputation and then back to the light for Lover ) she has tailored her style, her color palette, her persona as a winner (taking back her intellectual property) to fit the story she’s telling at that point in time. Her enduring relevance has a lot to do with her constant reinvention through personal storytelling and the kinds of strategic album releases, promotional campaigns and larger-than-life tours that don’t neatly fit industry narratives. Case in point: with her Taylor’s Version series of re-recordings of Big Machine-era albums, she has pulled off a coup of re -marketing her own career to a new generation of fans, while forging an even deeper connection with long-haul Swifties. – MS

She Changed the Way Label Contracts Are Written

With heavily publicized re-recordings of Fearless , Red , Speak Now and 1989 doing blockbuster numbers — and consistently outperforming the original albums on streaming services — several more artists have either released re-recordings of their own music ( Switchfoot , Wheatus, Paris Hilton ) or announced their intention to do so ( Ashanti ). According to some top music attorneys, that has spurred record labels to overhaul contracts to include language prohibiting new signees from re-recording their music for as long as 30 years — a significantly longer period of time than was the norm previously. While it’s difficult to imagine almost any other artist replicating Swift’s success on this front, the overwhelming triumph of her Taylor’s Versions has clearly been inspirational not just to other artists but to label bosses, who are now clearly intent on preventing a similar situation from happening in the future. – CE

Get weekly rundowns straight to your inbox

Want to know what everyone in the music business is talking about?

Get in the know on.

Billboard is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2024 Billboard Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

optional screen reader

Charts expand charts menu.

• Billboard Hot 100™
• Billboard 200™
• Hits Of The World™
• TikTok Billboard Top 50
• Songs Of The Summer
• Song Breaker
• Year-End Charts
• Decade-End Charts

Music Expand music menu

• R&B/Hip-Hop

Videos Expand videos menu

Culture expand culture menu, media expand media menu, business expand business menu.

• Business News
• Record Labels
• View All Pro

Pro Tools Expand pro-tools menu

• Songwriters & Producers
• Artist Index
• Royalty Calculator
• Market Watch
• Industry Events Calendar

Billboard Español Expand billboard-espanol menu

• Cultura y Entretenimiento

Get Up Anthems by Tres Expand get-up-anthems-by-tres menu

Honda music expand honda-music menu.

Taylor Swift is the artist of the decade

• Insider is reminiscing about the past 10 years of musical greats with a series of opinion essays dedicated to the artists who inspired fans around the world. Here, associate celebrity news editor Courteney Larocca explains why she believes Taylor Swift is the greatest artist of the decade.
• Not only has Swift been putting out No. 1 hit after No. 1 hit this decade, but her music has latched onto its listeners in deeply intimate ways. 
• The singer has also been actively using her platform as a successful artist to shed light on injustices within the music industry to ensure a younger generation of musicians can thrive in an environment that cares about their work, as opposed to commodifies it. 
• Visit Insider's homepage for more stories .

Insider is looking back on the last decade of musical greats with a series of opinion essays . Last up: Taylor Swift.

Taylor Swift knows that if you're the smartest person in the room, then you're in the wrong room. Oddly enough, Swift usually is the smartest person in any room. 

While the casual observer may see Swift as nothing more than a pop star, she's one of the few people who has actively been making her industry — and the lives of her fans — better in irreversible and notable ways throughout the decade.

Swift was barely 20 years old when she became the youngest artist to ever win album of the year at the Grammy Awards on January 31, 2010, for her sophomore album, "Fearless." While the album came out in late 2008, it set Swift up to become an international phenomenon over the course of the 2010s; it even landed at No. 98 on this decade's overall Billboard Hot 200 list. 

Her early success made sense — audiences love a wunderkind, plus there was something so incredibly relatable about a teenager telling her crush, "you belong with me." 

But for me, and other fans of Swift, it was more than that. She was someone we could see ourselves in as we navigated our own lives and romances. And with the release of "Speak Now," in late 2010, Swift proved she wasn't capable of just reinventing optimistic love stories, she had a complete grasp on heartbreak and pain, too. 

Swift demonstrated her songwriting prowess early on, and her music only continued to get stronger all the way through her 2019 album, 'Lover'

"Speak Now" is an entirely self-written album that charted on the Billboard Hot 200 for 137 weeks , which was not only a huge middle finger to critics who claimed Swift didn't write her own music , but also proof she was one of the most promising songwriters of her generation. 

Arming herself with lyrics like "I feel you forget me like I used to feel you breathe," and "The lingering question kept me up / Two a.m., who do you love?" Swift created a bulletproof foundation for a career built around her uncanny ability to pinpoint crucial moments of intimacy and turn them into universal anthems of heartbreak, love, and loss that became soundtracks to real fans' lives.

Obviously, the stellar music never stopped coming. With 2012 came "Red," an album that's aged so gracefully that it's landed on numerous best albums of the 2010s lists .

Swift dropped her pop masterpiece, "1989," in 2014 — an album that boasts her biggest Billboard Hot 100 hit to date , " Shake It Off ," which stayed on the chart for 50 consecutive weeks. "1989" also earned Swift another album of the year win at the Grammys, making her the first woman to ever be honored with that award twice. 

