Taylor Swift Releases New Album “The Tortured Poets Department”
By Matthew Gray
On Friday, April 19th 2024, Taylor Swift added the next installment of her list of albums that have spanned nearly 20 years. In her 11th studio album, the 2023 Time’s Person of the Year decided to go in a slow and thoughtful direction with “The Tortured Poets Department”.
Swift announced the album during the 2024 Grammy Awards, while accepting the award for the Best Pop Vocal Album of the Year, “Midnights”. Fans were given the title as well as the track list, but Swift remained relatively quiet about her latest project in the weeks leading up to its debut. The first half of the songs were leaked on social media two days prior to its full release, but many held off in order to avoid any sort of spoilers.
One fan embodied many listeners by posting “Raise your hand if you’re an ACTUAL Taylor Swift fan and aren’t listening.”
And for those who waited, the wait was well worth it. Just two hours after the 16 tracks of the original playlist were released, Swift casually added on 15 more songs to complete a 31-track deluxe edition of the album.
“The Tortured Poets Department is a secret DOUBLE album. I’d written so much tortured poetry in the past 2 years and wanted to share it all with you,” Swift said. “So here’s the second installment of TTPD: The Anthology … And now the story isn’t mine anymore… it’s all yours.”
With an overall positive reception from fans, Swift’s newest music has broken multiple records already on Spotify. Before the album was even released, it already set a record. Spotify announced a day before Swift’s latest collection was set to release that it had broken the record for the most pre-saved album on the platform. On its opening day, it the first album in the history of Spotify to have over 300 million streams in one day
Another question on many fans’ minds was if Swift would reference her newest boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, in any of the album’s songs. His name is never directly mentioned, but fans have speculated that a few specific lyrics are meant to reference the 3-time Super Bowl champion.
Among others, the lines that most likely are a nod to him can be found in the album’s 15th track titled “The Alchemy”. Among others, one piece of the song that is most obviously a reference to Kelce reads:
“Shirts off and your friends lift you up over their heads,
Beer stickin’ to the floor, cheers changed ‘cause they said
“There was no chance trying to be the greatest in the league”
Where’s the trophy? He just comes running over to me.”
This has been seen as a reference to Swift and Kelce celebrating the Chiefs win in the most recent super bowl, Super Bowl LVIII. This also reflects how at the end of the game, Kelce made his way over to Swift and gave her a long hug in celebration of his championship win.
As usual, millions of “Swifties” will now be spending the next month (probably longer) learning and singing Swift’s newest masterpiece. While the “Cruel Summer” singer has already broken more records than we can remember, “The Tortured Poets Department ” will surely continue her legacy of being one of the most influential artists on the planet.
