Taylor Swift Unabashedly Embraces Her Inner “Lover” on New Album: Track-by-Track Review
Many years ago when I was first being trained as a clinical psychologist, I worked with a young woman who was hell-bent on rebelling against her father following a family tragedy. After reflecting on the case my supervisor mused, “It’s always so fascinating when people conflate rebellion with independence. If how you act is completely determined by the impact your actions will have on someone else, isn’t it that the ultimate display of dependence on them?” I think about that nugget of wisdom often and it came back into my mind after my third full listen through Taylor Swift’s new album Lover.
Taylor Swift’s almost unfathomably critically and commercially first six albums — which won a staggering 10 Grammys and sold 30 million copies in the U.S. alone — are all varying degrees of terrific. They also all feature Taylor Swift trying to prove something about herself to others. 2006’s Taylor Swift and 2008’s Fearless found her striving to be taken seriously as a teenage singer-songwriter in a world that doesn’t take people her age — or her gender — seriously as artists. 2010’s Speak Now and 2012’s Red found her striving to be accepted by the mainstream with an increasingly mature and decreasingly country sound. 2014’s 1989 and 2017’s reputation found her striving for world domination as a pop music heavyweight. The latter in particular also found her eager to prove that she was both in on the jokes about her and not amused by them. After all that striving (which, in all fairness is inherent in the business model and resulted in a great deal of terrific music) it is so great to see her simply being herself on her seventh album, Lover (released last Friday). Although Lover doesn’t stray radically from the Taylor Swift formula, it feels delightfully unencumbered by a desire to prove anything.
Without further ado, here is my track-by-track review of Taylor Swift’s Lover.
“I Forgot That You Existed” After taking aim at her haters so pointedly on her previous album, the lighthearted opening number’s declaration that one magical day she woke up and forgot what she was so sad and angry about and decided to move on is a bold and satisfying way to begin the album.
- Favorite Lyrics: “How many days did I spend thinking/ ‘Bout how you did me wrong, wrong, wrong?/ Lived in the shade you were throwing/ ’Til all of my sunshine was gone, gone, gone”
“Cruel Summer” The synth beats and solid hook feel a bit to reminiscent of cuts from 1989 and it definitely does not push Swift into any new or interesting territory lyrically, but it is a high-energy, infectious pop song that is worthy of space on the album.
- Favorite Lyrics: “So cut the headlights, summer’s a knife/ I’m always waiting for you just to cut to the bone/ Devils roll the dice, angels roll their eyes/ And if I bleed, you’ll be the last to know”
“Lover” The third and latest single from Swift’s album is this guitar driven, slow burn of a love song that marks one of three songs on the album (along with “Cornelia Street” and “Daylight”) that she wrote on her own. The surprising and poignant lyrics are soulfully delivered by an artist that has rarely sounded more assured. Country music megastar Keith Urban had the following to say about the song: “When a song so exquisitely written becomes a record so gorgeously crafted I feel such a deep sense of gratitude for the “art” of making music.” One listen and you’ll see what he means.
- Favorite Lyrics: “Ladies and gentlemen, will you please stand?/ With every guitar string scar on my hand/ I take this magnetic force of a man to be my lover/ My heart’s been borrowed and yours has been blue/ All’s well that ends well to end up with you/ Swear to be overdramatic and true to my lover”
“The Man” The furious dancehall beat rivals the best of 1989 and is matched by a blistering indictment of male privilege and misogyny. Lyrics like “I’m so sick of running as fast as I can/Wondering if I would get there quicker if I were a man” and “If I was out flashing my dollars/I’d be a bitch not a baller” are some of the boldest and most quotable on the album. It is hard to imagine this not turning into a feminist anthem.
- Favorite Lyrics: “They’d say I hustled, put in the work/ They wouldn’t shake their heads and question how much of this I deserve/ What I was wearing, if I was rude/ Could all be separated from my good ideas and power moves”
“The Archer” With a synthesizer-fueled beat that mounts as the song builds from quiet longing to bombastic desperation, this song sonically evokes the 1989 era in the best way while providing some of the album’s most poignant lyrics (“I’ve been the archer/I’ve been the prey/Who could ever leave me darling? Who could stay?”).