Swift continued her career growth with "Reputation" in 2017, which helped her break The Rolling Stones' record for highest-grossing US tour in history by earning a whopping $266.1 million. Then, capping off the decade came 2019's "Lover," an album that showcased all of Swift's immense musical talents, but stands out in her catalog as the first album that she outright owns — a triumph that goes far beyond the music itself.

It's important to note, though, that there is no singular album that can easily be delegated as the "fan favorite," largely because each album is so special within Swift's discography. If you picked seven different fans off the street, they could very easily all have a different answer to the question, "What is your favorite Taylor Swift album?" 

Even critics can't fully answer that question. While "Red" is known for being critically beloved (and is my own personal favorite), Billboard had six of its writers argue for one of her first six studio albums as being her best. Also, when I ranked Swift's best and worst songs for Insider earlier this year, songs from every single one of her albums made the "best" list. 

One of the reasons Swift's fans constantly latched onto her music this decade — leading to her chart-topping dominance — was because her lyrics always felt so personal, yet relatable at the same time. 

Take "All Too Well," for instance. It was a deep cut tucked cleverly away at track No. 5 on "Red." It was never released as a single, but this mighty pop-rock ballad became the sort of musical zenith most artists only dream about writing.

“All Too Well” was never a single, and it always blows my mind that it is consistently one of the loudest songs the crowd sings when I play it. Moments like this defined the Reputation Stadium Tour for me, and I can’t wait for you to see it in full starting at 12:01 AM December 31, pacific A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift) on Dec 29, 2018 at 9:52am PST Dec 29, 2018 at 9:52am PST

Hearing Swift weave in intimate details about listening to her ill-fated lover's mother tell stories about his childhood or leaving her scarf at his sister's house might seem too specific to reach a larger audience outside of her piano room, but it's exactly that candor that makes Swift's best songs feel so ubiquitous. 

Swift's relatability proved crucial in 2017 when it came to her impacts on societal shifts outside of the music industry

Two months before the New York Times exposé of Harvey Weinstein was published, Swift stood up in a Denver courthouse against an ex-radio DJ who groped her at a 2013 meet-and-greet and then had the gall to sue her for damages after he was fired from his job. 

Related stories

The phrases from her testimony , "I'm critical of your client sticking his hand under my skirt and grabbing my a--," and "I'm not going to let you or your client make me feel in any way that this is my fault," will forever be ingrained in Swift's fans' minds alongside the lyrics she wrote in her high school diaries . 

After she won her symbolic $1, which she sought out for "anyone who feels silenced by a sexual assault," The Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, or RAINN, told ABC that its national hotline saw a 35% increase in calls over the weekend following her testimony. 

"Seeing someone that they respect, that they identify with [state they've been assaulted], has a big impact," RAINN's president Scott Berkowitz told ABC News at the time.

It's easy to look at a statistic and not think about the people behind it, but I can say that for myself, Swift played a pivotal role in how I viewed my own sexual assault. 

Even before her fearless testimony, I turned to her 2010 ballad, "Dear John," for validation that I wasn't the only woman who ever counted her footsteps, praying the floor won't fall through again while dating a man with a "sick need to take love away." I later found solace in "Clean," the atmospheric "1989" closer that promises its listener that they'll one day be able to finally breathe after a roller-coaster relationship. 

There's no doubt in my mind that I'm not the only one who saw their own pain reflected in Swift's lyrics, allowing them to grieve. After all, she wouldn't have become the artist with the highest-ever amount of American Music Awards , which is a fully fan-voted show, if her music was just OK . 

Swift has also made strides at bettering the music industry for her fellow artists as well as herself

I won't rehash the recent legal woes brought on by Scott Borchetta selling Swift's former label Big Machine Records — and thus, all of Swift's catalog up through 2017's "Reputation" — to Scooter Braun (because who needs Big Machine anyway? ). I will say that Swift fighting to own her art, and by proximity her fight for all artists to own their art, is just one example of the work she's done this decade to protect artists' rights. 

You may remember that she got endlessly dragged for taking her music off Spotify or writing a letter to Apple condemning its policy of not paying artists during a three-month free trial period of Apple Music. But underneath all of the misogynistic, " she's only out for money " criticisms spat at her, you'll find she did those things to bring light to issues within her industry that hurt up-and-coming artists who don't have the millions of dollars that Swift has. Within less than 24 hours, Swift received a direct response to her open letter to Apple, saying the company had decided to reverse its decision.

When Swift chose to leave Big Machine behind in 2018, she didn't just leave for the sake of leaving. She instead negotiated a deal with Universal Music Group that not only granted her the rights to everything she would create under the label but also included a clause in her contract stipulating that "any sale of [UMG's] Spotify shares result in a distribution of money to their artists, non-recoupable." 

My new home 🎶 A post shared by Taylor Swift (@taylorswift) on Nov 19, 2018 at 7:37am PST Nov 19, 2018 at 7:37am PST

She also said the label had agreed to this "at what they believe will be much better terms than paid out previously by other major labels." 

That means that with her contract, Swift made sure other favorite artists of this decade, like Rihanna , Lady Gaga , Ariana Grande , and Kanye West , will benefit from the revenue their art brings in. The same goes for lesser-known and newer artists signed to the label.  

