Taylor Swift - RED - October 22

oh fucking a

"All Too Well" destroyed me a little bit

second half of "treacherous"

I'm almost hoping to be disappointed!

Kate Bush is the only artist to make a batshit-awesome song with a Hitler reference so

this is a state of grace
this is the worthwhile fight
love is a ruthless game
unless you play it good and right
THESE ARE THE HANDS OF FATE
YOU'RE MY ACHILLES' HEEL
THIS IS THE GOLDEN AGE
OF SOMETHING GOOD AND RIGHT AND REAL

― lex pretend, Wednesday, October 17, 2012 3:17 PM

lex, this is not encouraging

ofl i actually thought this album was almost entirely terrible but i'm not gonna get strident about it yet

(for calibration i cried multiple times on first listen to the last one)

listened up 2 'we are never'.....this is a v good album, rest tmrw

dammit i'm gonna end up buying this aren't i

TREACHEROUS

the strings! the thousand taylors!

just gonna type every song title in here in all caps probably sorry

ofl i actually thought this album was almost entirely terrible but i'm not gonna get strident about it yet

(for calibration i cried multiple times on first listen to the last one)

cannot even begin to understand your perspective

the big ol slabs of edgeguitar on all the Major Ones clogged my arteries p quick and she's way worse at ke$ha's hedonist triumphalism on 22 than she was at hayley williams' envious moralizing on better than revenge and the lyrics i heard were unspecial (with the exception of all too well which i got misty on and the title track which is now the most tasteless thing on the shortlist for the end credits of my stalin biopic) and the one that had snow patrol on it deserved to

much luv for taylor as always tho!

Pretty sure I'll end up liking this more than Speak Now yeah.

Feel she touches more on her classic craft here than on that one. On "I Almost Do" , "Treacherous" and "All Too Well" she blends the s/t and Fearless styles while successfully allowing herself to do some different things sonically and vocally. On SN the attempts at renewal felt more experimental.

The tearjerkers are pretty irresistible as well.

So far.

Martin tracks really stand out as something different than the rest (except 22)

don't know how i feel about the snow patrol dude showing up halfway through this thing

stephen thomas erlewine compared "sad beautiful tragic" to mazzy star which is kind of right on

All Too Well tho, damn.

worst t. swift lyrics ever on "starlight" y/n

nice tune tho

oh no have i missed it all argh,.

calling "holy ground" the best thing on here

hooray
hooray

i guess i can say that "all too well" was my OMG favourite on one listen now

the duets are both dreary and unnecessary but the rest is so good that it doesn't matter

i loved "22"

how has no one mentioned THE LANA DEL REY ONE yet

not totally sure which one you think that is

"the lucky one"

the one which is basically britney's "lucky" except about a girl who transformed herself into a 60s starlet and then there are LYNCHIAN GUITARS in the second verse

and then there is another amazing twist and it's prob not LDR after all but until the twist i was seriously thinking that

yeah my immediate association with that one was "lucky" and there's so much ghostly guitar reverb on this record that it's hard for me to pin it to lynch particularly

i don't have my notes with me but iirc the first seven tracks blew me away and after that a few inessential songs creep in. get rid of sheeran and lightbody and there wasn't a song i actually disliked though.

"we are never..." - in the context of the album (ie nothing else is like it) i'm far more ok with it and its vapidity; it's kind of like, you have to actually parody yourself in order to move on? i'm sure there must be other examples of artists doing this.

"stay stay stay" is great, it's the only out-and-out country moment really.

xp there was def a really obvious lynchian MOMENT - am just going on memory from the playback

am going to have to wrestle with my bf's ridiculous stereo system to listen today, gah

"22" is "15" sequel, yeah? (she said yeah.)

i think the snow patrol dude song would be really good w/o the snow patrol dude

oh well

yeah i thought that too!

I couldn't identify a single snow patrol song so he's just a dude voice to me.

also i said on twitter earlier that "i almost do" and "we are never ever getting back together" are kind of the same song in very small ways, feel like their placement together is way deliberate and it's awesome

i am only at snow patrol now and the guitar bit is lovely

also, not the right place to say this but - lex the boy is a proper 'bf' now huzzah yay etc. YAY

actually that is an appropriate sentiment for a taylor thread.

too many thoughts so i am livetweeting them all here: https://twitter.com/lex_ferenda

amazing that the muffled drum bullshit of jeff bhasker actually serves "holy ground." it's so insistent yet totally contained

also, not the right place to say this but - lex the boy is a proper 'bf' now huzzah yay etc. YAY

that was more about the need for a shorthand

officially will defend the ed sheeran duet even though it's the most inconsequential thing on here

whatever. u like a boy.

enjoying that xpost

listening now. FUCKING HELL "ALL TOO WELL". like i knew i'd been blown away by it but it just happened again

wait lex had you not heard it since the listening session? OMG OMG

no!! they let us listen once! this is how playbacks work! they are the devil's work.

and that's the basis for an album review?

for some publications, yes

"stay stay stay" will be sleeper favourite, just irresistible. Dear Old Taylor

ludicrous lyrical conflation of "i knew you were trouble" and "99 problems" happening in my head

hey, you called me up again just to break me like a promise / so casually cruel in the name of being honest