By Brady Bullington
On August 24, Taylor Swift released a new single for her forthcoming, sixth studio album, Reputation. For the 27 year old singer, who has been in the spotlight since the age of 16 with her first album Taylor Swift, it has been hard for her to lead a normal life. The media seems to nearly always be on her back for breakup after breakup and feud after feud, and Swift can’t seem to catch a break from it all. With her fifth album, 1989, many people began to criticize her for changing her genre from country to pop music. But according to Billboard, the album sold 1.287 million copies in the first week, proving that her loyal fans didn’t care which category her music fell into.
With the release of the first single off the new album, “Look What You Made Me Do,” the social media world blew up with responses. Something didn’t quite line up when her website went blank, her social media posts on all accounts were taken down, and then she began video posts of a snake. Speculations began right away that new music was coming and #TS6 began to trend on Twitter.
When she dropped the song and the music video for “Look What You Made Me Do”at the VMA Music Awards on Sunday, August 27, many said the song was directed towards all of those who have “wronged” her. The list seems to keep growing: Kanye West and the feud between them because of how he claims to have made Swift’s success possible, Katy Perry who had stolen her backup dancers during her 2014 Red tour, and Tom Hiddleston, her most recent celebrity breakup who made a splash when he was photographed wearing an “I love T.S.” tshirt at her annual Fourth of July party.
A music reviewer for NewStatesmen magazine said, “It seems unlikely that Taylor Swift will own the mistakes she’s made, or create a genuinely soul-searching record. But if she wants satisfaction after the myriad slights she feels have been made against her, she should clamber out from of the whirlpool of referential jibes ‘Look What You Made Me Do’ sinks into. She needs to write a song that’s better than revenge.” But an artist like Swift should be able to cope however she wants to, even if it means writing a song about all the “slights” against her. People shouldn’t be judging others for how they work through things. It just repeats the cycle of Taylor versus the world.
Download the new singles and then the whole album and really listen for some insights from someone who has grown up in the public eye and maybe can teach us all a lesson about using our experiences to learn about ourselves.