Even other artists have given credit to Swift for the way she changed the way we consume pop music

It's hard to imagine today's pop stars like Ariana Grande would be able to name-check their former lovers in songs like "Thank U, Next," and have them be the successful hits we know today if Swift hadn't previously crafted breakup songs like 2010's "Dear John" and 2014's "Style" that made it clear who the tracks were about — John Mayer and Harry Styles — right there in the titles. 

Halsey , another artist who rose to prominence this decade, has even lionized Swift as one of her songwriting heroes, notably for her smart bridges. 

"The bridge [of a song] is a fortune cookie. It pulls the whole thing together, it's the punchline, it's one of the most important parts of a song. Ask Taylor Swift, she writes the best ones in history ," Halsey said in a November 2019 interview with Capital FM .

Anyone who's listened to " Out of the Woods ," "Don't Blame Me," or "Lover" knows this to be true.

Swift deserves to be the artist of the decade because her music validated women while she simultaneously fought for a younger generation to make new music in a better environment

It took 13 years for Swift to come out with a track contemplating the misogynist double standards she's had to face as a woman in the music industry, and it's easy to agree with her sentiment: If Swift were a man, then she would, no doubt, be "The Man."

But while she maybe would have faced fewer obstacles and overtly sexist criticisms throughout her career if she were a man, she may not have touched as many women's lives with her music. 

Being someone who has idolized Swift since I was 11 years old, I can say that the reason she matters is because not only does she produce beautifully-worded tracks that resonate with fans on extremely personal levels, but she also wants to make the world a better, fairer place — one music contract, open letter, and song lyric at a time. 

And that's something that should never be shaken off.

Courteney Larocca is the associate celebrity news editor (and resident Taylor Swift expert) at Insider. For even more of her thoughts on Swift and other stars, you can follow her on Twitter @cnlarocca. 

Watch: Taylor Swift is the world's highest-paid celebrity. Here's how she makes and spends her $360 million.

• Main content

If I Was The Man, Then I’d Be The Man: An Essay Inspired by Taylor Swift

An analytical-but-personal essay inspired by Taylor Swift’s song “The Man” and navigating a seemingly male-dominated music industry.

I n 2019, one of the most successful female artists of the century, Taylor Swift, released her seventh studio album Lover . However, it was only Swift’s first record she owned the full rights to. While it is true that Swift is not the only major artist to not own control of her entire catalog of masters — unless she rerecords each album , — she was notably receiving little-to-no support from her male musical peers.

It was only the other current female artists in the industry using their voices and standing up for her, Halsey and Lily Allen being just a few of the women rallying for Swift. Yet, when looking around at the discourse on the internet, predominantly on Twitter between white cisgender men, it’s these three chart-topping female artists (of many) that endure a slew of hatred online.

You might be asking, well, what do they all have in common? The answer lies in tracks with similar themes that present themselves, with descriptions of toxicity still present in all aspects of the music industry today. Whether it’s occurring or noticeable to your eyes, doesn’t mean it’s not happening. Allen’s “URL Badman” was released in 2014, yet still rings true. Allen, while she does namecheck Pitchfork, speaks about a concept that expands to the music journalism field as a whole.

As Guardian journalist Laura Snapes recently shared, “The music industry is so profoundly toxic and resistant to change, it feels unethical to participate in it at all sometimes.” When even independent record labels are engaging in a toxic Twitter discourse through now-deleted tweets, that’s when we should all be aware that something seriously needs to change.

Speaking of Halsey, “929,” from her new album, includes the line, “ They said, ‘Don’t meet your heroes. They’re all fucking weirdos.’ God knows that they were right ,” which could arguably apply to a slew of bands in the #MeToo era being exposed for misconduct — some alleged, some confirmed. Nevertheless, accusations should be taken seriously, as the saying goes, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?” It still fell, even if you weren’t listening or don’t believe that it did.

As for Swift, she has been the recent example and arguably, the bluntest, at portraying this disparity in the music industry on her latest Lover single “The Man.”

Swift writes from the perspective of how her life would be incredibly different if she were a man in music.

I would be complex I would be cool They’d say I played the field before I found someone to commit to And that would be okay For me to do Every conquest I had made Would make me more of a boss to you I’d be a fearless leader I’d be an alpha type When everyone believes ya What’s that like?

Watch: “the man” – taylor swift.

She faces these double standards head-on in her self-directed music video for “The Man,” donning prosthetics to become the man. Swift, as an embodiment of male privilege in the video, manspreads on the subway, surrounds themselves with models on a yacht, and is literally high-fived after leaving a one night stand. The man, in his eyes, can do no wrong.

After all, she’s experienced these double standards firsthand. If you analyzed charting male songs about relationships to the backlash they received about writing them, it would be near to non-existent. However, if Swift, a woman in her 20s at the time of songs like “Dear John” and “Back To December,” dates a typical amount of men and writes songs, it becomes punchlines for award shows on national television.

They’d say I hustled, put in the work, They wouldn’t shake their heads and question how much of this I deserve What I was wearing, if I was rude, Could all be separated from my good ideas and power moves

Now slowly approaching my twentieth birthday, I have spent years working in various aspects of this industry since I was fifteen. Yes, it is true that there are a few good dudes out there that are focused on bettering the collective industry as a whole, compared to just the individual self. Notably, Ross Martin from the defunct UQ Music , Ariel Bitran, and Atwood Magazine ’s own Mitch Mosk.

