Taylor Swift: Fearless Poll

Beyonce.

/sorry.

I like the lyrics about being a cheerleader and she's in the bleachers.

I've tried so long to find a default answer when asked this and it's just impossible. A different favourite literally every time I listen to it. And so my pick here will be fairly random.

"Forever and Always" forever and always. That song is just so fucking dope.

Hey Stephen

One more for Forever and Always.

love story

^

still dont get u dudes jizzing all over the one tree hill of pop

"Change"

i don't think i've ever even listened to the second half of this album

That's crazy because Forever and Always is her Stairway To Heaven

i'll never know

1 love story
2 breathe
3 hey stephen
4 you belong w me
5 you're not sorry

I think maybe it's "The Way I Loved You" for me right now. Love her singing on the hushed part of the last chorus.

I think that "Stairway to Heaven" is kind of a mischarachtization, but it is a BEAST of a pop song.

I think beast is a mischariterizization, but it is a colossal monster of a stairway to heaven

man, both of us fucked up spelling mischaracterization, though.

hey stephen

the one tree hill of pop

Taylor's more like Friday Night Lights season 3. One Tree Hill would be like Colbie Caillat.

1. Fifteen
2. You Belong With Me
3. The Best Day
4. White Horse
5. Love Story

i don't think i've ever even listened to the second half of this album

i didn't listen to it for the longest time because i had to play the first five tracks on loop like crack, but they're all as amazing tbh, and it was a real treat when i finally got to them - love it when an album keeps giving like that.

this poll is so hard. "fearless" vs "white horse" vs "breathe" vs "hey stephen"

You're Not Fucking Sorry.

I voted for The Best Day. It was down to that, Fearless or You Belong to Me, though there's no song on here I don't like.

So......people genuinely like T Squinty Swift's fair to middling dear diary lyrics and bland production? To each it's own I guess...

no, this is a parody thread, if such people existed (which they don't)

thank heathus christ. I was legit getting worried.

i could vote for any of a bunch of songs -- "love story," "hey stephen," "white horse," "you belong with me," "the way i loved you," "forever and always," "the best day," it's a hard call. tempted by "the way i loved you" because it's a great case study in crescendo -- the whole song is a series of build-build-release, over and over, from the intro thru to the bridge, and the chorus is a monster. also by "the best day," because it is honest-to-god lump-in-the-throat material. it's hard to do that kind of "i luv u mom'n'dad" family stuff well.

love the rhythm of the words at the end of the "way i loved you bridge": "you were wild and crazy/just so frustrating/intoxicating, complicated/got away, my sole mistake" -- it's a great tumble that mixes up all the residual anger and lust and shows that they're basically inextricable.

i mean, the "way i loved you" bridge.

the "way i loved you bridge," i don't think they've started naming infrastructure after her yet.

also, the video for 'the best day' is pretty great.

Love them all, would pick a different one every day, but the first one I loved most was the title track, so Imma go with that.

So......people genuinely like T Squinty Swift's fair to middling dear diary lyrics and bland production? To each it's own I guess...

― RubyNoir, Sunday, February 28, 2010 10:23 PM (1 hour ago)

to each, it is OWNED

the album

each of us

anyway this is impossible but

1) you belong with me
2) fearless
3) forever and always? i basically love them all the same after this

voting 'the best day'.

The lobby at my dentist's office is the best place to discover new music!

is that where you go after you're suggest banned?

if it wasn't for my dentist, i never would've discovered gucci mane

1 you belong with me
2 breath
3 fearless

had to go with "you belong with me". it was the one that changed my mind about her. and its just perfect.

I love Gucci! Especially when he guest stars, that dude is comedy. He's got some excellent wordplay on his songs unlike Tay Swift

i would sb you again but

Just kiddingggg. Sorry for the bitterness, I'm just feeling terrible.

gotcha back xp

^^^

For me the funny thing about this album isn't merely that my favourite changes all the time but that songs radically wax and wane in my affections, dropping from 1 to 7 or so from day to day.

But I love most often: "Love Story", "Hey Stephen", "Forever & Always"

You're Not Sorry is probably right, but I kneejerk voted for Hey Stephen

I voted Fifteen but listening again now its clearly The Way I Loved You. her vocal performance on that is PERFECT POP. totally fantastic.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

still dont get u dudes jizzing all over the one tree hill of pop

Any other really similar pop-stars get this much love here in the past?

...

I'm standing by it.

given how many words have been expended on explaining why t-swift is amazing, claiming you don't understand why people love her or acting surprised when they express this love is tantamount to admitting you're illiterate at this point

or we are decently literate and just think a lot of people on this site are fronting

I think a lot of people here don't actually enjoy country music as they'd like to on some philosophical level and taylor swift - who writes decent, approachable pop songs - is a good way to pretend like they actually like country music. hope she makes a 'yankee hotel foxtrot' soon!

also whenever you guys start analyzing her amazing songwriting techniques, you guys look like some parent talking about their 10 year old's amazing academic prowess. look at her, she used a 'bridge'!!! can you believe she's only 20??

I don't think anyone on ILX who praises Taylor Swift is using it in any way to claim they're really into Country now, or even that Swift is the token Country artist they like as some sort of 'look at how eclectic I am' front.

just one theory to explain the fronting, maybe you got a better one?

somewhere between 'she really is that good' and 'Tim F's enthusiasm is infectious'?

most of the "real" country music fans on ilm like taylor swift, afaik. including me.

but i like the idea that anyone needs a theory to explain why people like good pop music.

I still hate country. I don't believe that Taylor Swift has any country in her music, other than a few extremely minor banjo parts and shit.

you definitely don't have to like country to like her. fearless especially is pretty much just a pop-rock album with a few country touches. (the first one is more obviously country.)

but you also don't need some complex double-blind study to figure out why anyone enjoys catchy well-written pop songs.

Her stuff reminds me more of Fleetwood Mac.

I'm giving my vote to Love Story, since it's the song that won me over. And I really enjoy almost all country music.

