Taylor Swift, Midnights: The Highs, the Lows, and Everything in Between.
Christmas came early for Taylor Swift fans—or so they thought. On October 21, 2022, Swift released her tenth studio album “Midnights.” Recently, Swift has mostly been releasing re-recordings of her old songs. “Midnights” is the first body of new work from Swift since the release of her 2020 sister albums, “Folklore” and “Evermore.” The concept of the 13-track album is to represent Swift revisiting 13 tortured midnights from her past.
It did not take long for this new album to break multiple records. In the first three days, the album earned more than 1.2 million equivalent album units. These numbers are not uncommon for Swift. Similarly, in 2017, Swift’s “Reputation” album sold about 1.2 million copies in the first week of it being released.
Swift announced the album on August 28, 2022, during the MTV Video Music Awards. New and old fans alike waited eagerly for the album drop in October. Even though “Midnights” is the newest album in Taylor Swift’s repertoire, it calls back to some of her older works, like “1989.” One reason for this is that the album touches on some of Swift’s main storytelling themes: romance, heartbreak and skepticism about love.
The Album: Some Greats and Some Not-So-Much…
There is a lot packed into this album. In just 13 songs, Swift touches on multiple topics that would make anyone lie awake at midnight: losing a lover, body image issues and gaining the courage to be a girl boss. However, Swift has grown up a lot since the release of “1989,” and her voice and storytelling through “Midnights” is more mature than fans have seen in previous albums. Since the album is told from the perspective of looking backwards, to her most troubled midnights, Swift is more self-aware when it comes to her own shortcomings about love. “Maroon” touches on this narrative by Swift reassuring her younger self that even in a relationship with moments of connection and love, she can be satisfied with her decision to leave.
Some fans (and critics) have argued that in “Midnights,” Swift takes on an anti-love and anti-hero persona—it’s reasonable to come to the “Anti-Hero” assumption when that is the third track of the album. All of this goes back to the reality that this album, more than Swift’s albums in the past, has forced Swift to make peace with bad relationships in the past, but also recognizing her own flaws in relationships.
Hours after Swift released “Midnights,” she also dropped “3am Tracks” which includes seven additional songs to the album. While the additional tracks compliment the album in some ways, the “3am Tracks,” with its desperation and anger, is a stark difference from the Swiftian pop of “Midnights.” The additional songs from “3am Tracks” speak more to the extreme, raw heartache that Swift went through to get to where she is today.
Some songs on “Midnights” have already become fan favorites. “Lavender Haze,” the album opener, is quintessential Swift: being in love, and being damned by whatever decision she makes next. The song takes on an airy, fresh vibe, with an upbeat tempo—a perfect song to jam to in the car.
If you’re listening to the album front to back, the next song is just as amazing. “Maroon” is a nostalgic call-back to Swift’s past work, including “Reputation” and “Red.” Even in her lyrics, Swift continues to play on an outdated color theory about love that she has touched on throughout many of her albums.
Unfortunately, not all of the songs on the album are as incredible as the first two. As you listen, you may think to yourself, “this is really giving me some Lana vibes”—and you would be right. It’s reasonable to assume then, that you were pretty excited when you saw “Snow on the Beach (feat. Lana Del Ray)” come up. However, by the end of the song you’ll be wondering, “where is Lana’s solo verse?” Lana’s solo never comes and the song leaves listeners wondering why Lana was featured on the song at all if she was just going to “ooo” in the background.
Other songs on the album, like “Vigilante Shit” and “Bejeweled” have been getting less-than-stellar reviews. These count as Taylor Swift album skips because of the cheesy, childish lyrics that Swift tried to avoid in the rest of the album. Those type of lyrics made sense during her first several albums, when she was a literal teenager, but not now.
Even though not every song on the album is a showstopper, Swift fans are streaming the album like crazy—which is no surprise. Swift’s latest gift to fans was her self-directed music video for “Bejeweled” where Swift is transformed into a modern-day Cinderella. Only 12 hours after its release, the video racked up 5.4 million views on YouTube and is No.4 on trending for music.
Even with all of the album’s shortcomings, Swift fans are still enamored with “Midnights,” and they already can’t wait for the next album to arrive.