However, there are other male peers I’ve encountered along the way, that as I’ve become more self-aware, I’ve become disillusioned by their inability to use their platforms to create change of any magnitude, especially if they have a large influence on social media. No matter what area of the music industry you work in, there is always room to grow and call for change, notably white cis males standing up and supporting those who are different than themselves.

Just last month, 98 KCQ, a Michigan-based country radio station, tweeted, “ We cannot play two females back to back. Not even Lady Antebellum or Little Big Town against another female .” This brought a larger conversation about women in the country music industry to the forefront, with heavy-hitters like Kacey Musgraves and Kelsea Ballerini joining in. This is best described in a brilliant and well-written article by Chris Willman about the situation. With a toxicity towards women in this musical subsection that’s been present long before the Dixie Chicks, it’s no wonder Swift made the switch to pop radio in an attempt to gain the respect she deserves.

Even with country radio being a smaller part of a current and relevant conversation about a woman’s place in the music industry, the men I knew who worked and performed in this specific subsection never said a word about it — neither for or against. Nor did they say a word in November of last year, when Jennifer Nettles arrived at the Country Music Awards with a cape that read, “ Play our f—-in records, please and thank you .”

Instead, they used their social platform and place in the industry to heavily promote their own record (a collaborative duet between two men), and I found myself increasingly disappointed and losing respect in them.

As Swift notes in her newly premiered Netflix documentary “Miss Americana,” she constantly was told regarding her place as, “A nice girl doesn’t force their opinions on people. A nice girl smiles and says thank you.” Yet, in an industry that as Swift describes as one that puts famous, yet successful, ladies in an “elephant graveyard by the time they’re 35,” when, in a career as a woman in music, do we cross the threshold of being “nice” and become someone worthy of respect?

I’ve urged other male writers I know to speak up about things that are happening, specifically the Reading and Leeds lineup debacle as one example. His response was one of, “Well, I support some women,” followed by a few paragraphs of mansplaining about money and indie publications, that I refused to open the can of worms into responding to before I could clearly articulate my thoughts.

If you are praising underground independent female artists, but tearing down chart-topping, mainstream ones, such as Swift, Halsey, and Allen from previous examples, in the same breath, that is not a pure and complete respect of women in the industry who went through consistent trials and tribulations to get to that success level. They tell us, “Respect your elders,” and in some exceptions, I do. Yet, at what point as a woman in music, do your elders start to respect you?

A few months ago, I attended a show for a New York-based band that I had been interested in working with and learning the business aspect of things. The members consisted of all men in their early twenties, older than myself, but not by much. Other attendees at the concert consisted of their manager and various attendees at the Bushwick venue that night. However, once their manager met a male music journalist from Kerrang! , he didn’t speak to me again.

The second red flag and reduction I felt from the group that helped me decide to officially cut ties, came from their lead singer, who texted me a few days after their show, inquiring if I could write a “pretty little article” for them. I suppose this is that article he wanted — not little, but hopefully he finds it pretty. As for the Kerrang! writer at this gig, I gave him my email when he asked. Needless to say, it’s been months of silence, so the disheartening feeling has subsided.

When it comes to the subsection of music journalism within the larger scheme of the industry, I am aware of the certain privileges I have operating the field as a white woman, however, it has still been a process filled with reductive experiences from men. While working as a booking intern at a New York concert venue, a drunk performer in a spin-off group, formed by a member of an iconic band, unaware of my internship status, inappropriately attempted to invite a clearly underage (X’s on each hand) girl to an “afterparty,” only to have his advances blatantly rejected.

If I was out flashing my dollars, I’d be a bitch, not a baller. They’d paint me out to be bad, So it’s okay that I’m mad

Swift’s lyricism within “the man” feels not only like a long time coming in terms of her personal experiences, but also a breath of fresh air..

It’s a spot-on description of how many women in this music industry — or any male-dominated industry, for that matter, feel. It’s a social commentary about double standards and working-hard-but-getting-nowhere, that makes it all the better option to become Lover ’s next single. It’s a song and a music video release that dig into something deeper than themselves. Not only does the song have an already universal relatability because of its themes, but as a single, “The Man” will hopefully, reach and inspire the young women in the next generation in the same way. It will also, hopefully, inspire at least some men in the music industry to make some serious changes within themselves. In the meantime, the rest of us ladies will keep on running as fast as we can…

Connect to Taylor Swift on Facebook , Twitter , Instagram

Discover new music on atwood magazine, roundtable discussion: a review of taylor swift’s ‘lover’, welcome to the new era of taylor swift, taylor swift’s “lover” is dramatic and dazzlingly romantic, “ the man “, a music video by taylor swift, an album by taylor swift.

Samples, Sonnets, and the Surf-Punk Scene: A Conversation with The Frights

You may also like.

