A deeper look at Lover
I have to be honest. After the release of ME!, I was terrified the new Taylor Swift album would be filled with abrasive pop, lacking her signature style and filled with less than memorable lyric pairings. As more and more singles came out, my anticipation returned, and last Friday I popped out of bed when my alarm went off and pressed play on the album. Lover combines the cohesive pop nature of 1989 with the raw, creative and risky lyric and sound combinations heard throughout Red and reputation, putting it on a fast-track to become one of Taylor's most lauded albums. Song after song on Lover surprised me (and bridge after bridge -- the bridges on these songs are incredible!!). And while there are one or two forgettable tracks on the 18-song album, there are many, many, many hits. Here are a few of my favorites (in no particular order):
Side note: I already wrote about Lover, the song, becoming one of my top five favorite Swift tunes, so that one won't be included in the rundown below. Also not included is Soon You'll Get Better, which is obviously one of the best songs on the album, but I can't listen to it without sobbing so I'm giving it a shout-out here to move on to pop-ier tunes.
Cruel Summer: The second song on the album is one of its strongest. An expertly produced track filled with expertly crafted lyrics like "Fever dream high in the quiet of the night/you know that I caught it (Oh yeah, you're right I want it)/Bad, bad boy, shiny toy on a price/you know that I bought it (Oh yeah, you're right, I want it)." The song builds as she details a risky summer romance, until the bridge bursts with "I'm drunk in the back of the car/and I cried like a baby coming home from the bar/said I'm fine, but it wasn't true/I don't want to keep secrets just to keep you" and her admission of love. It's a completely unique pop hit detailing the not-so-unique experience of a no rules, cruel summer.
Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince: When I first saw the song title Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince, I imagined a Taylor song that sounded like more of a country throwback. What we got was a darker kind of throwback tune, which flips the narratives built in songs like You Belong with Me, Love Story and Fifteen and plays them out past the glory days of homecoming games. She tells the story of a couple facing whispers in the hallway and depressed damsels. It shows growth on Swift's part that she's subverting tropes featured in her past work and reinventing them to turn into something new. In my favorite part of the song, the bridge uses a call-and-response pattern reminiscent of a cheerleading team to say: "And I don't want you to (Go), I don't really wanna (Fight), 'Cause nobody's gonna (Win), I think you should come home."
Paper Rings: In the second most romantic song on the album, after Lover of course, Taylor writes about wanting to marry her man with paper rings, no shiny objects necessary. It's a pop-filled bop that includes the lyrics, "I hate accidents except when we went from friends to this" and "I want to drive away with you/I want your complications too." It's perfection.
Death by a Thousand Cuts: I love when my pop culture interests collide. Jennifer Kaytin Robinson wrote the Netflix film Someone Great, which was inspired by a break-up she went through. While she was processing the end of the relationship, she listened to 1989. Taylor Swift watched Someone Great on Netflix, loved it and was inspired to write a song inspired by the heart-wrenching break-up in the movie. What a brilliant circle of women inspiring women! It's been so fun watching Jennifer freak out on Twitter that her film inspired a Taylor Swift song, and it's been equally fun watching Taylor talk about incredible the movie is. Now onto the song... Death by a Thousand Cuts details a tragic breakup, "If the story's over/Why am I still writing pages? Saying goodbye is death by a thousand cuts/Flashbacks waking me up/I get drunk, but it's not enough." In a bridge filled with an expertly crafted collage of words, she sings, "My heart, my hips, my body, my love/Trying to find a part of me that you didn't touch/Gave up on me like I was a bad drug/Now I'm searching for signs in a haunted club/Our songs, our films, united we stand/Our country, guess it was a lawless land/Quiet my fears with the touch of your hand/Paper cut stings from our paper thin plans." You thought Taylor had perfected the break-up song? She just upped it again.
Daylight: In the perfect finish to the album, Taylor closes things out with Daylight. This tune and Lover both embody the pink and golden colors on the album cover, which makes sense considering the album was almost named after this tune. Again, the bridge is a true standout, as Taylor invokes another reference to a past album, "And I can still see it all (in my head)/Back and forth from New York (sneaking in your bed)/I once believed love would be (burning red)/But it's golden/like daylight, like daylight." The whole thing ends with a voice memo from Taylor herself talking about being defined by what she loves. A final love note to close out an album all about this emotion. Remember when people said Taylor wouldn't have any song inspiration after she found love? Yeah right.
