With the release of Taylor Swift’s most recent album, most of my free time not spent writing essays has been devoted to watching her music videos on repeat until the wee hours of the morning. Since the release of “Red,” each of Swift’s new albums incites an outpouring of Twitter angst as Taylor moves further and further away from anything resembling country music. I have often bought into this line of thinking, but as much as I have hated Taylor’s new direction, I have found I problematically love her new music.
Unfortunately, I didn’t really get into Taylor Swift until after the release of “Red” — the effective death of country Taylor. I always hated country as a kid and it wasn’t until late high school that I started to find it bearable. After latching onto “Springsteen” and Jason Aldean songs mentioning Amarillo, I slowly built up my country repertoire, eventually entering a Taylor Swift phase at some point in my first year that focused entirely on “Fearless” and “Speak Now.” It wasn’t until I heard “22” that I paid any attention to her newer music. Even this year, I thought “Blank Space” and “Shake it Off” were Katy Perry songs the first dozen times I heard them before basketball games at JPJ.
At the heart of this issue is a kind of moral outrage. Both country and pop are no doubt popular genres, but country fans hold some level of self-righteousness. Country’s lightly produced acoustic sound and simple blue-collar themes appeal to the Southerner in all of us, but “to go pop” has always been synonymous with selling out to a less legitimate genre. The idea that Taylor has sold out certainly isn’t helped by the fact that she commemorated the release of “1989” by taking all of her music off Spotify. (I read an interview where she justifies this by saying she did it to set album sales records, which essentially translates to “I wanted to make a lot of money.”)
As much as this new direction initially annoyed me, some of my indignation isn’t really fair. While many people, myself included, would like to think otherwise, Taylor has been pop to some extent since “You Belong With Me.” The sad truth is, Taylor Swift is from Pennsylvania and it is hard to be angry at her decision to stop faking a southern accent. The genre doesn’t exactly have an exclusive claim on her.
Aside from the fact that a lot of Taylor’s pop music is really catchy — she’s the only pop star I actually like — there are other redeeming factors in her new direction. Her newer music has a mature, self-deprecating tone that is refreshing. With all the criticism saying she dated every boy band member she could get her hands on just to write songs about them, it’s nice to see in “Blank Space” that she’s actually in on the joke these days.
As much as I fall strongly on the side of team country, I think it is time to stop faulting Taylor for what she is not and embrace who she is. There are plenty of country icons in the world, but there is only one Taylor Swift.
Christian’s column runs biweekly Fridays. He can be reached at c.hecht@cavalierdaily.com.
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