Premiere: Embracing Heartache in The Proud Sons’ Radiant “Company”

“Don’t be defined by these chains”: Curling’s Heated, Anthemic Alt-Rock Surrender, “Patience”

Premiere: Jack Klatt’s “Ramblin’ Kind” is an Americana Poem of Redemption

Book Review: Marc Myers Pulls the Curtain Back on the Live Music We Love So Much in ‘Rock Concert’

Review: Foxy Dads Explore the In-Betweens on Debut Album, ‘Songs from the LIRR’

Premiere: Stu Larsen’s Heavy Heart Aches in Lovelorn “Phone Call From My Lover”

More stories.

Today’s Song: Mal’s Sweet “Bluebird” Soars on Intimate, Stirring Debut EP ‘In Free Fall’

Find anything you save across the site in your account

Listening to Taylor Swift in Prison

By Joe Garcia

The first time I heard about Taylor Swift , I was in a Los Angeles County jail, waiting to be sent to prison for murder. Sheriffs would hand out precious copies of the Los Angeles Times , and they would be passed from one reader to the next. Back then, I swore that Prince was the best songwriter of my lifetime, and I thought Swift’s rise to teen-age stardom was an injustice. I’d look up from her wide-eyed face in the Calendar section to see gang fights and race riots. The jail was full of young men of color who wrote and performed their own raps, often about chasing money and fame, while Swift was out there, actually getting rich and famous. How fearless could any little blond fluff like that really be?

In 2009, I was sentenced to life in prison. Early one morning, I boarded a bus in shackles and a disposable jumpsuit, and rode to Calipatria State Prison, a cement fortress on the southern fringes of California. Triple-digit temperatures, cracked orange soil, and pungent whiffs of the nearby Salton Sea made me feel as though I’d been exiled to Mars. After six years in the chaos of the county jail, however, I could finally own small luxuries, like a television. The thick walls of Calipat, as we called the place, stifled our radio reception, but an institutional antenna delivered shows like “Access Hollywood,” “Entertainment Tonight,” and “TMZ.” I was irritated by the celebrity gossip, but it was a connection to the outside world, and it introduced me to snippets of Swift’s performances for the first time. Here and there, I’d catch her on “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” or “Fallon,” and was surprised by how intently she discussed her songwriting. I didn’t tell anyone that I thought she was talented.

Podcast: The New Yorker Radio Hour Listen to Joe Garcia read “Listening to Taylor Swift in Prison.”

In 2013, when my security level was lowered owing to good behavior, I requested a transfer to Solano state prison, the facility with a Level 3 yard which was closest to my family in the Bay Area. I got the transfer, but my property—a TV, CD player, soap, toothpaste, lotion, food—was lost in transit. I shared a cell with someone in the same situation, so, for months, we relied on the kindness of our neighbors to get by. Our only source of music was a borrowed pocket radio, hooked up to earbuds that cost three dollars at the commissary. At night, we’d crank up the volume and lay the earbuds on the desk in our cell. Those tiny speakers radiated crickety renditions of Top Forty hits.

During that time, I heard tracks from “Red,” Swift’s fourth studio album, virtually every hour. I was starting to enjoy them. Laying on the top bunk, I would listen to my cellmate’s snores and wait for “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” to come around again. When it did, I would think about the woman I had lived with for seven years, before prison. I remembered bittersweet times when my sweetheart had visited me in county jail. We’d look at each other through security glass that was reinforced by wire. It didn’t seem fair to expect her to wait for me, and I told her that she deserved a partner who could be with her. But we didn’t use the word “never,” and deep down I always hoped that we’d get back together. When I heard “Everything Has Changed,” I had to fight back tears of exaltation and grief. Swift sings, “All I knew this morning when I woke / Is I know something now / Know something now I didn’t before.” I thought back to our first date, and how we had talked and laughed late into the night. We had to force ourselves to get a few hours of sleep before sunrise.

After several months, my belongings, including my CD player, finally caught up with me. I was getting ready to buy “Red” from a catalogue of approved CDs when I learned that the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, or C.D.C.R., had placed me on another transfer list. I didn’t want the album to get stuck at the prison after I had been transferred, so I resorted to a country station that regularly featured Swift. Sometimes, hearing Southern drawls and honky-tonk medleys, I’d laugh out loud at myself. But that was the station that played the widest variety of her music, from “Tim McGraw” to “I Knew You Were Trouble.” There was, in her voice, something intuitively pleasant and genuine and good, something that implies happiness or at least the possibility of happiness. When I listened to her music, I felt that I was still part of the world I had left behind.

Hitting a new yard—in this case, the prison known as the California Men’s Colony (C.M.C.)—means finding new friends and allies. Each table and workout area was claimed by a different gang or ethnic group. I’m Asian and Hispanic, and I chose to join the Asians in a cement workout area. When they asked me what kind of music I liked, I confessed that I was anxiously waiting for a Taylor Swift album. Everyone laughed. “Oh, my God, we’ve got a Swiftie on the yard!” Lam, a muscular guy, told me. “You in touch with your sensitive side? Are you gay?” He especially loved to heckle me in front of his buddy Hung, who spoke little and laughed almost silently.

