Taylor Swift: Red

Red

Best song: All Too Well

Worst song: Everything Has Changed unless you have the deluxe edition

Overall grade: 6

I really expected to be seriously unimpressed by this. The sheer number of bands I discovered in the time between ‘Speak Now’ and this one alone means it’s automatically going to be at more of a disadvantage – at one point I was doing a band every week and listening to their entire discography in that time. You can tell I never do my schoolwork. Anyway, much to my surprise, this turned out to not only be the best collection of songs Taylor Swift has put out, but one of the best records of 2012, full stop.

The original album brief was that it would detail “the rise and fall of a relationship”, so I did wonder if it would be a kind of rock opera – well, pop opera, I suppose. Popera? That term must already have been coined by someone. But that didn’t turn out to be the case, as these stories don’t follow any kind of thread. Which was a minor disappointment at first, but then I realised that if they did, there couldn’t be any of her songs that tell the tale of an entire relationship, which are always so effective.

Unlike the last album, a handful of these songs are written by Swift in collaboration with other people. For the album’s fifth track, ‘All Too Well’, she returns to her original writing partner Liz Rose, who helped her edit the song down from 10 minutes in length. Not that I would have minded if she’d kept the length. Despite appearing fairly early on it acts as a centrepiece of the album, and although it follows the same basic pattern as many of her songs have before – starting with two verses that introduce the story, then a really powerful, swelling middle eight before a quiet, mournful section and then the eventual emotional finish – this guitar-driven confession only improves on what has come before. Musically and lyrically she knows exactly what she’s doing, getting her audience involved in the story before delivering the crushing though unavoidable blow that this relationship can never work out: ‘Cause there we are again when I loved you so/Back before you lost the one real thing you’ve ever known.’

Elsewhere, a freshness is brought to the songwriting process by other artists joining Taylor in a duet. The first of these is with Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol, and together they come up with the amazing alt-country song ‘The Last Time’, a dark look at an on-off relationship that both parties swear is now on for the last time. The two play off each other well and parts of it feel spontaneous and conversational, like the great exchange ‘This is the last time you tell me I’ve got it wrong/This is the last time I say it’s been you all along/This is the last time I let you in my door/This is the last time I won’t hurt you anymore’. But the other duet is with Ed Sheeran, and though I expected the two of them to be a perfect match, the song they came up with is bland and uninteresting, making it easily the worst thing here (although on the deluxe edition there’s a bonus track called ‘Girl at Home’ which is the worst thing she’s written, ever. Don’t listen to it)

The most commercial, chart-topping songs come courtesy of pop writing/production super-duo Max Martin & Shellback, although Swift still takes first credit and manages to bring her own voice to them. They’re all winners but I’m most interested by ‘I Knew You Were Trouble’ because it shows she’s trying to push boundaries, maybe not in music as a whole but within herself. The dubstep influence is as far removed from country as you could get, but she performs convincingly on this purposefully messy song.

Most other material here is entirely Swift’s own (she also helps produce!) and it’s here that she slips back into her country ballad and pop rock tendencies, with consistently good results, although I’m going to dock points from ‘Holy Ground’ – I like it, but it doesn’t have any real hook, and isn’t the whole point of a pop song to get into your head? Other than that, solid stuff. ‘I Almost Do’ and ‘Sad Beautiful Tragic’ are the emotional tearjerkers and the second one in particular is very evocative, skilfully remaining general enough as to apply to many people’s memories. A change in subject matter comes in the form of ‘The Lucky One’, the ‘fame-isn’t-so-great’ song that every Serious Artist is obligated to record at one point in their life. As one of the world’s biggest pop stars, she’s earned the right, and the comparison of her own life with Joni Mitchell’s keeps things interesting, along with a particularly dynamic vocal performance.

 ‘State Of Grace’ opens the album with a killer drum and guitar introduction and a lyric that does basically sum the whole thing up: ‘Love is a ruthless game unless you play it good and right.’ The game is only played good and right in three songs; lighthearted bubblegum country ‘Stay Stay Stay’, escapist pop anthem that’s sure to be lots of people’s wedding song in ten years’ time, ‘Starlight’, and closer ‘Begin Again’. Contrary to the last two albums, it’s not a massive arena rock track with a far-reaching message, it’s a snapshot of an unsure, intimate moment between a couple who are just starting out and thinking that maybe, this time, things might work. It’s like Swift saying to us after all the negativity: ‘Don’t worry – I still believe.’

Right now, I can’t imagine Taylor Swift ever putting out a set of songs that equals or betters this. But then, I’ve said that before.

Taylor Swift: Speak Now

Speak Now

Best song: Dear John

Worst song: Innocent

Overall grade: 5

Taylor Swift’s third album is the first one I listened to all the way through. The first two, I knew as individual songs, and the fact that they were all released at the same time was of little to no consequence. By the time this was released, though, I could see the importance of the album format, so this went on my CD player and I played it straight through, discovering every song at once. Does that influence how I think of it? Probably. There’s no connection between any of these songs, but in my mind they’re far more parts of a whole than just a collection of parts.