Very curious about this "philosophical level" that I should be or would like to enjoy country music on?

http://www.humanities.mcmaster.ca/~bertrand/5_nob_6.jpg

"If you don't like Taylor Swift on my level, you're just fronting."

just one theory to explain the fronting, maybe you got a better one?

the obvious - it's not fronting and you have to be really, really fucking thick to think it is

also whenever you guys start analyzing her amazing songwriting techniques, you guys look like some parent talking about their 10 year old's amazing academic prowess. look at her, she used a 'bridge'!!! can you believe she's only 20??

how on earth is this even remotely like what anyone's said? who has ever praised her for using a bridge? at this point you're just arguing with the voices of the strawman in your head

Ol' Strawy. Great guy.

Lol at the idea of people saying they like Taylor Swift as a way to gain cred. for liking country. ??? Liking country still doesn't bring a lot of cultural cache. If you did want to prove you liked country, there are hundreds of country artists it would be more appropriate to claim to like rather than Taylor Swift.

I don't think people are fronting when they say they like her, I think they're fronting about how much they like her.

So many non-country fans probably like her precisely because she's pop country.

x-post:

Well it's certainly possible for people to front for various reasons. Personally I like her but not nearly as much as some others seem to do. I really did find her one of the more appealing recording artists on commercial radio over the last year and a half, and I genuinely do find some of her songs pretty moving. Her overall sound is a little too far removed from what I usually go for for me to want to hear her that often.

Haha, if people on ILM front about liking things, it may simply be because a lot of us really enjoy liking things.

this is boring. iatee, you're being a) totally ill-mannered b) completely dense - shrieking "i don't believe you!" in response to a bunch of disparate people articulating why they like something doesn't cut it. i think you're fronting when you say you don't believe any of us tbh.

as I said, I don't disbelieve that plenty of people genuinely like taylor swift and I do think there are reasons to like her...she makes simple and accessible pop music. I just think there's a difference between a. 'like taylor swift' and b. 'believe that taylor swift created the best piece of music in 2009'. I do think anyone in group b is fronting to some degree or another, and it's pretty apparent in the way some people here talk about her. this thread: Taylor Swift '08: The Hype, Anticipation & Appreciation Begins Right Here is filllllled with people projecting complexity onto her music.

No, they're not projecting complexity onto her music. Most music is complex, has subtext, some sort of motivation. They're trying to untangle what it all means, and finding the process gratifying. Why? Because the music is so good they want to pore over every detail. What you're doing is completely ridiculous and the worst kind of argument because you make sure that nothing we say will ever 'prove' it wrong. I can verbally abuse you and call you a shithead, and you'll keep on saying "you're fooling yourself". I'm not in the habit of playing something on repeat far more than any other music unless I think it's the best album of a particular year. Short version: Get a life.

lol @ its good cuz i like it

iatee killing it itt

No, they're not projecting complexity onto her music. Most music is complex, has subtext, some sort of motivation. They're trying to untangle what it all means

um if you need some help untangling what a taylor swift song means, I can help you out

I think a lot of people here don't actually enjoy country music as they'd like to on some philosophical level and taylor swift - who writes decent, approachable pop songs - is a good way to pretend like they actually like country music

this is really stupid -- why would anyone pretend to like country music? i don't fuck with country music at all but taylor is the most mainstream pop country out there -- that's why a lot of people who don't like country dig her

fyi white horse is really abt her challenging battle with cocaine addiction

http://i.ytimg.com/vi/0CNi9wqirCA/0.jpg

i think it's one thing to say "you all are retarded for liking this music" -- i think it's another to say "you all are pretending to like this and are expressing this by writing paragraphs upon paragraphs about this music on a message board thread read by 20 people" -- i really don't think that there's any fronting going on

fyi white horse is really abt her challenging battle with cocaine addiction

O_o

i think it's one thing to say "you all are retarded for liking this music" -- i think it's another to say "you all are pretending to like this and are expressing this by writing paragraphs upon paragraphs about this music on a message board thread read by 20 people" -- i really don't think that there's any fronting going on

right, again and again: I don't think people are pretending to like her. liking taylor swift isn't that hard. I think a lot of people are exaggerating how much they like her and the paragrahps upon paragraphs are be sorta smh embarrassing after her next album comes out and it's more of the same, except a little worse and you guys get bored.

i don't fuck with country music at all but taylor is the most mainstream pop country out there -- that's why a lot of people who don't like country dig her

I said as much...

the "paragraphs upon paragraphs" are a lot less than has been written on ilm about vampire weekend, tv on the radio, animal collective and a whole lot of other schmindie hype that i for the life of me can't figure out how anyone stays interested in enough to listen to much less write about, but i don't think any of those people are or pretending or exaggerating. they just like different stuff than me. i don't know how you'd measure if someone is exaggerating how much they like something, but i know for sure that in the last 16 months or so fearless has been one of the 10 albums i've listened to most, and i wouldn't be surprised if it was in the top 5. i've also made copies of it for friends and family, and made fans of several of them.

so ... yeah. some of us really do like it that much.

yah idk i totally believe u dudes like this garbage "that much" but a lot of the paragraphs strike me as granting whats basically a 2nd rate rilo kiley album a degree of subtlety and complexity is doesnt have & doesnt really much seem to want

I've never heard a Rilo Kiley song, but the song Jenny Lewis did for Bolt was nice.

That shit actually breaks my cold heart, come to think of it.

granting whats basically a 2nd rate rilo kiley album a degree of subtlety and complexity is doesnt have & doesnt really much seem to want

conversely a lot of the anti-taylor snideness here and elsewhere strikes me as almost-not-at-all veiled contempt for the idea that teenage blonde girls could have anything at all to say.

Would prefer it if Taylor Swift's were more along the lines of Voivod, it is true.

conversely a lot of the anti-taylor snideness here and elsewhere strikes me as almost-not-at-all veiled contempt for the idea that teenage blonde girls could have anything at all to say.

they dont, really! i mean i guess u can call t.swift's suburban fairly tale garbage "universal" or w/e but catching feelings off a taylor swift jam is just lol.

Which are the T Swift songs that involve fairies, goblins, elves, trolls, giants or gnomes? That's more like some Finnish metal shit right there.

conversely a lot of the anti-taylor snideness here and elsewhere strikes me as almost-not-at-all veiled contempt for the idea that teenage blonde girls could have anything at all to say.