I was waiting for “Red” to arrive when I saw Swift perform “All Too Well” at the 2014 Grammys. That became the song that I played first when I peeled the plastic wrap off the disc, and the song I’d stop at and repeat whenever I spun the album. (Her ten-minute version is even better.) As Swift sang about love’s magical moments, how they are found and lost again, I thought about a time before my incarceration, when I briefly broke up with the woman I loved. She came to my house to return one of my T-shirts. When she hung it on the doorknob and walked away, I was on the other side. I sensed that someone was there, but, by the time I opened the door, she was gone.

When “Red” arrived, I finally found out why Lam had been clowning me in front of Hung. “Red” was the only Swift CD that Hung didn’t own—because he considered it a misguided pop departure from the country greatness of “Fearless” and “Speak Now.” Eventually, Lam outed himself as a Swiftie, too. For six months, the three of us would work out and debate which album was best. Then Hung transferred out of the prison, taking his CDs with him.

Around the time Swift dropped “1989,” I acquired an old-school boom box. Technically, exchanging property and altering devices is against C.D.C.R. rules, but every prison has guys who fill their cells with radios, TVs, and speakers to repair and resell. I looked out for one guy, G.L., when he first hit the yard, and he became one of the best electronic fix-it guys I’ve ever met. He loved reconfiguring different speakers to get the best sound. He rewired the boom box for auxiliary cables and gave it to me. At C.M.C., I had a cell to myself, so I’d turn up the music enough to drown out obnoxious sounds outside my cell. Of course, some people always think that Swift is the obnoxious sound. “What’s up with the damn Taylor Swift?” a neighbor yells out. Another voice chimes in with requests: “Play ‘Style.’ That song’s tight right there.” By the time the song ends, someone new will admit, “That girl’s got jams.”

When you transfer between prisons, you can’t take any undocumented property with you. At the end of 2015, I gave that boom box back to G.L. and left C.M.C. for Folsom prison. After a year, I landed at San Quentin. I started working at the San Quentin News , the in-house newspaper, for a quarter an hour. Around that time, C.D.C.R. started allowing a vender to sell us MP3 players for a hundred dollars. They charged $1.75 per song and ten dollars for a memory card. Eventually, I asked my family to order one and would call my cousin Roxan with requests. “What’s up with all the damn Taylor Swift?” she’d say during phone calls. By the time Swift released her album “Lover,” in 2019, I had almost every song she’d ever released. And, when the MP3 players were restricted because crafty folks were using the memory cards in illegal cell phones, mine was grandfathered in.

One of my homies at San Quentin had a pristine radio that played CDs and cassette tapes. When he earned parole, everybody hounded him for it. He knew how much I’d appreciate such a luxury, but I didn’t join the herd of pesterers making offers, and I think he appreciated that. He gave it to me as a parting gift. I was even able to have it officially documented on my property card. The MP3 player clipped neatly into the cassette door, so now I could see my playlists while I listened. My neighbor, Rasta, was the weed man for the building, so I played Swift to drown out the guys who were lighting up outside. Rasta made fun of me, but the crowd always liked her “Bad Blood” remix, featuring Kendrick Lamar . “That’s the shit right there,” they’d say. “Who would’ve thought?”

Seven months after “Lover” came out, C.D.C.R. shut down all programming because of the COVID pandemic —no indoor group interactions, no volunteers from outside the prison, no visitors. C.D.C.R. brought the coronavirus into San Quentin when it moved some sick guys from another prison in. By the end of June, 2020, hundreds of us were testing positive and getting sick, including me. I lugged all my property to an isolation cell in a quarantine unit, where I shivered and sweated through a brain fog for two weeks. My only human contact came from nurses in full-body P.P.E., who checked my vitals, and skeleton crews of officers—the ones who weren’t sick themselves—who brought us intermittent meals. I followed San Quentin’s death tallies on the local news. Would I die alone in this cell, suddenly and violently breathless? I made a playlist of Swift’s most uplifting songs, listening for the happiness in her voice.

Alone in a prison cell, it’s virtually impossible to avoid oneself. As my body and mind began to recover, I started to question everything. What really matters? Who am I? What if I die tomorrow? I hadn’t been in touch with my sweetheart in more than two years, because she had told me that she was trying a relationship with someone who cared about her. Now, though, I wrote her a letter to see if she was O.K.

A week after I mailed my letter, I received one from her. Prison mail is slow enough that I knew it wasn’t a response—we had decided to write to each other at the same time. “The lockdown has afforded me plenty of time to reflect on all sorts of things,” her letter said. “I’ve been carrying you with me everywhere.” Reading it brought to mind Swift’s lyrics in “Daylight”: “I don’t wanna think of anything else now that I thought of you.” She was single again, and we started talking every week. In lockdown, between paltry dinner trays, I did pushups, lunges, squats, and planks in the twenty-two-inch-wide floor space in my cell. The twentieth year of my incarceration was approaching.

In 2020, the California legislature passed a law that made anyone who served twenty continuous years, and who was at least fifty years of age, eligible for parole. I’m fifty-three, and I’ll get my first chance at release in 2024. I couldn’t help but think of “Daylight” again. “I’ve been sleeping so long in a twenty-year dark night,” Swift sings. “And now I see daylight.”