It might not be just me, though. Taylor’s certainly becoming more mature here and on many songs we see her taking on a more ‘adult pop’ style, so it wouldn’t be out of the question for her to be looking more towards the album than the singles. Although this development also leads to my main problem with the album: it’s a little predictable. The songs are well written pop songs with a hint of country, exactly the same as the last album, the slightly more sophisticated music and lyrics just able to counterbalance the fact that she’s not stretching herself re. styles.

But still, I’m not one to argue with a bunch of good songs, so let’s talk about some of these. Here, we can divide most everything into upbeat pop songs, slower ballads, and a small amount of slightly more ambitious material.

This last category comprises two of my favourites: this album’s answer to the emotional, multipart storytelling of ‘Love Story’ is ‘Dear John’, but this time it’s a story of empowerment rather than dependence, and it’s outstanding in the way Taylor’s voice shows its narrator move from being broken and hurt to realising she’s better off without that relationship. (That description doesn’t exactly make it sound groundbreaking, but this is impressive stuff.) The other one is ‘Haunted’, a very melodramatic song that almost strays into orchestral rock territory at times and features Swift almost shouting some of the lyrics, refusing to hold back any of her feelings.

A whopping five songs fall into the slow ballad category, and the best is the thoughtful and introspective ‘Never Grow Up’, where Swift gathers the courage to sing to her younger self, pleading with her to enjoy being young while she can, and the futility of the whole exercise makes it incredibly poignant. Also successful are the slow-building, understated ‘Last Kiss’ and the apologetic, uncertain ‘Back to December’ that showcase her talents to the full, both as a singer and a writer. On the other hand, ‘Enchanted’, while a nice tale of meeting someone once and having an instant connection that I can definitely relate to, ultimately doesn’t play to her strengths. And ‘Innocent’ is just an embarrassing attempt at psychoanalysing Kanye West for the incident when he interrupted her VMA acceptance speech.

And finally, upbeat pop. The title track and the closer ‘Long Live’ are both overblown, overproduced, and far cheesier than they rightfully should be, and I wholeheartedly enjoy both of them. Apart from anything else, it’s nice to see a famous musician writing a song appreciating their opportunities rather than complaining about the perils of being famous. ‘Sparks Fly’ is the closest this album comes to filler – it’s fun and catchy but doesn’t have any kind of a deep meaning. ‘Better Than Revenge’ is slightly self-conscious, a girly girl trying too hard to be one of the boys, but it’s catchy as hell and probably a great live number.

And that’s without even mentioning the actual lead single, the double-platinum ‘Mine’. Lyrically it’s the closest copy of anything from ‘Fearless’, with its description of a relationship that goes through its trials and tribulations but ultimately ends up perfect, but it deserves recognition for being the last of Swift’s songs to feature such themes, and there is a charming naiveté in her belief that this could happen.

This third album was entirely written by Swift herself with no help from other songwriters, making it completely her own work. It’s clear she really cares about the messages behind her songs and giving them a certain amount of musical depth, and is capable of realising these aims, but it’d be nice to see her push herself more and think outside the box a bit.

Taylor Swift: Fearless

Fearless

Best song: Fifteen

Worst song: You’re Not Sorry

Overall grade: 5

Following the release of this album, Taylor Swift headlined her first tour, and I saw her play Wembley Arena in London. Her support act was a young Canadian musician who nobody had ever heard of, and his name was Justin Bieber. Two months later, everyone was talking about him. “I’ve seen him live,” I was able to say, and got starry-eyed looks in response.

Even if it did make Justin Bieber big, there’s still a lot to like about this album. It’s packed with danceable pop songs and mournful ballads that, in other hands, might seem like vapid carbon copies of other contemporary music, but not when Swift’s singing them. She’s just so earnest – her lyrics aren’t afraid to tell the whole truth of a story and even though the themes are still high school romances and teenage dramas in many places, she clearly believes what she’s singing about.

A huge country music fan would be likely to call this album ‘selling out’, but personally I think she was always going to turn to pop. It’s clear in some of the songs on her debut, like ‘Our Song’, but even more so in its bonus tracks and in a lot of her unreleased material from her early days, and combine that with the fact that, now in the limelight, she was probably exposed to a lot more pop music than country, and I don’t think it was a conscious decision to write her new songs in this way.

Taylor Swift is often accused of writing exclusively moany breakup songs, but that only applies to three songs here, and two of them are actually really good. The first is White Horse, which begins with her feeling downbeat and sorry for herself, having realised that ‘I’m not your princess; this ain’t a fairytale’ but goes on to see her getting up and feeling empowered as she decides that ‘this is a big world, that was a small town, there in my rearview mirror disappearing now’, takes charge of herself and leaves him. The other is ‘Breathe’, a song contrasting reserved detachment in the verses with an outpouring of emotion in the painfully honest chorus.