I don't see why it's even snobby to suggest that your average suburban teenage girl who hasn't finished high school isn't going to have a ton of interesting insights into the world. most of her songwriting ideas seem to come from MTV movies. there's zero depth (musically or lyrically) to any of this stuff and I mean, it's not her fault or anything - people shouldn't be looking for it. reading things in the taylor swift tea leaves is just sorta sad - the absurdist taylor swift analysis paragraphs say more about ilx than they do about her.

ever heard an English/Film Theory/etc... major?

i don't know really what "lyrical depth" entails, but taylor swift's best songs seem honest and clear in a way that goes well beyond cliché. and i mean, not all her songs are her best ones, and she obviously uses plenty of clichés, and even some of my favorites of hers i like more for the tune and the vibe than the words per se. but if songs like "fifteen" and "the best day" don't seem artful and true to you, then i dunno. maybe you just have different ideas about artful and true.

or something like "our song," which is just zippy and fun but has a clever little lyrical device in the chorus.

What type of music do you like, iatee and Lamp?

lamp has really good taste

Not questioning that. I'm just.asking.

uh, my itunes top played artists are john cale, smog, jacques brel and the beach boys. have at me.

seriously if Rilo Kiley could write even one song even 10% as enjoyable as anything on Fearless i'd be pretty surprised.

You haven't even attempted to discuss this on the basis of her music, it's "teenage music shouldn't be taken seriously". Why should you be taken seriously?

I don't see why it's even snobby to suggest that your average suburban teenage girl who hasn't finished high school isn't going to have a ton of interesting insights into the world.

She's 20 years old and got her high school diploma in 2008. Not that that necessarily impacts the point you're trying to make, I guess, but still. And not to make untoward comparisons, but, like, John Lennon wrote "In My Life" when he was 25, you know?

seriously if Rilo Kiley could write even one song even 10% as enjoyable as anything on Fearless i'd be pretty surprised.

Well, this is just nonsense.

do we really need to bring sockpuppets into this discussion xp

we've been discussing nothing *but* the basis of her music

seriously if Rilo Kiley could write even one song even 10% as enjoyable as anything on Fearless i'd be pretty surprised.

I'm only a casual Taylor Swift fan (enjoy the singles, can't be bothered to pay $ for the album and hear the other songs) but this is the most OTM thing I've seen on this thread all week.

iatee, you are a fucking retard.

wikipedia says: 'In July 2008, Swift graduated from the Aaron Academy, a Christian school in Hendersonville, Tennessee, which offers a home-schooling program'

haha sounds like she was trying to get into the UT football program

John Lennon wrote "In My Life" when he was 25, you know?

is your point 'young people can write good songs'? that's not being debated. but 'in my life' doesn't sound like a song that was limited by the author's limited experience w/ this world. 'you belong with me' does.

When he was 18, he wrote "Lve Me Do."

can't wait for taylor's revolution no.9

Is that something to be proud of?

Serious question, not trolling. Taylor has written better songs than "Love Me Do."

xpost

liking taylor swift isn't that hard

man if only we could have a taste as great as iatee, think of all the complicated music we could appreciate

so you're saying...there's music more complex than taylor swift? do tell!

is your point 'young people can write good songs'? that's not being debated. but 'in my life' doesn't sound like a song that was limited by the author's limited experience w/ this world. 'you belong with me' does.

Maybe so, maybe not, but it's not contingent on the writer being your average suburban teenage girl who hasn't finished high school.

so glad we're finally comparing taylor swift to the beatles

after her next album comes out and it's more of the same, except a little worse and you guys get bored.

<3 music that "progresses"

No, I was trying to make a point about how ""Love me do isnt that great of a song, ut Lennon grew, whereas TSwift has written a beast like "Forever and Always" it is fine musical craftsmanship

xpost
and of course her next album definitely could be more of the same but not as good, and it might be boring. but fearless will still sound great.

Also, I've only heard the singles off of "Fearless," but, like, the sudden Rilo Kiley slagging is baffling to me. I enjoy "Wires and Waves," "Silver Lining," "I Never" and "Breaking Up" at least as much as anything Taylor Swift has ever done.

xxp

so glad we're finally comparing taylor swift to the beatles

See, this is a strawman, which is why I said I didn't want to make untoward comparisons. You're the one who brought up her (incorrect) age and the (incorrect) fact that she's in high school. If you don't want people to engage with dumb fucking arguments, don't make them.

so sorry I said she was in high school when she really graduated from some online christian diploma mill?

i need my artists to 'speak to me'.

lyrical depth is v important to me

i am an altbro. we are all altbros

I think I broke k3vin k :(

i don't know really what "lyrical depth" entails, but taylor swift's best songs seem honest and clear in a way that goes well beyond cliché.

idk i think "lyrical depth" requires a distance & nuance that a 20 yo or 18yo or w/e the fuck she was when she wrote those songs doesnt really have. or at least that she doesnt. like the song abt her rad family & getting malts & car rides cuz sum1 made fun of her ratface in junior high - i can see liking that songs blatant emotionalism but its too str8 forward and unalloyed to be "deep" or really worthy of much thought. its a nice song & its p catchy but its entirely flat. i mean mb u can read something in the irony of a teenager posing her past self as unknowing (the bit abt the leaves) or w/e but... its 2 much.

lamp you are the man but i pretty much disagree with every point you just made there. maybe we should all just take a step back

seriously if Rilo Kiley could write even one song even 10% as enjoyable...

