A Wigwam for a Goose's Bridle

While some people baked sourdough, some tried their hand at a Marie Kondo clean, some tried to get fit, and others just tried to survive working from home whilst supervising their kids’ schoolwork, Taylor Swift used Quarantine-20 to do what Taylor Swift does best: create. Early in the year, she posted on Instagram to suggest there was “not a lot going on at the moment”, a flashback to the album Red (that deserved a Grammy, but that’s a story for another day). Of course, Swifties did not for a second believe this. Were we finally getting a Cruel Summer music video? Was she re-recording new masters of her old music (yep, another story for another day). But I will wager that not one of us thought she meant TS8. Covid has mucked up all our plans, and we are still waiting for our chances to see Lover Fest, and the Cruel Summer music video, so a completely new studio album is worlds away, right?

Wrong! Taylor woke up on Thursday 23 July and dropped a bomb on us. A new album. At midnight. Not even a full day’s warning. Perhaps she was just trying to avoid another holes-in-the-fence fiasco. She said there was no perfect date just that she had something good to release to us, but let’s face it, 2+4+7 = 13 and I do not believe Shifty Swifty didn’t plan that. TS8 is titled folklore, with its own sepia glitter Instagram filter, an oversized cardigan and cottagecore aesthetics.

In an echo of Reputation, folklore is about stories that are told, although perhaps with less negative connotation. As we have seen so often in the past 18 months, Taylor is taking control of the narrative. She knows we will speculate on aspects of her personal life in these songs, and she has told us from the get-go that the lines between fiction and fantasy will be blurred, there will be truth and myth, just like in real folklore. These songs will come from multiple perspectives, telling multiple stories. We will create our own meanings. Some will be right, some wrong, does it even matter? Meaning aside, this is arguably her best album yet (I didn’t think that was possible), with lyrical complexity and melodic beauty, pumped out in mere months like it’s just another thing we could all do in isolation.

Let’s start this story with The Last Great American Dynasty, which is quite clearly inspired by Rebekah Harkness and her relationship with William Harkness; Taylor now owns their Rhode Island “Holiday House” and she appears to be both imagining life as Rebekah, and comparing some aspects of their lives. Both women ahead of their times. Both causing ripples in their communities. Both “mad” woman with “bad” men in their lives.

Mad Woman could equally be written about both Taylor and Rebekah, or about any number of real and fictional women in history who have been declared “mad” because they did not take male abuse and misuse lying down. The lyrics discuss being baited: “you poke the bear till her claws come out and you find something to wrap your noose around.” It definitely harks back to Taylor’s issues with Scott and Scooter, and to her ongoing Feud with the Wests. The idea that women hunt witches too sounds to be a direct hit at Kim, whilst echoing “they’re burning all the witches even if you aren’t one” from I Did Something Bad”. And is she suggesting Kanye is cheating on his wife?

Alongside the full album, Taylor gave us the music video to Track 2: cardigan. This song reminisces about a lost love from a long time ago, and although it feels like it could be related to All Too Well, it is also quite clearly “Betty” singing about James (whereas in the song Betty, we hear from James’s perspective). Now is it coincidence that Rebekah Harkness was known as Betty? I think not. I also think the painting on the wall in the music video is a painting of “Holiday House”. And I notice that the B key on the piano is broken. To complete the story of Betty and James’s love gone wrong, we have August, sung from the perspective of James’s summer fling, who didn’t realise he was never hers at all. These three songs echo each other with mentions of cobblestones, cars, summer and school – and both James and the protagonist of August mention her pulling up alongside him and asking him to get it the car.

This is Me Trying combines, in my interpretation, more of James wanting Betty back (“I’m here on your doorstep”; also the rusting wheels echo “salt air and rust on your door” in August), along with personal and professional stories from Taylor’s life. I feel this song is at least in part about the barriers to her career, that dark time when she thought about tossing it in and wasn’t even sure if we’d be sad if she stopped making music. I love love love the lyric “I was so ahead of the curve, the curve became a sphere”, possibly the cleverest thing she says on this album. There she is, still out there trailblazing, not fitting neatly into the country box or the pop box, so ahead of the curve that some people can’t appreciate the genius.