‘You’re Not Sorry’ tries to do the same thing as ‘Breathe’, but it’s a poor imitation, uninteresting musically and it doesn’t make me care about the outcome of the relationship is describes.

The complete opposite of these songs is the wonderful single-type material of ‘You Belong with Me’, ‘Forever And Always’ and the title track, all of which make me wish I was a twelve year old girl again, dancing around my room and singing out of key and wondering how it was that this Taylor Swift understood my feelings. You can hate them because they’re not as ‘serious’ as a lot of music or you can love them because they do exactly what they’re supposed to and they make you happy. I’m pleased to be in the second camp.

But there are two really, really standout songs on this record that I haven’t mentioned yet, and either one of them could be best song, cause I’m never sure which is better. ‘Love Story’ is the single that made her famous; you probably know it, it was shamelessly produced to be a hit but it can’t hide the fact that its retelling of Romeo & Juliet has a far broader, longer-lasting appeal than the average MTV audience. ‘Fifteen’ is where Swift gets to shine as the sole songwriter with a big-sisterly warning about the difficulties of high school where the music seems to develop and grow older along with the narrative. Clever stuff.

The only tracks that depart from the love song formula are the final two. ‘The Best Day’ is closest in style to the last album, lacking the anthemic choruses of this one and instead staying simple and understated. The fact that she writes a song for her mother is sickly sweet but the song itself is genuine enough to justify it. Lastly, ‘Change’ is the sweeping grand finale, full of power and triumph and soaring ‘hallelujahs’ over a string backing, and the best part is, it’s vague enough that you’ll always be able to apply it to your life.

I’d be very surprised if Taylor Swift ever took a political stand or put herself into a cause, but that being said I can think of far worse role models for young girls to have. In this album she speaks up for underdogs, takes moral high grounds, moves on, gives advice, has fun and even appreciates her parents. And she does it all to music that isn’t too bland or boring to actually listen to.

Taylor Swift: Taylor Swift

Taylor Swift

Best song: Tim McGraw

Worst song: Stay Beautiful

Overall grade: 4

The first time I listed to Taylor Swift was when this was the only album she’d released. A friend of mine posted the lyrics to ‘Mary’s Song’ in a forum signature on the Internet, and considering I was something of a hopeless romantic at the time, I fell in love with it before I’d even heard her sing it. I wanted a relationship like that. So I listened to it, and I listened over and over again, and then I started listening to all her other songs (the rest of this album, as well as a whole bunch of unreleased songs that you can find on YouTube). Taylor Swift just ‘got’ me, so I played them all out until I was sick of them, and then she announced her second album! It was an incredible moment for a 12-year-old.

As time went on and I started to listen to older and more obscure music, most popular or mainstream artists that I’d previously liked started to seem insignificant in comparison to what Roger Waters was singing about on ‘Comfortably Numb’, and steadily I stopped listening to them. But strangely enough, that’s never happened with Taylor Swift. I’ve gone on to buy her third and fourth albums and consider her to be consistently above the quality of most of what my housemates play, and I think her being lumped in with other ‘MTV artists’ of today is quite unfair.

Now, among those who do like Swift, this album is generally either their favourite or least favourite, and for the same reason whichever it is – it’s a full blown country album. (One of only two that I own. I don’t consider country to be a favourite genre of mine, though I have nothing against it either and enjoy the occasional song – see ‘I’m Gonna Hire A Wino To Decorate Our Home’. Or maybe I just find that song hilarious. Whichever.) Either they have the opinion that she was never as good once she started incorporating pop influences, or that she didn’t become as good until she had those pop influences.

I’d call it the worst, not because of the country, since the fairly simple, acoustic style worked well for her at a time when she had less songwriting experience, but because the record as a whole lacks diversity (the production is incredibly similar on all the songs and Swift’s voice sounds identical throughout), continuity (a lot of the songs sound awkward next to one another and are better appreciated when played individually), and lacks anything spectacular (songs are fairly good throughout, but a serious listener would be unlikely to call them superb). I guess it’s also been hurt by my overplaying it, as many of the songs don’t hold up so well to long term listening – they’re good on the surface only.

But I have a lot of respect for the fact that, even at age 16, she has a solo or co-writing credit on all of her songs. Most of the songs are about love, something she often gets criticised for, but they show a lot of different perspectives on the subject – so for each one that’s a little stupid, like the childish reasons for infatuation on ‘Stay Beautiful’, there’s always a ‘Tim McGraw’ that has a much more mature outlook, in this case the bittersweet memory of a summer romance that had to end. And there’s several examples of songs that relate to different subject matter – see ‘A Place in this World’, ‘The Outside’ and ‘Tied Together With A Smile’.

It’s hardly a massive statement of a debut, but the talent’s definitely here.