Oh come on. That's silly.

i mean at least i am going to. i feel like i'm arguing with sarah palin

Carole King wrote "Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow" when she was 18. Stevie Wonder wrote "Uptight" when he was 16. Age is a red herring here, folks. If you want to argue there's something inherent about Swift particularly, that's fine, but falling back on ZOMG SHE'S A TEENAGER WHAT COULD SHE POSSIBLY KNOW ABOUT LIFE will get you exactly noplace.

wtf kinda sense does that make, you listen to the sarah palin of music

carole king and stevie wonder didn't limit their subject matter to songs about being a teenager. her age comes up because it's all she fucking sings about.

yeah i think we're the sarah palin in this equation, kev

uh, my itunes top played artists are john cale, smog, jacques brel and the beach boys

Hey, how about those deep, meaningful, engaged-with-the-world lyrics Mike Love and Brian Wilson wrote when they were 19 and 20 amirite?

if carole king wrote 'will you still love me after 3rd period' and stevie wonder wrote 'uptight: about homework I don't want to do', people might like those songs less

taylor should cover porpoise song imo

i think age gets brought up so much w/r/t to t.swift because a) she mentions it all the time ihs b) most of themes are articulated in p teenage way and c) theres a p omnipresent teenage quality to her music - its brash emotionalism & its immediacy &c - that makes it hard to avoid talking abt.

i mean this is more time than i ever wanted to spend thinking abt taylor swift so w/e its all subjective.

oh & my most played album in itunes is nachtstrom's 17 songs after midnight. so yeah

haha beach boys lyrics are awful, even when they're good! they had some other things going for em. taylor swift don't.

carole king and stevie wonder didn't limit their subject matter to songs about being a teenager. her age comes up because it's all she fucking sings about.

― iatee, Thursday, March 4, 2010 5:09 PM (5 minutes ago)

these rappers only rap about "pimpin and bitches"

Dude, she's a teenage girl. Teenage girls tend to lead pretty insular lives. I'm okay with her sticking to that for now, because she does it pretty well.

those guys aren't rappers, you should prolly listen to more old music kev xp

Next people are going to me telling me that I should check out Metric for some really intense female songwriting with depth, as i'm just fronting with this enjoying things that are obviously good business. Confusing place ILM.

http://freshlyservedhiphop.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/cam.gif

i feel that .gif so deep in my heart

frankie valli sang about being a teenager

xp dude ive been looking for that for so long, i have cranky dorks on ilm to thank for finally finding it

idk i think "lyrical depth" requires a distance & nuance that a 20 yo or 18yo or w/e the fuck she was when she wrote those songs doesnt really have.

well i said she was honest and artful, which doesn't necessarily mean "deep." i don't actually think she's all that "deep," but otoh patti smith is "deep" and some of her stuff is way the hell more embarrassing than any taylor swift songs. i think taylor swift writes exceptionally good pop songs about the experiences of being a teenager. that's plenty for me.

DickieV Last week I saw Gladys Knight in concert n tonight= 'm going to see Taylor Swift-that is versatility baby just like Evan Turner!

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

Uh oh, time for another poll!

so this is basically about discomfort with people expressing extreme amounts of enthusiasm isn't it

it's cool lampatee--sometimes ppl weird me out when they do that too

Forever and Always wuz robbed people

DickieV Taylor Swift was Awesooome Baby! half a minute ago via mobile web

http://i33.tinypic.com/2r4hl3m.jpg

dickie v's opinions abt most things > dickie v's opinions abt college bball

there are lots of Taylor Swift songs I haven't heard, but I do know that if I'm at a place where I'm practically forced to listen to country music radio and I hear "Love Story," then I'm pretty happy. And if I hear "Tim McGraw" (the song) then it's been a good fucking day...

I would probably characterize "You Belong With Me" as enjoyable fluff, but I don't think it's a totally inappropriate candidate for song of the year...I like "Daniel" and "Obsessed" (wz this even nominated?) a little more, and "Paparazzi" a little less...

has anyone itt heard of the intentional fallacy

pretty boomin band imo

duly noted, noted scholar

I just listened to White Horse for the first time...that's a pretty affecting song...

for all the haters who are like "it's ok for teenage girls, but be real, bros..." it's possible that you are letting the slick, produced mainstream pop-country sound and the accordant teenage wholesome good-girl image distract you from the songwriting smarts that are clearly there...

http://naturalismo.files.wordpress.com/2006/12/bros.jpg

plus, you never know, maybe there was actual teenage girls who post on here. it would be pretty crazy i know, everyone knows girls don't REALLY like music, not proper music like us guys. AM I RIGHT GUYS? YEAH! WHOO!

what?

xp my bad, wasn't trying to say that there wasn't...

plz don't start another ILM Census.

*registers teenage girl sockpuppet*

(how is it that Lamp says that teenage girls don't have real thoughts and I get shit?)

*registers teenage girl sockpuppet*

But... I thought Emily's Cheese was already on the site? :(

on my first listen-through, this is pretty d-_-b

parts of 'the way i loved you' sound like sk8er boi. and the opening to 'tell me why' sounds like that alicia keys song 'like you'll never see me again'

I got so bothered at how the J Newsom thread was just a giant carnival of internet yuks despite not liking that album all that much, and I kind of <3 Swifty but I always suspect her heterosexual grown man fans of having a fantasy about watching their girlfriends die in childbirth

Trying to stay one step ahead of the patriarchy has ruined my life, guys

chill out take a drive in a truck

ABSENTMINDEDLY MAKIN ME WANT U

A B C how did you peek into my secret heart and find out my desirs?

:kanyeshrug:

I kind of <3 Swifty but I always suspect her heterosexual grown man fans of having a fantasy about watching their girlfriends die in childbirth

?????

title track got fewer votes than i thought it would!

tswizz :3

I kind of <3 Swifty but I always suspect her heterosexual grown man fans of having a fantasy about watching their girlfriends die in childbirth
?????

― Tim F, Saturday, March 6, 2010 7:26 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

yah srsly. i mean, girlfriends??

I always suspect her heterosexual grown man fans of having a fantasy about watching their girlfriends die in childbirth

Like, what. Dudes can't listen to music by women? Grow the fuck up.

My kingdom for a Deal With It Demi Lovato gif

ftr I meant girlfriend pillows

Like I would trade my pregnant wife for Ol' Ratface Taylor Swift or any other dumb rock star.

ftr, I meant grow the fuck up.

huh

anyway - <3 her

oh god those are some bad posts

sorry thread, sorry kingkong vsgodzilla, sorry taylor swift homeschooler hit machine

Why do so many good threads go to waste like this one? Can't we just talk about liking her music and why without this wining about what that means and who it makes us? I don't like Joanna Newsom, but I don't bother posting on her thread and telling people they are stupid for liking her. It's really that simple.

lol I didn't even get A B C's zings until kingkong pointed them out. good lookin tho against the patriarchal majority, stop them from their fiendish task of reappropriation imo.