- Favorite Lyrics: “I wake in the night, I pace like a ghost/ The room is on fire, invisible smoke/ And all of my heroes die all alone/ Help me hold on to you”
“I Think He Knows” Another impeccable co-production by Swift and Jack Antonoff that is far more musically complex than it appears at first listen, this exceedingly fun and funky song about her desire for her man to “lock it down” benefits from its short run time.
- Favorite Lyrics: “Lyrical smile, indigo eyes, hand on my thigh/ We could follow the sparks, I’ll drive/ “So where we gonna go?”/ I whisper in the dark/ “Where we gonna go?”/ I think he knows”
“Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince” Its sound may feel like a melding of 1989 standouts “Wildest Dreams,” “This Love,” and “Clean” but the lyrics, which find Taylor revisiting the young high school love that she wrote about as a teenager as an older and wiser woman, make this song a winner.
- Favorite Lyrics: “My team is losing, battered and bruising/ I see the high fives between the bad guys/ Leave with my head hung, you are the only one/ Who seems to care/ American stories burning before me/ I’m feeling helpless, the damsels are depressed/ Boys will be boys then, where are the wise men?/ Darling, I’m scared”
“Paper Rings” This high energy cut sounds like a cross between “99 Luftballoons” and a cut from No Doubt’s Tragic Kingdom, which is to say that it is one of the more unique songs on the album. But like most of the risks Swift takes on the album, it works.
- Favorite Lyrics: “The moon is high/ Like your friends were the night that we first met/ Went home and tried to stalk you on the internet/ Now I’ve read all of the books beside your bed/ The wine is cold/ Like the shoulder that I gave you in the street/ Cat and mouse for a month or two or three/ Now I wake up in the night and watch you breathe”
“Cornelia Street” The lyrics and themes evoke “All Too Well” (the album cut from Red that is my vote for best song Taylor Swift has ever crafted) but unlike that slow building tearjerker, “Cornelia Street” is accompanied by another strong Jack Antonoff arrangement that makes it an infectious, danceable jam. It is one of the album’s highlights.
- Favorite Lyrics: “You hold my hand on the street/ Walk me back to that apartment/ Years ago, we were just inside/ Barefoot in the kitchen/ Sacred new beginnings/ That became my religion”
“Death by a Thousand Cuts” Another Antonoff-assisted breakup anthem, this one has a bold vocal performance and a surprisingly complex lyrical arrangement. It’s not one of the album’s highlights, but it’s solid nonetheless.
- Favorite Lyrics: “Saying goodbye is death by a thousand cuts/ Flashbacks waking me up/ I get drunk, but it’s not enough/ ’Cause the morning comes and you’re not my baby”
“London Boy” Second to “ME!” this is the silliest, frothiest track on the album. It opens with a sample of an interview that James Corden conducted with Idris Elba and features an almost exhausting litany of references to British geography and culture. It is a true testament to Swift’s musical gift that she can convincingly sell what could have easily been a low point for the album.
- Favorite Lyrics: “I love my hometown as much as Motown, I love SoCal/ And you know I love Springsteen, faded blue jeans, Tennessee whiskey/ But something happened, I heard him laughing/ I saw the dimples first and then I heard the accent”
“Soon You’ll Get Better (feat. The Chicks)” Swift has rarely mined emotional material as heartbreaking as she does in this quiet, guitar-driven ballad in which she recounts the feelings of helplessness and isolation when the person you love is seriously ill. The impeccable vocal support from The Chicks only deepens its impact.
- Favorite Lyrics: “Holy orange bottles, each night, I pray to you/ Desperate people find faith, so now I pray to Jesus too”
“False God” The second half of the album’s somewhat jarring musical transitions continue with the prior tearjerker being followed by arguably the most sensual song Swift has ever crafted. The song has an R&B influence rarely seen in her music and an impressive vocal performance to match. It also features some of her more daring lyrics (e.g., “We might just get away with it/The altar is my hips/Even if it’s a false god/We’d still worship this love”).
