Reputation

Sound DNA

• Pop
• Contemporary Pop

• synthetic
• swaggering
• urban

About

A fall from grace is inevitable when you’re on top of the world. Taylor Swift experienced a taste of that in the aftermath of <i>1989</i>, when her overexposure mixed with a rehashed public feud with Kanye West (and his then-wife Kim Kardashian). After the snake emojis flooded her comments and the narrative failed to exclude her, Swift went dark. She went so dark that when she returned with <i>reputation</i> in 2017, she had gone full macabre in her visuals and sound. Swift’s “goth-punk moment of female rage,” as she would describe it years later, was a full brand and sonic tilt for the singer. She reenlisted her <i>1989</i> co-conspirators Max Martin, Shellback, and Jack Antonoff, but this time around, her typical girl-next-door persona was shed like snake skin. The old Taylor was dead and the new Taylor was back with a vengeance: She cuts to the chase on “Look What You Made Me Do,” a Right Said Fred-sampling banger about the album’s villain origin story. Later, she’ll laugh off the betrayals on “This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things”—literally. But don’t get it twisted: This isn’t an album about feuds and foes. <i>reputation</i> is largely a love story, relaying what happens when your world falls apart but someone is able to turn poison ivy into a daisy. Swift’s “big reputation” hovers over the quiet origins of her budding romance, as she sings on “End Game” alongside verses from Ed Sheeran and Future. On tracks like “Getaway Car,” “Don’t Blame Me,” and “Gorgeous,” she hints at the less-than-ideal timing of falling for someone as another relationship crumbles. Rage is replaced with tenderness on “Delicate,” a sweet recollection of the type of nervous energy that buzzes in the early, uncertain days with someone new. By piano ballad album closer “New Year’s Day,” she’s settled in quite nicely with her new love, celebrating the banal domesticity after the party dies down.

via Apple Music

Tracklist

Credits