Taylor Swift - Look What You Made Me Do

Taylor Swift has completed her metamorphosis into a Disney villain. It comes at a pertinent time after being ousted as a manipulative fraud due to her lying about the whole "Famous" thing in order to boost her image at the expense of someone else's. I know what you're thinking, you're thinking 'but you worship at the temple of Yeezy, of course that's the side you'd take'. And naturally there's nothing I can do to justify my stance no matter what the situation is, so I won't. I could of course make the same accusation the other way back to anyone who questions the integrity of my opening statement. I think it's worth noting with the example just how frequently Disney villains turn out to be someone who, maybe appears nefarious to the outside viewer, but to the soon-to-be usurped/murdered/kidnapped etc, they're just a friendly person in their lives until the deed is done. We live in an age where people can be convicted of all sorts of horrid crimes but will have defenders purely on the basis of their past perceptions being too stubborn to change.

But I'm not here to demonise Taylor Swift, rather to applaud her on this clear showing of self-awareness in the situation. What would a villain be without a villain song? This sounds exactly like that, both on the fundamentals & the sonics. That it sounds cold & abrasive is perfect for the tone of the song. The pre-chorus is the most inspired part of the song from my perspective, taking clear influence from Jack Antonoff's work with Lorde earlier in the year, it's so fitting that it comes with 'I got smarter...' lyrics, who knew she was such a Rick & Morty fan? The momentum implodes a little when the chorus hits which has a weirdly abrasive quality to it, almost as if it's intentionally made to be uncomfortable for the targets of the song's ire. Perhaps because of that, I don't think the song has much mileage to it, but it still stands as a big moment to witness. I still fondly remember waking up to all sorts of reactions akin to this being some bizarre avant garde noise rock thing. It kind of impressed me that she didn't play it safe when it would be so easy to do so.

(Also a reminder that this was looking set to peak at #4 on US Pop radio until her record label did some sort of behind the scenes manipulation to convince radio to put it at #1 for a week, because it was about to be overtaken by an underdog indie band. Are we the baddies?).

(Also also if you really do want the old Taylor, that's pretty much Kelsea Ballerini's career arc at the moment).