Let’s move on to mirrorball, which even before I heard it reminded me of when Taylor showed up to the 2018 American Music Awards looking like a human disco ball. Again, I actually feel like this is about both Taylor herself and about Rebekah. The theme of high heels from Cardigan, plus knowing what we do of Rebekah’s real life. This song discusses trying to be pretty for people, trying to make them enjoy their party, showing them all the sides of themselves, but also shattering into pieces when you break. Talking about changing to fit in, about trying to make people laugh, really feels like a reflection of Taylor’s journey trying to balance being herself with being who she was “meant to be” as the artist people wanted.

The 1 is another track about love lost, what could have been. This could be about any number of real or imagined relationships. A mention of the roaring 20s reminds us of the Gatsby references in This is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things and Don’t Blame Me on the Reputation album. It could also refer to James and Betty, given that the real Rebekah was born in 1915, although obviously there was no meeting people on the internet back then. The 1 introduces a theme of films (“you know the greatest films of all time we’re never made”) which is picked up again in Exile, the song written with Bon Iver. “I think I’ve seen this film before and I didn’t like the ending.” Even the melody of this line reminds us of a song from earlier in her career, If This Was a Movie “baby, what about the ending?” (I’m just waiting for someone with more technical nous than me to mash up Exile with It This Was a Movie.) Exile also feels reminiscent of The Last Time.

At this point, I’m going to make a note that we don’t know who William Bowery is. Dessner has neatly commented that they haven’t met due to social distancing. Is this another Nils Sjoberg or Jack Leopard and the Dolphin Club affair? Would the real William Bowery please stand up?

My Tears Ricochet is true Track 5 glory. Emotional and moody, it has copious references to love as a battle, a battle that she has lost. Many lyrics in this song remind me of many older Taylor songs. Although ostensibly about love, I believe this song is about Taylor’s career, with the old Taylor being dead. ImBig Machine is “wearing the same jewels I gave you” and “crossing out the good years” whilst at the funeral. And they can’t sleep at night because of her “stolen lullabies”, a reference to her music that they still own. They killed the old Taylor, “but it killed you just the same.”

Invisible String is the one song that clearly ties in with Taylor’s relationship with Joe Alwyn , who used to work at a yoghurt shop. She mentions the dive bar from the song Delicate. She even name drops her own song, Bad Blood. I love that she brings the green leaves to gold, with a golden string, tying this song into the theme that she has finally found the love that is golden, the one she hoped to find back when she was writing Red, that she could finally write about in Lover.

Epiphany is the song Taylor said was inspired by her grandfather in World War II, but I feel that she is also speaking to the health professionals dealing with Covid-19. “Something med school did not cover.” This for me is the deepest, most moving song on the album.

Taylor continues the war motif in Peace, which I believe is another song about Joe. They’ve come of age. Their original summer “fling” is over. This is true love. But as she’s said before, “touch me and you’ll never be alone”. Loving her means being in her fishbowl world. There will probably never be peace, and she wonders is this still enough for him. I note she mentions “family that I chose” in this song, versus “your chosen family” in The 1.

Hoax is a dark song, and the one that I perhaps have the hardest time trying to decipher. It has left some Swifties concerned about Taylor and Joe’s relationship, because we think the shades of blue refer to him. She mentions that “you knew the hero died so what’s the movie for?” which seems to echo back to the film motif of The 1 and Exile. Then again, I wonder how much of this is directly aimed at Scott and Big Machine. “My best laid plan, your sleight of hand… I am ash from your fire… my kingdom come undone.” (Doesn’t that remind you of “I don’t like your kingdom keys, they once belonged to me”?) “This was just as hard as when they pulled me apart.” I think she really believed all along Scott was still on her side and would still come through for her. He’d seen her best and worst times, he knew where she was vulnerable.

Seven is a song about a childhood friend who appears to have had a bad home life, perhaps related to the fact that they were either homosexual and/or transgender. Knowing the tumblr community, this is going to cause significant speculation regarding Taylor’s own sexuality. We never know in this song if this friend is male or female. We don’t know if her love for this friend is romantic or platonic.

This leaves us just one last song to discuss: Illicit Affairs. On face value this is easy to interpret, it is a song about exactly what the title says. Again, there will be many speculations, is it about actually Taylor having an affair? Is it about someone cheating on her? Is it “just” part of the James and Betty story? It has echoes of Sad Beautiful Tragic, which she happened to name drop in the chat before the Cardigan premiere.

If I knew how to make it, I’d insert a meme here: the album Red looks at the album Folklore. Red says, “who are you?” Folklore replies, “I’m you, but stronger.”