Maybe gone to waste isn't the best way to put it, still.....

the ship will right itself, take a look at the joanna newsom thread

nothing wrong with going over to the newsom thread and saying you don't like her (all in the how, of course), but the anti-Taylor business has been covered in the og Taylor thread and the singles poll, so I can't imagine why anyone should bother spreading it here as well.

okay well to try to turn this thread back on topic - wow @ this album. easily the best thing I've heard all year. completely walks the other critical faves from last year that I've heard so far (yyy's and phoenix, apologies for not being that into 'current' music atm.) the only other thing I've heard that comes close in terms of euphoria is maybe 'shine blockers' but that's completely different.

parts of 'the way i loved you' sound like sk8er boi.

I meant complicated, of course

returning briefly to the whole issue of whether she can actually sing outside the recording studio, this is a good argument in her favor. she's no powerhouse, but in a room with good sound and monitors, she sounds just fine.

I thought the childbirth post was good and well phrased!

I have not heard this album really.

I do think anyone in group b is fronting to some degree or another, and it's pretty apparent in the way some people here talk about her.

this is just o_O

anyway listening to this on headphones now and it feels a little bit too intimate - feelin a little embarassed tbh

all i know is i wanna pound her till her eyes fall out of their sockets

gunnin for 51 with a double up of username and comment
Saluting you canks.

why would anyone SB me for that? i bet even the homos itt would bang the bejeezus outta her

yeah i don't think canks is the first to express that sentiment

She's only fifteen dude. I bet you banged Abigail too.

she gave cankles everything she had

i feel sorry for your mother :korean shopkeeper voice:

hahahaha

cause when you're
SB'd
and somebody tell you they got a hot chick waiting for them
you're gonna believe them

arianne more like amirite?

lol canks
taylor is vv pretty yes WS x10000000

smashin ol ratface

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkK0bfJhYhw

today my favorite song is 'the best day'

For me the funny thing about this album isn't merely that my favourite changes all the time but that songs radically wax and wane in my affections, dropping from 1 to 7 or so from day to day.

― Tim F, Wednesday, March 3, 2010 2:02 PM (1 month ago) Bookmark

have reached this point with the album. last week it was the best day. yesterday it was breathe. today it's tell me why. what does tomorrow hold?

a facebook friend just discovered her tom petty cover, and now my homepage is full of angry rockists waving torches and getting out the tar and feathers. sacrilege!

I have no problem w/ calling taylor swift our generation's tom petty

i think that's a solid rallying cry, really.

yeah that's about as good as it gets.

I think a lot of people here don't actually enjoy country music as they'd like to on some philosophical level and taylor swift - who writes decent, approachable pop songs - is a good way to pretend like they actually like country music. hope she makes a 'yankee hotel foxtrot' soon!

This has probably all been pointed out, but...

1. I don't need to "pretend" I enjoy country music. I generally don't.

2. Taylor doesn't do country music so much as she does flawless, heart-swelling pop songs.

3. Fearless is better than Yankee Hotel Foxtrot could ever dream of being.

yankee hotel foxtrot can have some amazing dreams cause it's a viking of sleep

also stfu

Also YMMV but I would also take Fearless over pretty much anything in Cale's solo output, maybe aside from Vintage Violence or Paris 1919... anything released by Smog (speaking of a "viking of sleep")... the list continues to grow.

so I'm not having this debate with anyone

but I'm especially not having this debate with you

go read pitchfork or something

i dislike country on some philosophical level and taylor swift - who writes amazing, approachable pop songs - is an artist who writes amazing, approachable pop songs

go read pitchfork or something

??

You're more likely to find Cale or Smog or Beach Boys reviews there than anything related to Ms. Swift!

What a fantastic album. Some of the most nostalgic and relate-able lyrics I've heard in a long time. I may just be re-hashing what everyone has alrSady said but its quite amazing. Anywhere from a 12yr old girl to a 50+ senior could feel something from her lyrics. she makes the kind of music that reminds me why I started liking pop music in the first place. She paints pictures of small town wherever, failed relationships, remembering the past for the good and bad times that it was. She's the best. It's been awhile since a female pop star has hit me this way.

I re-upped this because its election season and yall better recognize. Definitely one of the best releases in the past 5 years.

Pretty sure I posted these on another thread... but, I went to Taylor's Houston show about a week ago with my little one (who went nuts, predictably) and took a bunch of photos, which can be found here for those curious.

friending u iirc

I'll likely throw Fearless a vote in the '05-'09 poll, btw!

lot of ppl there, more than yr average indie rock show O_O

They screamed a lot.

any show of excitement at a concert is a good thing imo

Dude your FB profile is totally blank. What gives?

Are you concerned the CIA is watching (remember: don't use Google either!!!!!!!!!!11)?

I happened to hear "You Belong With Me" twice during car rides while staying with my brother a couple weeks ago, and I've lost any ambivalence I had about it. One thing I like about it is the way the current of joyousness in the song builds in momentum, so it becomes less and less about frustration or envy and more about the joy of an imagined world in which she is together with her love object, or even just a celebration of the feelings she has in their own right. It's also an incredible song to have playing during a car ride, as I think others said.

^^otm - the lyric of "you belong with me" is open-ended enough to be performed in completely different ways, there's no confirmation of a happy ending in it - it could be a lot more ambiguous or even self-deluding - but it's just performed with this incredible optimism. i've written before that that indicates that the narrator (as performed by taylor) does get her man in the end, but actually rudipherous is right - it's the sheer heart-swelling celebration of having feelings this big and strong in the first place (and as such a celebration of being human, really).

and its melody is pliable enough to work in different settings, too. i like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVHJhaExkgw

omg

omg this is great

hahah that makes me feel like I'm in a karaoke room

awesome.

lolz at the anime orchestra version of fearless
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BFQjyb_WIE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnWDtQUd9Dk

"The Other Side Of The Door" from the Platinum Edition triumphs them all. Well except "You Belong With Me"

definitely not

this album is perfect but probably "fearless"

CAPture it
REMEMber it

I wish someone would have brought up a young Kristin Hersh upthread.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYpCU13hdi8

Tell Me Why was robbed. Such a great song. How did no one vote for it? Secret heart of the album, imo.

