Taylor Swift - The Tortured Poets Department (April 19, 2024) Album • Page 70

After another few listens I think both "halves" work really well as albums, the first half more of a continuation of the Midnight sound and the second half more of a continuation of the folklore / evermore sound, with the caveat that both sides are a few songs too long. I definitely don't think the second half is weaker like I did at first, and I think that impression comes from this whole thing just being so long.

I guess I don't think the best way to hear the second half songs is after already listening to over an hour of Taylor Swift doing the kinda more fun synth pop sound. That doesn't really give those songs a fair shake, and they are the more subtle songs also.

This is more of a classic double album to me, albeit one marketed and released in a very strange way.

 

I love most of this but the more I listen to it the more But Daddy I Love Him reigns supreme as my fav track

 

IM SO DEPRESSED I ACT LIKE ITS MY BIRTHDAYYYYY EVERY DAY

 

I’m interested to see what her reaction to the reaction is. Midnights wasn’t incredibly critically acclaimed, but Anti Hero’s incredible success and the eras tour made it one of her most successful releases ever. Feels like this one is trending to absolutely insane first week sales numbers and then potentially being forgotten about quickly - the reaction seems pretty muted so far and the surprise release more divisive than the 3am edition.

 

So close!

 

have an important deadline today, but once i'm done with my work to meet said deadline, i'm gonna sit down with this album again. i've seen a lot more discussion about its quality in the past couple days that's made me want to pay closer attention to the quality of the lyricism and the supposed monotony of the production. don't know yet where exactly i'm ranking this compared to all her other albums, but at this point, i think it might end up in the lower third of my rankings.

 

but daddy i love him is such a rush it feels a little out of place lol. that is a great song

 

I feel quite sure this will settle into the bottom tier of her albums so far, to me. But, the bottom two before this still have some gems, and I can already tell the same will hold true here. “Down Bad,” “Florida!!!,” “Clara Bow,” and “But Daddy I Love Him” are the main ones for me right now.

Still curious if I’ll be able to pick enough songs that stand out to envision a theoretical 13-track album.

 

my wife and i are making separate “13 from 31” playlists so we can compare our 13 best and i’m struggling to decide on the last 3 spots

 

Another stray thought:

If we’re fully committing to the “eras” approach to Taylor Swift’s career, I don’t think there’s gonna be “a Tortured Poets era” or whatever. This album, the TVs, and the tour(s) all feel like one extended… “Eras Era”? Idk.

Kinda wonder what she does after this, her next stretch of touring, and the last TVs. Does she finally slow down? Does she start seriously working on a proper film?

 

"But Daddy I Love Him" is definitely the best song here, and reminds me of the old Taylor. It's obviously an update of the "Love Story" fairytale, but I also hear a lot of the provocateur of "Blank Space," filtered through the wordiness of modern Taylor. It's smart and audacious and funny and biting, in a way that not enough of the rest of the album is. Just brilliant stuff.

 

Huh, everyone seems to love Daddy here. I gave it three listens and it didnt grab me at all. Ended up not making the cut for my 20 track cutdown.

 

tbh, i don't know if i trust her to write a good screenplay. there's a difference between how you tell a story in a song vs. a script, and given how dense and wordy yet somewhat samesy the lyrics on this album are (even if there are some great ones here), my fear is that the dialogue won't sound as human as she intends it to, and that the story will ultimately tread familiar ground that's better handled on her albums. the little dialogue in the ATW video was fine, but mainly because there was so little of it. idk how her writing style would work for 90+ minutes of dialogue.

i personally think she's better at using her lyrics to described the imagined and the introspective (although there are probably several songs where she effectively describes the external, like the last great american dynasty). there are obviously ways to convey these emotions on the screen besides dialogue, but i'm concerned that she'll rely too much on visual Easter eggs to illustrate the subtext of her story. the movie could be beautifully shot, but still not have the depth she and her fans imagine it might. again, i could be wrong and maybe she'll make a really good film, but i'm skeptical.

 

Not that Spotify streams are the end all, be all... but the drop off between the initial 16 and the next 15 is pretty stark. Midnights also has this stark of a drop off. I wonder if this data will mean anything to her. (I think with this album, she literally just had to purge everything she was feeling no matter what. I think we might return to higher curated works going forward.)

 

i honestly really like the title track. i think it’s fun and lightly tragic and catchy. the silly lines seem silly on purpose.

 

to me, they sound exactly like the inane shit high people say to each other

 

Love the title track and But Daddy I Love Him.

Two of my favourites.

 

Yep, that's why it works for me. I've said absolutely stupid shit to people I vibe with.

 

I still want to spend more time with it and eventually revisit her other albums but at the moment I'm thinking this is my favourite of hers. Just a crazy amount of songs I absolutely adore.

 

The more I hear "Fortnight" the more I love it. And Post Malone's parts are my favorite parts of the song. Didn't know I was a PM fan haha.

 

Fortnight and Daddy are probably my favorites at this point. The only song I actively dislike is So Long, London. For whatever reason, it's the one that strikes me as most derivative of the past few records.

 

I don’t think you’re wrong about how she’ll struggle in making a film (which is why I personally wish she’d start with either a short film or a co-writer), but none of that stops me from wanting to see her try. At this point I’d be more interested in a film than another album tbh, lol. I think it’d be a cool creative challenge that’d produce at minimum something interesting.

 

Between this and how much I liked his feature on the Beyoncé record, I think I need to give Post Malone another chance.

 

Post is an artist that still has his best material ahead of him so far imo - he has spurts of hinting at something greater but he hasn't been able to tie it all together on a full project yet.