Taylor Swift’s 10th Studio Album, Midnights, sees the country turned pop turned eclectic turned folk singer return back to her old familiar and shimmery domain of pop once again. The album was created as a means to reflect, not reinvent, as she looks back to the stories of “13 sleepless nights scattered throughout my [Swift’s] life.” Swift’s new album is a combination, seamlessly slipping in and out of her personas with a chameleon-esque effortlessness and sounds, in partnership with her long-time collaborator and Bleachers frontman, Jack Antonoff.
folklore and evermore, her previous surprise drop studio albums, were about expanding — reaching to folk stories and fictional stories of love’s labor’s lost. In contrast, Midnights’ is perhaps the 32 year-old artist’s most personal, inward symphony, analyzing her most intrusive and haunted thoughts as well as some of her most heartfelt ones too, whether it is looking at herself as the problem (“It’s me! Hi!”) of all things in the world or simply reminiscing on the peace of a simple, loving relationship at the end of the night. The surprise release of seven bonus songs in her Midnights (3 am Edition) also serves to add more stories and her trademark lyricism to an already impassioned album.
This album serves as her own multiverse — inspired by all the passion, theories, gossip and essence of Taylor Swift. In some ways it is the most “Taylor Swift” of her albums, with many of her styles effortlessly combined into a singular album. It is no surprise that her beyond highly anticipated joint album tour after the release of Midnights has been aptly titled Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour as the album perhaps marks as a perfect bookend for the current era of Taylor Swift.
As Eliah Goldberg, Sophomore English and History double major put it, “I don’t think Midnights is a big change from her other albums; it’s just a different combination of her classic sounds.” For many fans this album has truly been, “like if Taylor Swift threw Reputation, Folklore, and Lover together in a blender to make a compelling, emotional, pop smoothie.”
And that statement remains true right from the get go with the opening track, “Lavender Haze,” which feels like a perfect blend of the cool, unapologetic track, “Call it what you want,” from Reputation and the fluttery sounds of “I think he knows” from her bubble-pop infused Lover album all while critiquing public assumptions regarding her and her personal life in ways that could be linked back to her 1989 album.
Perhaps, the biggest stand-out of the album is the sonically upbeat but lyrically melancholic, “Anti-Hero,” which seems like a culmination of her anxieties and fears through the aforementioned eras. A consistent crescendo backs the spiraling song where Swift decides to spill her heart and her guts out in a mix of polarizing lyrics (“sexy baby?”) and poignant verses where she ruminates on the roots of her insecurities (“I stare directly at the sun but never in the mirror”) that have been established as a consequence for dealing with the devil that is her ever-growing fame.
After confronting herself at her darkest in “Anti-Hero,” Taylor decides to let the floodgates open with every song filled with a distinct energy that can truly only be attributed to her recurring motif of midnight hours.
Her heartbreaking, indie-synth inspired coming-of-age track, “You’re on Your Own, Kid” caught the adoration of many fans and was undoubtedly one of her most personal songs yet all laid over a guitar and a simple beat. The fast paced vocals echo the billions of thoughts and reactions of an isolated adolescence with some of Swift’s most evolved lyricism in her trademark bridge for the track.
The track is followed by “Midnight Rain,” a song that feels pulled from the catalogs of Lorde and indie artists in her vein with its deeply interesting composition and production work owing to the partnership formed between Swift and Antonoff. Taylor once again, uses the motif of Midnights to confront her failed relationships in a manner that feels more authentic than any other puff-piece or gossip columnist could ever do. In Midnight Rain, she is heartbreaker and heartbroken, iterating the fact that her story and complexities are her own to tell thus, reinforcing her promise and motto of Taylor’s Version beyond the confines of re-mastering her album.
The album, which is meant to later be released as a visual album already combines stark imagery such as the chest-tightening “Labyrinth” featuring the famous, “Breathe in, breathe deep, breathe through, breathe out” lyric which she disguised in her commencement speech at NYU Class of 2022’s graduation earlier this year. The song along with Track 6, “Question…?,” focuses on the hardships of romance in a picturesque and visual manner, as if awaiting their music video release already.