Eh, maybe not.

it's a great song, album is full of great songs, i for one remain sore that i'm the only vote for "you're not sorry"

http://i.imgur.com/3JC1KjH.png

how in the world did tell me why not get a single vote

poss my favorite twifty song ever

seriously

i think it's her most underrated deep cut

also fearless with only 1 vote wtf

ten yrs old today

Re-recorded Love Story drops tonight at midnight. Full album with lots of bonus material coming soon. I'm excited to see how this shapes up - Fearless is still my favorite of all her work.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Et8qlsWXMAQ80VC?format=jpg&name=4096x4096

“bonus material” and suddenly my interest goes from 0 to 10

i'm definitely curious if she's messed with things at all or if they're going to just be slavish re-recordings. i'm expecting the latter but you never know

unreleased tracks are very cool of course

re, ufo: someone noted in another thread that if the point is to encourage anyone who wants to use these songs to use "Taylor's Version," it wouldn't make sense to change things up. Would expect them to be quite faithful to the originals - maybe just polished up.

On the right day, this is still my favorite Taylor album. The self-titled showed great promise but the little critical writing I remember seeing on it seemed to attribute at least some of that to cowriter Liz Rose. Fearless was grander in scale ("Love Story," "Change"), more personal ("Fifteen," "The Best Day" - the tenderness of which has only grown on me more as I've grown up and had kids of my own), and was when her gift for writing melody became obvious ("Hey Stephen," "You Belong With Me," every song...).

At the time, I was the only person I knew who took Swift seriously. I was living in the UK and the Pop mix of "Love Story" was in rotation, but friends back home dismissed her as Radio Disney or Shania Twain lite. I don't recall Fearless doing particularly well on EOY lists, though Rolling Stone probably ranked it. I didn't pay any attention to the Grammys at this time in my life and don't remember what the reaction was to Fearless winning AOTY. Was the sense at the time that she was for real or that this was the Grammys being the Grammys?

ok the "love story" remake is out and it's kinda fascinating to compare because while it's largely a recreation, there's a few slight differences in the details, the tones are different etc., and i prefer her current voice too

I like it! Not better than the original, but it's good as just another version. Drums are more rock than on Fearless, which gives it a slightly bar-band feel, in a good way. Modulation at the end still slays.

I just watched lyric video, which is a compilation of old photos and clips of young Taylor with her fans and to be honest, I had to reach for a box of tissues over here, filled with nostalgia for a very different time.

lmao the rerecording made me cry, i am such a mark

I don’t like this song very much to begin with, but I do think the playing and performance were better on the original. I hope she brings something new & interesting to some of these rerecordings, rather than just delivering “bar band”–style covers.

I was bumping Reputation today; the idea of redoing that album (in particular) is just so bizarre… I wonder if she’ll actually get there.

I don't think her goal is exactly reinterpretation. She wants these to displace the originals as much as possible, so I'd expect more fidelity than not.

If I heard it on the radio when out, I'm not sure I'd notice it was a different version. It's true that the new drums make it sound slightly more like something from 1994 rock radio.

I assume the Swifties will buy/stream the new albums no matter what they sound like, while less hardcore fans will only f with them if they sound like they have a reason to exist (beyond the financial reason). So why not do that? I guess she must know what she’s doing.

Maybe her plan is to eventually convince the streaming services to pull the original versions of the albums altogether.

I'm sure she'd love that but I think for now she's mostly trying to complicate the algorithms. Every stream that goes to a new version is one Scooter doesn't get.

What happened with the re-recordings by her former bandmates Def Leppard? The version of Hysteria on Spotify looks like the original, not the 2013 re-recording, although I didn't listen.

xp Good point; I may still underestimate/ not fully grasp how the streaming ecosystem really works.

I guess it’s a huge advantage just to have hers on top, chronologically. (But still, if those are the ones that people will be clicking on and sticking with default, why do they have to closely imitate the originals?)

I think it's so if someone clicks on "Love Story," it's close enough to what they're looking for that they don't go looking for the other one.

And not all artists could do this at Taylor level, obviously, but those new recordings are going to totally swamp the old ones for plays for months after they come out, at a minimum, because Taylor's fans will do that — both because they will want to support her, but also because they'll genuinely want to hear the new ones.

I wonder how close she’ll try to imitate the original cover art, without running afoul of copyright.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/k7a7ka/why-taylor-swift-re-recording-her-old-music-scooter-braun-explained

Maybe it's my imagination, but I think she sounds a little emotionally flat/ lacking in conviction on the re-recording; she may be singing better technically but she sounds less like she means it.

She probably sees Scooter Braun's face floating in the air as she records every line.

I bet the ones that are already vindictive are going to have some added emotion behind them.

She doesn't sound like she believes she is a scarlet letter anymore.

that is a particularly hard song to pull off singing as an adult, i would imagine.

This new 'Love Song' recording hit #2 on Spotify global so I imagine this re-release thing overall will contribute a ton to her streaming presence this year, re: talks of why she does it and how it could replace old recordings.

https://www.iaspm.org.uk/taylor-swift-eras-narrative-digital-media-and-music/

I look forward to hearing the new "Hey Stephen." Do we know if the rerecording contains all the songs on the "Platinum Edition"?

Decent NYT piece here, about her perspectives shifting as she gets older: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/09/arts/music/taylor-swift-folklore-youth.html

Despite having once been a teenage girl myself (unlike a lot of music critics), I confess that I am not completely free of these internalized biases. I was initially dismissive of “Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince,” a song that appeared on Swift’s 2019 album “Lover.” The first few times I heard it, I wondered what a grown woman on the cusp of 30 was doing still writing about homecoming queens and teenage gossip.

(maybe not a very clear metaphor, but regardless)

I wonder how close she’ll try to imitate the original cover art, without running afoul of copyright.

Oh, I see – it's already online. Clever:

https://cdn.countrynow.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Taylor-Swift-Fearless.jpg

Also, to answer my other question – I see now that "Fearless (Taylor's Version) consists of all of the 19 tracks from Fearless Platinum Edition (2009), her soundtrack single "Today Was a Fairytale" (2010), and six additional songs that were scrapped from the 2008 album."

