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VIRAL EXCLUSIVE
Aug. 15, 2023
Do We Really Know Taylor Swift All Too Well?
With the hype surrounding the recent Eras Tour, our playlists and screens seem to be taken over by Taylor Swift. But beyond her unparalleled success as a pop star, who is she? We take a closer look at what shapes one of the biggest stars of our generation. By: Theng Min Yee
For many of the teenagers and young adults who were scrambling to get their hands on Taylor Swift’s concert tickets, and packing the stadiums for her much-anticipated The Eras Tour, the pop singer’s music was a defining part of their childhood. Be it the rustic tones of country music, the soothing vocals in her indie-folk album Evermore, or a high-energy pop song like Shake It Off, Taylor’s music has undoubtedly captured the imagination of an entire generation of teens. In 2022, The Times called Taylor ‘the Bob Dylan of our age’. Having won 12 Grammy Awards and 29 Billboard Music Awards, among many of her accolades, she has cemented herself as a pop culture icon. But apart from her pop star persona, what makes Taylor Swift?
Creative Soul
Born in West Reading, Pennsylvania, Taylor spent her early years on a Christmas tree farm, with her parents and younger brother Austin. Her interest in music was first ignited by country musician Shania Twain and Faith Hill, which spurred her family’s move to Hendersonville, Tennessee, in pursuit of her music career. Taylor eventually signed with Big Machine Records, where her first self-titled album Taylor Swift materialised. The album was a big success, leading to Taylor becoming the first female country music artist to write or co-write every track on a U.S. platinum-certified debut album.
Being dubbed a ‘music chameleon’, Taylor’s music would evolve to contain elements of eclectic pop, rock, and electronic styles over the years, which serves as a testament to her creative propensity. In Taylor’s NYU commencement speech, made after she received an honorary fine arts doctorate, she said, “As a songwriter I’ve never been able to sit still, or stay in one creative place for too long.” Beyond being a singer or performer, Taylor’s creative streak is best exhibited through her songwriting, which she sees as her chief creative outlet. In a 2011 interview with The New Yorker, Taylor identified as a songwriter first: “I write songs, and my voice is just a way to get those lyrics across.” Being a voracious reader, she is surrounded by inspiration and is said to make, “Lists and lists and lists” of the words she loves.
Her creative soul is most apparent through her varied styles of songwriting. “I have secretly established genre categories for the lyrics I write. They are affectionately titled Quill Lyrics, Fountain Pen Lyrics and Glitter Gel Pen Lyrics”, she revealed in an interview with NME. Taylor categorises her song All Too Well as a “Fountain pen song”. She describes it viscerally as: “Trying to paint a vivid picture of a situation, down to the chipped paint on the door frame and the incense dust on the vinyl shelf.”
In 2021, the National Music Publishers’ Association awarded Taylor with the Songwriter Icon Award. Her way with words has also led to her publishing two original poems, Why She Disappeared and If You’re Anything Like Me.
Taylor’s creative pursuits do not end at songwriting. In 2022, Taylor announced her feature directorial debut with Searchlight Pictures, where she wrote an original script to be produced by the Oscar-winning studio behind The Shape of Water. In February, her self-directed music video All Too Well: The Short Film also won the 2023 Grammy Award for Best Music Video.
Love Her or Hate Her
Despite receiving acclamation for her songwriting talent, an equal amount of backlash was volleyed at her. Taylor’s confessional lyrics, which often chronicled her romantic relationships, directed the media’s attention onto her boyfriends, threatening to overshadow her music. Besides the media circus, critics have highlighted that Swift’s life and career have been subject to intense misogyny and slut-shaming. From celebrity manager Scooter Braun’s hateful actions against her, to the infamous VMA moment where Kanye West interrupted Taylor’s acceptance speech, the pop star seems to attract unwanted attention and hateful acts, especially from older male counterparts in the industry.
In a 2022 feature, Glamour unpacked the reasons behind the misogynistic treatment of Taylor by the industry. They wrote: “Back then, society saw her as a victim, as weak and young and girlish. She was the princess in Love Story, the guitar-strumming girl in the prom dress who needed rescuing from bad boyfriends.” The feature continued, “Taylor has a history of holding men accountable, for everything from assault to stealing her red scarf, and when you’ve been outsmarted like this – or out-sung and outsold by a singer no one took seriously because of her exaggerated femininity and assumed naivety, it is little wonder some fragile male egos have been tempted to take pot-shots at her success.”
Despite the hate she gets subjected to, Taylor is determined to stay true to herself and her style of songwriting. “If you’re horrible to me I’m going to write a song about you and you are not going to like it,” said Taylor to the Mail in 2009, as she remains steadfast to her diaristic style. In her NYU commencement speech, she said: “I’d like to say that I’m a big advocate for not hiding your enthusiasm for things. It seems to me that there is a false stigma around eagerness in our culture of “unbothered ambivalence”.”
Taylor’s unmasked attitude and stances towards various issues is evident with her public criticism of white supremacy, racism, and police brutality, as well as her overt support for gun control reform in the US. Swift also identifies as a pro-choice feminist and is one of the founding signatories of the Time’s Up movement against sexual harassment.
Kindred Spirit
Like her diaristic and confessional lyrics, Taylor has the ability to connect with fans on an intimate level. The New Yorker’s Amanda Petrusich attended Taylor’s concert and said: “Swift has for years been a savant of what I might call “you guys” energy, a chatty, ersatz intimacy that feels consonant with the way we exist on social media—offering a glimpse of our private lives, but in a deliberate and mediated way.” Taylor’s girl-next-door image and likability has also earned her the title of the “World’s Most Admired Female Musician from 2019 to 2021”, according to YouGov surveys.
Whilst presenting Taylor with The Big Help Award at the 25th Kid’s Choice Awards for her humanitarian work, Michelle Obama described her as an artist who has, “Rocketed to the top of the music industry but still keeps her feet on the ground, someone who has shattered every expectation of what a 22-year-old can accomplish.” Amongst her myriad of charitable work, she donated $1 million to Nashville tornado relief efforts in 2020, as well as $50,000 to a mother of five whose husband died of COVID-19 in 2021. Her generosity was most recently exhibited when she gave bonuses totalling over $55 million to every person working on The Eras Tour.
With The Eras Tour in full swing, the pop sensation will be touring across 5 continents, well into the year 2024. Swifties can look forward to her self-penned feature film, and the remastered versions of Taylor’s music while she works on re-releasing her past albums. Having been in the scene for almost two decades, one might think they already know the singer all too well. Yet, from her fresh creative pursuits, humanitarian efforts, and unwavering stance towards social issues, she has shown herself to be more than a mere pop singer; evolving to become a timeless icon of our generation.
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