Taylor Swift - RED - October 22

hay everybody i had no idea this happened

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylor_Swift_and_Def_Leppard

yup. and i love RED more than these guys, but the hit to miss ratio is certainly different here.

fearless is perfect, pretty much. maybe one song i don't ~love~.

speak now has Innocent/Haunted which I don't love but they're two tracks in a pretty killer back half.

Holy Ground/Starlight/Begin Again are the only ones in the back 7 that stand up against anything else off Speak Now (and I actually kind of like the Ed Sheeran duet :S )

i was just completely stunned to discover speak now was longer than this one

― difficult listening hour, Thursday, December 6, 2012 1:25 PM (38 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this one feels like melon collie

― difficult listening hour, Thursday, December 6, 2012 1:25 PM (25 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

truth

lex, "melon collie" is a smashing pumpkins album

Not with Better Than Revenge and The Story Of Us it's not

I find it really difficult to compare what she's doing now to Fearless, for several reasons

Xps

like. i dunno. if you put 'Sad Beautiful Tragic' against either heartbreak waltz on Speak Now it just seems so obvious? the chorus alone is just....limp.

compare that to last kiss which is over a minute longer but sustains the narrative tension allll the way through.

in ways that are maybe even better than All Too Well?

I find it really difficult to compare what she's doing now to Fearless, for several reasons

this is fair, too

i still think it's a step down from speak now tho

Story of Us is a perfect Taylor power-pop song. Right up there with I'm Only Me When I'm With You.

Better Than Revenge is... uncomfortable... for a variety of reasons, but re: her delivery and musically it's pretty great.

anyway, this is a narcissism of small differences for me. I'm with you re: the first 9. I just think Speak Now didn't drop off nearly as starkly as this does.

you know what, I'm fine with taylor being a great singles artist from now on as opposed to a great albums artist. the highs are just as high

you guys know a Swift cover of "Bodies" would so rock

I think I came to this realization after her hunger games singles dropped.

i think this album will end up being a pretty minor footnote in her career... mostly it just made me very interested in what she does w/ her music in the next 5 or so years. she tries out a whole bunch of new sounds (the few tracks that sound like snow patrol but don't have the snow patrol dude are awesome) but on this album in particular i think it's really jarring. her next one tho could be a monster if everything clicks, or the one after that.

It's even gotten so I think "Stay Stay Stay," which I once liked, is cloying as fuck.

Tbh any album with an opening NINE as strong as Red - and a closer like Begin Again - can drop off however much it likes in between and I wouldn't care; the highs are as high as I expect of Taylor, and plentiful too, is what I'm arguing. Just delete the duets, who cares

I've come around to 'sad, beautiful, tragic,' it's taylor getting her sadsack indie mope on

<I>i think this album will end up being a pretty minor footnote in her career...</i>

Pretty sure it's taken her to a new level commercially (internationally)

right i just meant musically

xp

And not just internationally, but generationally -- I know people in their 30s and 50s who have just discovered her with this album.

On the Max Martin stuff, the only one I don't like is "22," which to me feels more like a forced merger of their sensibilities than a collaboration. "Trouble" is one of the best things on the album, and "We Are Never" has really grown on me, too.

After a few weeks of driving around with it on shuffle (which I prefer to the actual album sequencing), the only songs I routinely skip are "22," "The Last Time" and "Sad Beautiful Tragic."

And even my Taylor-skeptic girlfriend has come around to grudging respect. She especially likes "I Almost Do."

'begin again' still gives me ashlee flashbacks

i almost sent "all too well" to my taylor-skeptic on-good-but-distant-terms ex, and then i was like wait no, don't do that

lmao does she have a scarf of yours that you want back

she made me one actually i still have it it's my primary scarf :/ song gets me

yes the first 9 tracks are ludicrously good but the drop-off doesn't seem severe to me... "holy ground" and "begin again" are among my favourite things she's ever done. in previous years 'i guess we fell apart in the usual way / and the story's got dust on every page' would be the basis of the entire song, i love how her relationship themes have developed

"sad beautiful tragic" is nice and moody, "starlight" would be the most incredible thing ever at a cheesy club at 4am, the duets and "the lucky one" are a bit whatever but not actively awful.

"treacherous" => "i knew you were trouble" => "all too well" is the best 3-track run in the history of music i'm pretty sure

I don't like "22" *ducks*

where's the synth sound on Red?

I think "Red" is the best song on the album, love love love her voice on it, the most country singing on the album

& is that banjo throughout? it's such a cluttered production & I love it for that

Several of her songs use that trick of having burbling banjo that you only really register if you listen for it. ("You Belong With Me," e.g.) I sort of think Mutt Lange pioneered that with Shania, but I haven't actually traced its genesis. It gives enough of a "country" gloss to pass muster at country radio, but not enough to put off the non-country contingent.

Iirc that's what you thought about her past albums too so whatevz

Not really. For the first time I really like what she as a singer and/or lyricist is bringing here, like, I dunno, a PG Ke$ha of intriguing quirks and ticks. I think she makes the music better. But the music doesn't do too much for me, which may be what I said before. Though it is definitely still full of some distinctive highs. I vote for the album as interesting transition that makes me excited about what she does next.

Production-wise, it really does float in that purgatory between pop and country "remixed" to be poppier, a la Shania. Maybe Taylor Swift will release an "international" version, like "Come On Over."

She's had pop mixes of a bunch of her singles, going back at least to "Love Story."

Oh, I know. I just mean the whole album feels like that this time, or at least much of it.

I think this album actually has meant the most to me of any of her four to date, but that may be less due to the album in itself and more the sense that with each album I feel more involved in the character.

I think this album actually has meant the most to me of any of her four to date, but that may be less due to the album in itself and more the sense that with each album I feel more involved in the character.

otm. but also her singing improves so much from album to album that i have a tough time revisiting the others for a while

http://www.mtv.com/videos/taylor-swift/864179/i-knew-you-were-trouble.jhtml#id=1698833

lmao

lol

Sorry, this video is not available in your region.

I AM GOING TO FUCKING MURDER SOMEONE OVER TERRITORIAL RESTRICTIONS ONE OF THESE DAYS

~SPOILER~ I was hoping that the video would have ended with him getting killed by those pool players

Song doesn't work for a "We Found Love" video.

The new video is not Tay's finest hour. Kind of looks like a generic modern pop video. Even though this video follows the same basic "plot" as the "Begin Again" video (Taylor meets Cute Guy), it's hard to believe that the two videos were made by the same artist.

these extended monologues in music videos need to fucking stop

driver 8 otm

oh dear, that's not good. the song isn't BIG enough to bear the weight of portentous spoken word monologues, all the imagery is just ~edgy~ by numbers, and taylor looks vaguely uncomfortable throughout. cringe @ the literalism of "now i'm lying on the cold hard ground". lol @ how the video is kind of her slut-shaming herself.

it's odd, for an artist i love so much she's made zero videos i really love. they all paint in the broad, clichéd brushstrokes that her songs avoid.

Nice to see you say something negative about her.

;)

it's odd, for an artist i love so much she's made zero videos i really love. they all paint in the broad, clichéd brushstrokes that her songs avoid

The "You Belong With Me" video is pretty charming. And I like Taylor's princess dress and the overall faux-Jane Austen vibe of the "Love Story" video. And, while I could do without the Afterschool Special-style anti-bullying vignettes in "Mean," the performance half of that video is probably her best video.

The I Knew You Were Trouble video clip appears to be a morality tale about the consequences of bad haircuts.

lol