Taylor Swift has written and recorded the year's best and most exciting pop album

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corianderstem said:
Um.

Uh.

There are songs on this that I'm actually enjoying.

..... I think I need to go lie down.
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This

Haha, I was picturing more The Graduate, but when you really think about the song..
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aaaaaand this.

Look, I've been stalking you for a long time, and your girlfriend will never love you like I love you.
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:lol:

Other thoughts:

Speak Now has temporarily seized control of my ipod. Broken Bells have retreated to a defensive position, surveying the Now Playing Plain, waiting for an opportune moment to stage a comeback.

As I said earlier, this isn't an album or genre I would have listened to without GAF's relentless enthusiasm, so listening to an individual singer's mainstream-focused pop/rock album all the way through is somewhat of a new experience. The vocalist is the draw here, so....I don't know TS's band situation, if there's a constant band or she just hires session musicians and has a producer help her or (maybe even!) writes every bar herself. But.

I think Swift has the art of writing lyrics and catchy vocal melody mostly nailed, so I'm going out on a limb and saying her next task should be to figure out her backing band situation. Take Mine for example- the melody in the first 16 seconds is basically wallpaper. She more or less punted to get to the meat of the song once the verses and chorus start (which are good! I like the song!). Is that complaint minor? Yeah, but it's still Swift settling for "good enough" when this album suggests she's clearly gunning for great. Having complained about that, I feel obliged to compliment Innocent's scratchy looped drum intro and downbeat guitar; and Haunted's string section as notable parts.

Now that I think about it, I don't really like Never Grow Up despite the nice sentiment, and it's making me wonder if the straightforward acoustic sound has something to do with it. There's a Grand Unified Theory of Mobvok's Musical Preferences out there somewhere, I can feel it.

I found it ironic that the song "Better Than Revenge" isn't actually about how Taylor's a better person than that, it's about how well she does it. :) Her lyrical...bitterness? Honesty? is definitely distinctive.

~ 5:05 into Dear John is the Top 40 version of 3:32 into Nude (Radiohead).

Long Live is the...also Top 40 version of I Gotta Feeling

For some bizarre reason Speak Now's making me listen to Exit more often. I think it might be the narrative type of verse.

Overall I think I'm a little surprised how consistent Speak Now is from start to finish. The only speed bumps are Back to December, Never Grow Up, and Last Kiss, which appear to all be ballads- again, there's probably a Grand Unified Theory out there somewhere.
 
Shit. Cori and mobvok, you have no idea how happy it makes me that you guys like (at least parts of) the album. Cori, you said you like "Mean" and the title track. Do you know the names of the other three or so tracks you liked? I'm extremely curious.

As for the title track, and the discussion of it on the previous page -

corianderstem said:
Although I was thinking the whole time ".... and how does the guy feel about all of this?" I kept picturing him being all "WTF you crazy stalker, I haven't talked to you in a year!" And that made me laugh.
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The last chorus of the song, in what has become a signature Swift move, is sung from the male perspective. So we actually do get to know what he feels about it:

"I'll meet you when I'm out of my tux at the back door. I didn't say my vows. So glad you were around when they said speak now..."

So the narrator wins, essentially. It's also worthy of note that this is Taylor writing out of character, as she has mentioned that the narrator is one of her best friends who actually had to watch the guy she loves marry the wrong girl. It's supposed to be ridiculous. Very tongue-in-cheek track.

mobvok said:
I don't know TS's band situation, if there's a constant band or she just hires session musicians and has a producer help her or (maybe even!) writes every bar herself.
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She has had the same backing band since her debut album, and they are all very close. They also do all of the studio work, there are no session musicians. The closing track, Long Live, is a tribute to her backing band and what they've all been through together the last couple of years, the ups and downs of being the nameless backups to one of the fastest rising superstars in decades. "A band of thieves in ripped up jeans got to rule the world...", "Bring on all the pretenders, we will be remembered..." "Long long live all the mountains we moved, I had the time of my life fighting dragons with you..." etc, etc.

God, that song gives me chills.

I trust she'll stay loyal to her band and won't be ditching them anytime soon. As for the writing, she did indeed write everything on this album. There are no co-writing credits on Speak Now. She co-produced it with Nathan Chapman, who's been with her from the start, and I'm sure he has some input into some of final polishing, but the actual songwriting is all her.

And I'd be remiss if I didn't at least mention the fact that she fucking sold 1,000,000 plus in the first week. Just insane and unheard of in this current state of the record industry. I can't even...I don't even. I'm just ridiculously happy for her. Keep killin 'em.
 
Yeah, I'd obviously stopped listening to the lyrics by the time the last verse rolled around! Ha.

These are the tracks I liked:

Mine
Sparks Fly
Speak Now
Mean
The Story Of Us
 
Of all the songs on the album I like, I think Sparks Fly, Mean and Haunted float to the tippy-top.

GirlsAloudFan said:
The last chorus of the song, in what has become a signature Swift move, is sung from the male perspective. So we actually do get to know what he feels about it:

"I'll meet you when I'm out of my tux at the back door. I didn't say my vows. So glad you were around when they said speak now..."

