Note: This review is number seven in a series looking back at Taylor Swift’s first 10 albums.
The foreshadowing on Swift’s previous album “reputation” comes to fruition on “Lover.” Swift’s seventh album celebrates love of all kinds and spews happiness, providing a complete 360 from her last album.
This era consists of lots of pink, rainbows, butterflies, and hearts, contrasting the black, snakes, and newspaper print aesthetic of “reputation.”
“Lover” became significant in Swift’s career, as she took a leap of faith in expressing her opinions on more controversial topics.
Swift speaks out about LGBTQ+ rights, feminism, and political issues on this album. Eventually, Swift even endorsed President Biden in the 2020 Presidential Election.
Taking a political stance as an artist is something Swift had always been advised against. “A nice girl doesn’t force their opinions on people. A nice girl smiles and waves and says thank you. A nice girl doesn’t make people feel uncomfortable with her views,” Swift says in the documentary “Miss Americana.”
She was done being the nice girl.
Her song “The Man,” track four on “Lover,” explains the difficulties of being a businesswoman in a patriarchal society.
Swift sings:
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?
With her bold lyrics, Swift steps out of her sphere of safety and attacks society for its flaws. This was a leap for Swift, showing off that she was a feminist could turn away some people in her fanbase. However, this is also part of the reason Swift is so admired by her fans. Over the years Swift has begun to stand up for her beliefs, creating an even more genuine icon for people to admire.
Later in the album, Swift advocates for the LGBTQ+ community on “You Need to Calm Down.” This was a bold decision for Swift, risking the possibility of turning away more of her listeners.
She sings, “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,” declaring her beliefs about tearing down any previous people-pleaser tendencies. She no longer feared public backlash.
Swift also added lighter, fun songs on this album, like “Cruel Summer,” (which became the number 1 streamed song four years after its release), “I Forgot That You Existed,” and “Paper Rings.”
These songs are her classic pop sound and, of course, include her signature amazing bridges.
For this particular bridge, she sings, “I’m drunk in the back of the car/ and I cried like a baby coming home from the bar (oh)/ Said, ‘I’m fine,’ but it wasn’t true/ I don’t wanna keep secrets just to keep you/ And I snuck in through the garden gate/ Every night that summer just to seal my fate (oh)/ And I screamed for whatever it’s worth/ ‘I love you,’ ain’t that the worst thing you ever heard?/ He looks up grinning like a devil.”
In her first seven albums, Swift showed just how much she had grown not only as an artist but a person.
Previous Album “reputation” (2017)| Next Album”folklore” (2020)