These days, I call my sweetheart as often as I can. Officers can shut down the phones with the flick of a switch, and technical glitches often take the system offline, so I treat each call as if it were my last. It often feels like she’s waiting to hear from me. She tells me that it’s complicated and confusing for her, speaking to the ghost who disappeared twenty years ago. But, leaning against a wall, next to all the other guys talking with loved ones on the phone, I don’t feel like a ghost. I feel alive. Just recently, she told me, “Talking like this over the phone so much, I think we’ve gotten to know each other way better than before.” We talk about how much we have changed. “You might not even find me attractive anymore,” she tells me. “I’m not the same person I was back then.”

One morning in October, 2022, I had breakfast in the chow hall and made it back to my cell in time for “Good Morning America.” My TV doesn’t have any speakers, so I plugged it into my boom box. Suddenly, I heard a familiar voice singing an unfamiliar chorus: “It’s me, hi / I’m the problem, it’s me.” The anchors on the broadcast were giddy to announce Swift’s new album “Midnights,” and play clips from the music video of “Anti-Hero.” Swift appeared as a larger-than-life figure, arguing with different versions of herself. I laughed to myself. Here we go again.

Our MP3 distributor was always slow to release new music, so I spent a couple of weeks hearing about the album on the news, waiting for my chance to listen. Then, out on the prison grounds, I bumped into a volunteer whom I’d known and worked with for years. We were walking through the yard together when they started looking around to make sure no one was watching. After confirming that the coast was clear, they slipped me a brand-new copy of “Midnights” and wished me a happy birthday. The gesture nearly brought me to tears. That evening, after dinner, I peeled off the plastic and brushed a bit of dust out of the boom box’s CD player. “Lavender Haze” played as I read the liner notes. “What keeps you up at night?” Swift writes.

For the past two decades, sleep has not come easily to me. Often, when I get into bed, I think about the day I was arrested at the scene of my crime. Some neighbors called 911 and reported gunshots. I can still see the grieving family members of the man I killed, staring at me in the courtroom at my trial. I’m guilty of more than murder. I abandoned my parents and my sweetheart, too. There’s no way to fix this stuff.

Taylor Swift is currently the same age, thirty-three, that I was when I was arrested. I wonder whether her music would have resonated with me when I was her age. I wonder whether I would have reacted to the words “I’m the problem, it’s me.” Hers must be champagne problems compared with mine, but I still see myself in them. “I’ll stare directly at the sun, but never in the mirror,” Swift sings, and I think of the three-by-five-inch plastic mirrors that are available inside. For years out there, I viewed myself as the antihero in my own warped self-narrative. Do I want to see myself clearly?

In “Karma,” Swift sings, “Ask me what I learned from all those years / Ask me what I earned from all those tears.” A few months from now, California’s Board of Parole Hearings will ask me questions like that. What have I learned? What do I have to show for my twenty years of incarceration? In the months ahead, when these questions keep me up at night, I will listen to “Midnights.” The woman I love says she’s ready to meet me on the other side of the prison wall, on the day that I walk into the daylight. Recently, she asked me, “If you could go anywhere, do anything, that first day out, what would you want us to go do?” That question keeps me up at night, too. ♦

New Yorker Favorites

A prison therapist grapples with a sex offender’s release .

What have fourteen years of conservative rule done to Britain ?

Woodstock was overrated .

Why walking helps us think .

A whale’s strange afterlife .

The progressive politics of Julia Child .

I am thrilled to announce that nothing is going on with me .

Support The New Yorker’s award-winning journalism. Subscribe today .

By signing up, you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

By Charles Bethea

By Eyal Press

By Richard Brody

By Eric Lach

• DOI: 10.1080/07494467.2021.1945226
• Corpus ID: 237695045

Taylor Swift and the Work of Songwriting

• Published in Contemporary Music Review 2 January 2021

4 Citations

Policing the celebrity of taylor swift: introduction, podcasting taylor, are you ready for it re-evaluating taylor swift, drew a map on your bedroom ceiling: fandoms, nostalgic girlhood and digital bedroom cultures in the swiftie-sphere, 47 references, the song machine: inside the hit factory, copyrights and copywrongs: the rise of intellectual property and how it threatens creativity, ‘taylor swift: the hardest working, zaniest girl in show business…’, authorship and the popular song, the jukebox of history: narratives of loss and desire in the discourse of country music, feminine endings: music, gender, and sexuality, the sonic episteme, what happens when a celebrity feminist slings microaggressive shade: twitter and the pushback against neoliberal feminism, selling out: musicians, autonomy, and compromise in the digital age, the sonic episteme: acoustic resonance, neoliberalism, and biopolitics, related papers.

Showing 1 through 3 of 0 Related Papers

Read Taylor Swift’s new personal essay explaining eighth album ‘Folklore’

"It started with imagery..."

Taylor Swift has released her surprise eighth album ‘Folklore’ today (July 24) – read her new personal essay about the creation of the album below.

‘Folklore’ was largely written alongside The National ‘s Aaron Dessner, with further input from Bon Iver and Swift’s regular collaborator Jack Antonoff .

Read more: Taylor Swift – ‘Folklore’ review: pop superstar undergoes an extraordinary indie-folk makeover

“Most of the things I had planned this summer didn’t end up happening, but there is something I hadn’t planned on that DID happen. And that thing is my 8th studio album, ‘Folklore’,” Swift wrote when announcing the album yesterday afternoon (July 23), and she’s now expanded on the themes that make up the new album.