HI. I wanted to let you know that the first “From the Vault” song I’m releasing from Fearless (Taylor’s Version) comes out tomorrow at midnight eastern. It’s called You All Over Me (From The Vault). pic.twitter.com/0GdNXHvPM0

— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) March 24, 2021

One thing I’ve been loving about these From The Vault songs is that they’ve never been heard, so I can experiment, play, and even include some of my favorite artists. I’m really excited to have @MarenMorris singing background vocals on this song!! ☔️

— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) March 24, 2021

You All Over Me is produced by Aaron Dessner and co-written by Scooter Carusoe - can’t wait for you to hear it 💛

— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) March 24, 2021

ooh so it sounds the vault songs aren't just going to be her recreating the unreleased recordings from the fearless sessions and instead they'll all be newly re-worked which is interesting

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKaMUm7YwZc

it's solid

It’s a solid song, but (as with the new “Love Story”), her performance sounds kind of perfunctory to me. You can compare it with the Dessner–produced tracks from the last two albums... it has a similar sound, but def. not the same feel. Her heart’s not totally in it, right?

I like it

love "you all over me" to death lol

I like it too. It keeps vaguely reminding me of a bunch of songs I can't quite identify, but in a good way. Doesn't sound perfunctory to me in the same way "Love Story" does, maybe just because I don't have an original to compare it to.

She posted some puzzle/riddle thing (about the "vault") - anyone know what it means?

Btw, I've been listening to this (OG) album a lot, in preparation for the new version coming out - it is really good.

Fearless (OG) is still my fave t swift.

I love the Where is this GO-ing? part in "Forever and always" – that song totally hits my 2000s Avril-style pop/rock sweet spot.

("Tell Me Why" has a similar quality... I didn't realize she was working that particular style at this stage.)

I love “Tell Me Why”

gf wandering through the room while I'm listening to You All Over Me: This song is gross.
me: you don't like her voice?
gf: it sounds like she's complaining he came on her and she can't get it off.

Gone was any trace of you, I think I am finally clean

So the “codes” were titles of the unreleased songs, which I guess Swifties would know:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNNbIrsDkKn/

Yes to Maren Morris & Keith Urban duets

I'm guessing she won't be getting Nathan Chapman to come back to do the backing vocals

Colbie Caillat is back!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFjJs6ZjPe8

for the most part i think taylor's b-sides are not great so i'm a little blown away by how much i like the vault tracks. maybe it's bc they allow me to see new angles on an era of her songwriting that i kind of miss

this isn't a mindblowing song or anything but i love everything the chorus melody does

Featuring the debut of the phrase "casually cruel," before she re-used it in "All Too Well."

I like it!

I've pre-ordered the new CD, and I look forward to hearing it - but I still feel like there's a "going through the motions" quality to her vocal performance on each of these preview tracks.

honestly despite making her best and most mature work last year, there is a part of me that has missed the gleefully petty teenage aspect of her/her voice, and it's a testament to her growth as a singer/songwriter/performer that she can inhabit that former self in 2021. i would have gone absolutely feral if i'd heard this in a claire's in 2008.

i love the production on that, really dreamy

Rerecorded version out today

i think i might genuinely prefer this to the original, simply for minor changes in some of the timbres

"Fifteen" was the one I was most curious about, because it's one where she doesn't have to change a thing for it to feel very different — and it does, in obvious ways. I think the vocal is sweet, you can hear all the affection for her younger self. Also the lyric video has a nice slideshow with a whole lot of who I assume is the real-life Abigail.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLCol1C3ouc

p sure if i watch that i will cry

the new “fifteen” is good but this project mainly just reinforces how much i hate faithful rerecordings

can’t tell if it’s because i listened to it through streaming but the dynamics felt more squashed too

i did listen to evermore right after and got to marvel at how far she's come

Yeah overall I can't see myself reaching for this one rather than the original. But I think she's done it about as well as she could.

the vault stuff is uniformly excellent afaict tho

i think the song that suffers most for not being sung by a teenager is "forever & always"

I haven't had a chance to listen to it on good speakers because my bluetooth isn't pairing for some stupid reason, but via a cursory listen through my phone, I think I might agree. That one is my absolute favorite on the album too.

Is Abigail a real person(?)

"Breathe" sounds great. I'm enjoying this more than I expected to, based on the advance tracks. I still think her vocals lack a certain "commitment," and the overly faithful musical settings feel like a missed opportunity; but it still sounds good!

(Her singing has improved (technically) in a big way since 2008, which def. helps)

abigail is extremely real

Abigail makes an appearance in the Miss Americana documentary, iirc

listening to this new version of "fifteen" reminded me of the very bad feminist discourse around taylor swift circa 2009-2012

Felt like I was going insane with some of that discourse, it did take away the energy to talk about her music. It was a relay race, first she hated sex, then she did sex wrong or something, and then it shifted and probably peaked in insanity when she was a nazi ??? it sort of quickly fell apart like a house of cards at some point and now it's weird to remember it as a real thing but I guess these re-releases will force some of the skeletons out of the closet. I have read reviewers of this re-relase admitting "I didn't take her seriously as a songwriter back then I guess I realize now she always made great songs"

the overly faithful musical settings feel like a missed opportunity

well, it's not primarily an artistic pursuit. being unfaithful to the original songs would betray the motivation for doing this whole project in the first place

personally i'm kind of digging the slight 90s alt rock vibes of the re-recordings and also "you all over me" is one of the best songs of the year

i do enjoy the grungier guitar tone when it appears

the drums have that kind of dull thwack that sounds very live (the adjective not the band) to me, still not exactly sure why it ended up like that but i'm kind of into it. there's a certain rawness to the re-recordings

I don't really know this album aside from "You Belong With Me," so that's all I listened to, but the original version sounds much better to me. What the re-recording is missing, I think, is the wistfulness in her voice that balanced the cattiness of the lyrics. In the original, "she wears short skirts, I wear t-shirts" comes off mostly as envy; she would like to be the kind of person who can wear short skirts. In the re-recording, the envy is missing from her voice, so what I get instead is a sense of superiority, of "she's wrong for you because she's shallow and slutty, unlike me." Does anyone else have that reaction? I feel like I'm zeroing in on something so tiny as to be almost unnoticeable, but it really takes away what I liked about the song.