One of the songs that did garner a glittery-pop music video with a variety of popular faces such as Laura Dern, Jack Antonoff and HAIM all in a clever twist of her second music video, “Bejeweled,” acts as the true anthem of the album. It is fresh and empowering and motivational in the same way that 1989’s top hit, “Shake it Off” was. It was also not the only anthem in the song, the now TikTok famous “Karma” features some of Taylor’s more relaxed and humorous lyricism including comparing the joys of karma to petting a cat (accurately so!).
The last two songs of the album, “Sweet Nothing” and “Mastermind,” both serve as two vastly different mediums with which Swift expresses her romantic life. The former is one of her gentlest songs, allowing the listeners to glimpse into the sweet privacy of stable love as well as displaying a moment of growth for Swift’s lyricism regarding romance not just throughout the album but also throughout her vast career of love sonnets. However, the latter song goes to prove that regardless of her growing tranquility, the fire and spark of passion in her lyricism will never go away. The song sees Taylor scheming for love- the same one that has now grown into a soft place for her to land. The oxymoronic double feature of the two songs show the artist’s genius and ability to keep maturing without losing the aspects of her that make her, well, her.
The only song that has garnered some disappointment from listeners is the Lana Del Rey featuring, “Snow on the Beach” which has been criticized by many for pretty much omitting the melancholic singer-songwriter as a feature and sticking to Lana’s presence in the ambiance of the song only.
However, any reservations fans may have had quickly dissipated when Swift dropped the surprise Midnights (3 am Edition) featuring 7 additional songs including 3 made in collaboration with Aaron Dessner, member of The Nationals band and producer for her two folk inspired albums. For fan Jenna Beshara, junior Graphic Design and English Double major, the album “has the most cohesive vibe [out of Taylor’s extended discography] but the 3 am tracks particularly stood out to me, especially Glitch and Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve, all making a really good culmination of her career thus far.”
The combination of their work led to a truly special extended tracklist with evolved melodies and exquisite lyricism. The first track in the extended list, “The Great War” is a lyrically brilliant song about love that is built to withstand hardship. With lyrics like “Say a solemn prayer, place a poppy in my hair,” Swift elaborately depicts sensations of loss and sorrow combined with the relief of acceptance and acknowledgement.
Other songs like the hauntingly tragic, “Bigger than the Whole Sky” indicate some hidden sadness — a part of Swift we are not privy to and one that we do not even need to be. Her sentiment and pathos shines through to make it a deeply resonating song about grief and allow the human sentiment to sit in it with beauty and care like a hand on the shoulder.
The 3 am songs do not always dwell in grief — both the love-struck song, “Paris,” and the sultry dizzying track, “Glitch,” are Taylor at her most trademarked-ly: unique subsuming in love and the fear of its ephemera.
The heartbreaking “High Infidelity” shows Swift as both the betrayer and the betrayed. Walking between possible confession of past infidelity, Taylor reveals her shades of gray by the accusation of not loving enough as a higher sin. It is sharp and bitter and once again, invokes references that are anyone but the subject of her track to understand and concede in.
Maybe Swift decided to save her best work for last intentionally, as her penultimate tracks “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve” and “Dear Reader” are Taylor at her most cathartic, honest form. The former joins the ranks of “All too Well” and “Dear John” and cements itself as one of the best songs she has arguably made. An emotional journey focusing on the sheer trauma and anger she has faced in a past relationship, she lays all bare in this song collapsing into a heartbreaking bridge demanding for suture to wound that has already left a deep scar. The final song, “Dear Reader,” is a heartfelt letter to her listeners, marking us as readers to her rich words that she left for us and giving us advice on life all while allowing herself as the anguished, unreliable writer without a solution except the words she provides.
The album, despite the mixed reviews, has already become a staple in her pantheon, breaking the record to receive the single most streams of an album within 24 hours on Spotify and making history by occupying the entirety of Billboard’s Top 10 after its release. Taylor Swift sets her legacy down with Midnights by capping off an entire phase of her life and doing it so with the same sentiment and skill that everyone saw within the artist ever since she was penning down songs in her childhood bedroom which would end up to create history.
Ash Shehzad is a sophomore Psychology major and Arts & Culture Editor. Contact Ash at ayeshas1@umbc.edu.