- Favorite Lyrics: “But we might just get away with it/ Religion’s in your lips Even if it’s a false god/ We’d still worship/ We might just get away with it/ The altar is my hips/ Even if it’s a false god/ We’d still worship this love”
“You Need to Calm Down” I have already written enough (perhaps too much) about the album’s second single. Click here to see my take on the divisive song (TL;DR: it’s a catchy pop song with progressive and clever lyrics that was unfairly derided.)
- Favorite Lyrics: “You just need to take several seats and then try to restore the peace/ And control your urges to scream about all the people you hate/ ’Cause shade never made anybody less gay”
“Afterglow” This perfectly fine but unspectacular song features one of Swift’s favorite lyrical themes (deep regret over breaking someone’s heart), understated production, and a solid hook.
- Favorite Lyrics: “I lived like an island, punished you with silence/ Went off like sirens, just crying/ Why’d I have to break what I love so much?”
“ME! (feat. Brendon Urie of Panic! At the Disco)” It was hard to know what to expect from Swift’s latest era when this unironically optimistic candy-coated duet about a couple in love was released. The song announced that this certainly was going to be a departure from the reputation era, but what was it going to be? Now that we know, we can see this song for what it is — an infectious, silly, but ultimately forgettable ditty.
- Favorite Lyrics: “I know that I’m a handful, baby/ I know I never think before I jump/ And you’re the kind of guy the ladies want/ I know that I went psycho on the phone/ I never leave well enough alone/ And trouble’s gonna follow where I go”
“It’s Nice to Have a Friend” Far and away the album’s strangest song, this 2 minute and 30 second song finds Swift uncharacteristically opaque and tentative. It is not entirely clear what she is conveying, a rarity for an artist whose “heart-on-her-sleeve” approach to lyrics and production has been one of her signature qualities. The song has a musical arrangement unlike any song she has ever done. With its harps and spectral choir, it feels like a collaboration with Florence Welch (which, by the way, is something I would welcome with open arms).
- Favorite Lyrics: “Light pink sky, up on the roof/ Sun sinks down, no curfew/ 20 questions, we tell the truth/ You’ve been stressed out lately, yeah, me too/ Something gave you the nerve/ To touch my hand”
“Daylight” The album’s longest song, “Daylight” is reminiscent of 1989’s closeout “Clean,” and — like that song — matches yearning, hopeful lyrics with emotionally resonant vocals and strong production. It closes with a voiceover from Swift stating that she wants to be defined not by what haunts her, but rather by what she loves. It is a poignant declaration and reveals the truth that is hiding in plain sight throughout the album — that the lover of the title isn’t a man she’s infatuated with, it’s her.
- Favorite Lyrics: “Luck of the draw only draws the unlucky/ And so I became the butt of the joke/ I wounded the good and I trusted the wicked/ Clearing the air, I breathed in the smoke”
In Conclusion: As the spoken outro that closes out the album makes clear, Lover is an album about Taylor Swift unabashedly embracing the things she loves, like romance, empowerment, dancing, wordplay, and the search for a silver lining even in the darkest of times. It’s a joyous album that is a tremendously entertaining listen, but it is not perfect. Its varied musical style and considerable length (18 songs and 62 minutes long) means that it lacks the cohesiveness of 1989 and reputation and the emotional high points don’t soar quite as high as they did on Speak Now and Red. But it is nevertheless an impeccably written, produced, and performed album that begs the following question: How does one really compare an artist’s works when their output is so consistently strong and consistently evolving?
Grade for “Lover”: 4.5/5 stars
Read other articles about Taylor Swift by this author:
- Red (Taylor’s Version): Track-by-Track Review
- Fearless (Taylor’s Version): Track-by-Track Review
- evermore: track-by-track review
- folklore: track-by-track review
- You Need to Calm Down: An Analysis
- Reputation World Tour: Review
Read recent articles by this writer about other musicians: Lady Gaga, Mariah Carey, Aretha Franklin, Elton John, Madonna, and Florence Welch