I think that may fall under the rubric of what I've been saying about her vocals – she doesn't sound really expressive or like she's committed to "selling" the story or emotion in many of these songs (which isn't surprising, considering how old they are).

(and she's always been a really expressive singer, even when her singing was a lot more rough)

xxp: I have always read the short skirts/t-shirts thing as a superiority thing! The "I am not like the other girls" trope kinda applies there.

The lyrics read that way to me on paper, but I also hear some envy/wistfulness/insecurity in her younger voice that makes it more nuanced.

Like in the original version I can hear her wanting to buy into that trope because she's jealous; in the re-recording all I hear is the trope itself.

I also heard it as self-deprecating, in the original song. No one feels superior for sitting on the bleachers (well, a certain kind of snide teen does, but the character in the song isn't Daria).

But maybe you're right! Like, I think there could be elements of both that I had just never thought about.

Did give a listen to Forever & Always on better speakers and yeah, even though it's a decent performance of the song, the differences are kinda stark. Mostly on the production choices, I guess? I think the original was more driving. Also, there's a little artificial harmonic on the electric guitar in the second verse that's a huge point of joy for me in the song and they don't exactly nail it, I don't think.

It got me thinking about how people used to criticize TS for her lack of singing chops, which always confounded me because she sounded great to my untrained ears. Maybe what I liked were some of the vocal nuances that more singing-acquainted people would have considered bad singing and those have disappeared as she has grown as a professional singer? Or maybe she's just not all that worked up about Joe Jonas anymore and her heart wasn't all that in it.

As a high-school bleacher-sitter, I always felt way superior.

It was a false impression, but that's high school.

just wanted to say: "that's when"!!!!!!

I don't really know this album aside from "You Belong With Me," so that's all I listened to, but the original version sounds much better to me. What the re-recording is missing, I think, is the wistfulness in her voice that balanced the cattiness of the lyrics. In the original, "she wears short skirts, I wear t-shirts" comes off mostly as envy; she would like to be the kind of person who can wear short skirts. In the re-recording, the envy is missing from her voice, so what I get instead is a sense of superiority, of "she's wrong for you because she's shallow and slutty, unlike me." Does anyone else have that reaction? I feel like I'm zeroing in on something so tiny as to be almost unnoticeable, but it really takes away what I liked about the song.

― Lily Dale, Friday, April 9, 2021 4:13 PM (three days ago) bookmarkflaglink

I've been listening to this all weekend, and the vocal delivery is noticeably different throughout. What I hear is an artist who's worked a lot on things like breath control and pitch and is now delivering a much more sturdy, "professional" vocal track. Unfortunately there are places where it feels too clean, or maybe rehearsed is a better word.

And yes, I know *exactly* what you mean on "You Belong With Me." My favorite vocal on the entire original album was the end of verse 2 of "You Belong With Me" where she sings, "You say you're fine, I know you better than that/ Hey, what you doing with a girl like that?" The original is a super sweet falsetto that felt as though she had to work to hit what I assume is a rather tricky melody. It reads playful, naive, and yes, wistful is a good word, too. In the new one, she blows through the first falsetto as though she can now do it in her sleep, and then spits out a "what you doing with a girl LIKE that" in a more arrogant voice.

I know this reads as a criticism. I don't actually know if it's a good or bad thing. She's a far more capable vocalist now than she was when she first started, and I will happily listen to "Taylor's Version." But I'm actually a bit relieved to know others have noticed this too.

Having it on in the background, listening as a whole album, it mostly does the trick for me. I find myself getting wrapped up in it in a lot of the same places I do on the original album. I still think that Forever & Always didn't really get the performance it deserved and I imagine that there are other songs where it works that way for different listeners.

This is a nice song-by-song tribute that NPR put together with contributions from different writers and musicians.

https://www.npr.org/2021/04/12/985842675/still-fearless-re-recording-the-past-on-taylors-version

"Tell Me Why"
Fearless found me at the most pivotal time in my life. I was making the transition from middle school to high school, started growing my hair out in dreads — which would become a staple of my look well into the beginning of my career — and I was finally starting to get a grip on songwriting. I'd started teaching myself guitar in elementary school and by 8th grade, I was proficient enough that everyone wanted me to accompany them at the school's talent show since my middle school didn't have a guitar program (unlike the surrounding schools). I felt kinship with Taylor Swift because she started writing songs really early on in her life and it gave me the confidence to continue to write. Fearless felt like a masterclass on songwriting, but "Tell Me Why" always stood out.

"Tell Me Why" taught me how to write a chord progression. Though it wasn't a single, or even necessarily one of my favorites off the record, it was my absolute favorite to play. Despite its heavy lyrics, the chord progression sounded equally breezy and flowy sonically. The chorus of "Tell Me Why" really stands out. It's wordy and longer than the average chorus, but it never feels clunky.

Additionally, all three choruses in the song vary lyrically, which is something I always love to do. Obviously Taylor wasn't the first to do this, but she was the first I can remember doing it and making it sound as seamless as it was, thus creating yet another T Swift songwriting trick you can track throughout my entire discography — and, I'm sure, for future records to come. — Shamir, musician

Have a weird ask that I wonder if any of you may remember. I have this strong recollection of discovering Taylor's self-titled debut from a blog post circa 2007 that also covered Miranda Lambert's debut or maybe Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. As I remember the blog had a cartoon tiger in the header. Anyone have any clue what I'm talking about? I'd love to know who the writer was and find that post if it's still up somewhere...

I’m glad I bought this, for the “vault” tracks alone—they’re really good! (and what will probably keep me coming back to this version)

WELL WELL WELL you all really went out and left my greatest expectations in shambles this week.😆 Word on the street is you made Fearless (my version) the biggest country album 1st week of the last 6 years & the top release of 2021 so far. Honestly?? How?? Did I get this lucky??

— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) April 16, 2021

I’ve grown to like the re-recorded album tracks a lot now, too. I’ve basically been going back-and-forth between the two versions. What an album...