Taylor Swift is perplexingly amazing. Her lyrics aren’t phenomenal, her melodies are predictable and her voice is only average. Yet, somehow, she still always manages to churn out an album that I will listen to on repeat for weeks. She continues this trend with her latest effort, “Red.”
The Pennsylvania native’s fourth studio album is titled “Red” because the moments in her life that she writes about are all moments that she sees in the color. In her album booklet, Swift has a prologue where she explains the moments that inspired the album: “These are moments of newfound hope, extreme joy, intense passion, wishful thinking, and in some cases, the unthinkable letdown. And in my mind, every one of these memories looks the same to me. I see all of these moments in bright, burning, red.”
The country singer hasn’t just been influenced by pop music; she has started writing with some of the best names in pop. Swedish producers Max Martin and Shellback co-wrote three songs with Swift: “I Knew You Were Trouble.”, “22”, and “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together”. Martin and Shellback have collaborated with Pink, Adam Lambert and Britney Spears.
Taylor Swift, while she sells to the same demographic, isn’t really the same type of pop star. She has typically strayed away from synthesizer driven, overproduced tracks. Those three tracks are all very heavy on the electronic elements, and they don’t sound like typical Taylor Swift songs.
The Max Martin songs are irritatingly high pitched and repetitive. Yet, they have helped her sell records. “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” was the first and only single released before the album dropped and Swift sold 1.2 million records in her first sales week alone. It was the largest sales week for an individual album in a decade, according to Billboard.
The songs aren’t horrible, but they don’t really feel like the rest of the album. Swift keeps it pretty simple on most of “Red,” and that’s when she is at her best. “Sad Beautiful Tragic” is all of the titular words, and is mostly just Swift singing with an acoustic guitar. The percussion and bass are there but just barely. The stripped down sound makes the ballad feel intimate and sad.
“Sad Beautiful Tragic” doesn’t build to a dramatic finish, something Swift has done a lot in the past and continues to do on tracks like “State of Grace” and “Starlight”. “Love Story”, “You Belong With Me” and all of Swift’s biggest hits have a self-contained story with a beginning, middle and end. It’s a method that works for Swift and it gives her some of her best songs.
The new collaborations on “Red” aren’t just behind the scenes. Swift has a couple duets on her album with Ed Sheeran and Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol. It’s a welcome change and resulted in some of the best songs on the album. Sheeran co-wrote “Everything Has Changed” with Swift, a song about meeting a person and falling for them immediately. The collaboration with the new British singer/songwriter is surprising and perfect.
Swift also collaborated with Snow Patrol frontman Gary Lightbody. The piano driven, melancholic track is hauntingly beautiful. However, it almost feels more like a Snow Patrol featuring Swift rather than vice versa. She definitely adapts their contemporary rock sound. It actually proves that she can adapt and do something a little more serious than the catchy Top 40 country-pop tunes she has been churning out for years. It’s an unexpected song on the album but a welcome change.
Swift clearly wants to grow up a little more with this album. On “Treacherous,” Swift sings “And I’ll do anything you say if you say it with your hands.” She isn’t singing about being stuck in marching band anymore. It isn’t just a new sound she is looking for either. She has ditched her typical glittery dresses and blonde curls for straighter, darker locks. Even the album artwork is more mature.
The deluxe edition of the album, sold exclusively at Target, includes six extra songs. There isn’t anything wrong with them, but they don’t necessarily stand out either. This is most likely why they were kept off the regular album. It seems silly to pay more money for something that isn’t really new or different. At 16 tracks, the regular album is already packed.
“Begin Again” is the final song on the regular version of the album, which is ironic because it finally goes back to her country roots. Fiddles and banjoes are clearly heard on the track, among other instruments. It’s sweet and a sort of happy ending on an album that put Swift through the ringer emotionally.
The songs on her new album are all of her “red” moments: extreme highs and lows. She ends on a light note, ready to start another emotional rollercoaster.
That’s what sells Taylor Swift’s records: emotion. She doesn’t have Adele’s songwriting skills, Kelly Clarkson’s voice or Bob Dylan’s guitar playing talent. What she sings feels real because you’ve lived through moments just like the ones she sings about. That’s why she manages to go platinum within days of her album being released, and that’s why this album will be stuck in your head for months.