Read Swift’s full essay on the inspiration behind ‘Folklore’ below.

“It started with imagery. Visuals that popped into my mind and piqued my curiosity.

Stars drawn around scars. A cardigan that still bears the scent of loss twenty years later. Battleships sinking into the ocean, down, down, down. The tree swing in the woods of my childhood. Hushed tones of “let’s run away” and never doing it. The sun drenched month of August, sipped away like a bottle of wine. A mirrored disco ball hovering above a dance floor. A whiskey bottle beckoning. Hands held through plastic. A single thread that, for better or for worse, ties you to your fate.

Recommended

Pretty soon these images in my head grew faces or names and became characters. I found myself not only writing my own stories, but also writing about or from the perspective of people I’ve never met, people I’ve known, or those I wish I hadn’t. An exiled man walking the bluffs of a land that isn’t his own, wondering how it all went so terribly, terribly wrong. An embittered tormentor showing up at the funeral of his fallen object of obsession. A seventeen-year-old standing on a porch, learning to apologize. Lovestruck kids wandering up and down the evergreen High Line. My grandfather, Dean, landing at Guadalcanal in 1942. A misfit widow getting gleeful revenge on the town that cast her out.

A tale that becomes folklore is one that is passed down and whispered around. Sometimes even sung about. The lines between fantasy and reality blur and the boundaries between truth and fiction become almost indiscernible. Speculation, over time, becomes fact. Myths, ghost stories, and fables.

Fairytales and parables. Gossip and legend. Someone’s secrets written in the sky for all to behold.

In isolation my imagination has run wild and this album is the result, a collection of songs and stories that flowed like a stream of consciousness. Picking up a pen was my way of escaping into fantasy, history, and memory. I’ve told these stories to the best of my ability with all the love, wonder, and whimsy they deserve.

Now it’s up to you to pass them down.”

In a four-star album review of ‘Folklore’ , NME wrote: “‘Folklore’ feels fresh, forward-thinking and, most of all, honest. The glossy production she’s lent on for the past half-decade is cast aside for simpler, softer melodies and wistful instrumentation.

“It’s the sound of an artist who’s bored of calculated releases and wanted to try something different.”

• Related Topics
• Taylor Swift

You May Also Like

Kneecap – ‘fine art’ review: poetry on the cubicle wall of a wild night out, ‘the boys’ season four review: sweary supes battle electoral dysfunction, ‘backbeat’ at 30: the fifth beatle, john lennon’s bisexuality and macca’s “jealousy”, amaarae: “music is the only place where i get to be as vulnerable as i possibly can”, ‘call of duty: black ops 6’ preview: expect a scrappy gulf war shooter, more stories, “what a pop star should be” – bring me the horizon talk working with aurora on ‘limousine’, and how it was nearly someone else, bebe rexha hits out at “stuck up ungrateful loser” g-eazy, david beckham responds to rumours of a spice girls reunion, coldplay musical guest booed in romania for singing manele, listen to paul weller’s haunting cover of billie eilish’s ‘what was i made for’, taylor swift confirms the ‘eras’ tour will end in december.

Home / Essay Samples / Music / Taylor Swift / Taylor Swift: A Journey Through Music and Influence

Taylor Swift: A Journey Through Music and Influence

• Category: Music
• Topic: Taylor Swift

Pages: 1 (650 words)

• Downloads: -->

The Early Years: Country Roots

The transition to pop, social and cultural influence.

• Feminism and Gender Equality: Swift has been an outspoken advocate for feminism and gender equality. She has used her music videos and public statements to challenge gender stereotypes and promote women's empowerment.
• LGBTQ+ Rights: Swift has been a vocal supporter of LGBTQ+ rights. Her song "You Need To Calm Down" is a LGBTQ+ anthem that calls out discrimination and promotes acceptance and love.
• Mental Health Awareness: Swift has shared her own struggles with mental health, helping to reduce the stigma surrounding mental health issues. She has also made significant donations to mental health organizations.
• Political Activism: In recent years, Swift has become more politically active. She endorsed candidates in the 2018 midterm elections and encouraged her fans to vote, leading to a significant increase in voter registration.
• Philanthropy: Swift is known for her philanthropic efforts. She has made substantial donations to education, disaster relief, and COVID-19 relief efforts, demonstrating her commitment to making a positive impact.

Swift's Enduring Legacy

--> ⚠️ Remember: This essay was written and uploaded by an--> click here.

Found a great essay sample but want a unique one?

are ready to help you with your essay

You won’t be charged yet!

Beethoven Essays

The Drummer Boy of Shiloh Essays

As I Lay Dying Essays

Classical Music Essays

Just Walk on By Essays

Related Essays

We are glad that you like it, but you cannot copy from our website. Just insert your email and this sample will be sent to you.

By clicking “Send”, you agree to our Terms of service  and  Privacy statement . We will occasionally send you account related emails.

Your essay sample has been sent.

In fact, there is a way to get an original essay! Turn to our writers and order a plagiarism-free paper.

samplius.com uses cookies to offer you the best service possible.By continuing we’ll assume you board with our cookie policy .--> -->