So the narrator wins, essentially. It's also worthy of note that this is Taylor writing out of character, as she has mentioned that the narrator is one of her best friends who actually had to watch the guy she loves marry the wrong girl. It's supposed to be ridiculous. Very tongue-in-cheek track.
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Oh, neat. Didn't pick up on that bit, although I guess the tux should have tipped me off!

She has had the same backing band since her debut album, and they are all very close. They also do all of the studio work, there are no session musicians.

....

I trust she'll stay loyal to her band and won't be ditching them anytime soon. As for the writing, she did indeed write everything on this album. There are no co-writing credits on Speak Now. She co-produced it with Nathan Chapman, who's been with her from the start, and I'm sure he has some input into some of final polishing, but the actual songwriting is all her.
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Ah, interesting. Clearly she should stick with her crew, then. This segue might be good enough- after I heard Teenage Dream, I've been trying to follow Max Martin and Dr. Luke's writing credits on Wikipedia lately through a decade + of pop music, and it was interesting seeing where various singers/bands decided to pack it in and start blatantly gunning for a hit. Sort of the equivalent of getting produced by The Neptunes or Timbaland? I don't think it's inherently bad for the singer and songwriter to be two separate people, but I do end up with more respect for people who bear more of the burden themselves. If someone enjoys Party in the USA, are they a Miley Cyrus fan or a fan of her crew of all-star writers? If the latter, does that sacrifice some following with the artist for the temporary boost of a chart hit? I guess that depends on how much influence Cyrus had on that song. (Given that she admitted later she's never listened to Jay-Z, probably not a lot) But yeah, even with co-writers earlier on it sounds like Swift did a lot of the heavy lifting.

ramble off
 
Damn, I forgot about Taylor's concert tonight. Guess I'll just have to record it because I've got to get sleep at some point.
 
GAF, I will be listening to this soon. I've never listened to a Taylor Swift song, let alone a whole album. My brother bought it, though, and I'm going to give it a shot.
 
Jesus Christ "Mean" is a stupid song. I would have expected this out of her 5 or so years ago, but it's just fucking ridiculous how juvenile the lyric is. What a step backward from a brilliant (as far as pop songs go) song like, oh, Fifteen for instance.

And she uses a good dose of pitch correction...nothing inherently wrong with that, as far as this industry goes.


(eta: am well aware of the irony of posting negatively about a song like Mean, but just because she writes a song about someone who she thinks is mean..well surely doesn't mean it can't be open to stinging criticism :shrug: It's just a brutal song imo )
 
gvox said:
Jesus Christ "Mean" is a stupid song. I would have expected this out of her 5 or so years ago, but it's just fucking ridiculous how juvenile the lyric is. What a step backward from a brilliant (as far as pop songs go) song like, oh, Fifteen for instance.
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You would have expected this 5 years ago? Sooooo, before she'd put out a record and before anybody knew who she was? You've got crazy clairvoyancy skills there, gvox. :wink:

But, seriously, were you listening to her when her debut came out? I'm curious. For some reason I never in a million years would have expected that, but if you knew who Taylor Swift was in 2006 that's totally awesome and I like you more than I did before.

Interesting take on Mean. I personally love the sentiment of the song. As someone who's a big fan, and who does get sick of all of the negative shit talked about her (especially people who attack her outward appearance...I mean, really?), this song was a big righteous "YES!" moment. Tell 'em to fuck off, and then move on to track 7.

Also notice that that the insulting tones of the lyric are tempered by instances of self-awareness and self-deprication:

"I walk with my head down...You have pointed out my flaws again as if I don't already see them..." :heart:

I'm not sure how it's a step back from Fifteen, either, which is a song about the first day of high school? She should keep singing songs about the first day of high school? I don't think so. Fifteen was a good fit for that album, but she's singing about different shit now. The "I can see you years from now in a bar, talking over a football game, with that same big loud opinion but nobody's listening..." bridge on Mean is a lyric she never would have put on an album before now, and to me is such a spot on indictment of drunk idiot sports fans, and of people who bitch about her not being a good singer. I'm a drunk idiot sports fan, so it hits home. I just love that bridge, it's one of my favorite moments of her career so far.

Did you like any of the other songs on the album?
 
GirlsAloudFan said:
But, seriously, were you listening to her when her debut came out? I'm curious. For some reason I never in a million years would have expected that, but if you knew who Taylor Swift was in 2006 that's totally awesome and I like you more than I did before.
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I was guesstimating at the number of years, but what I meant was it sounds dumber than anything I'd heard from her before. I knew who she was probably about 2007 because I have a daughter who listens to her alot. She's recorded a couple of covers of Taylor's also, which are on youtube. Fifteen was one of them, and I mixed it before uploading it so it was constantly getting play around the house.

I haven't listened to the entire album mainly because of Mean, actually. I had to shut it off when my daughter played it for me. I get it, I mean, what's she's trying to do in the song, but it's just horrible writing imo., even for a pop song :shrug:

But don't take that personally! (unless you helped write it lol!!) :wink:
 
Sweet. I'm glad you're giving it a shot. I know this shit is way out of your wheelhouse.

But, everybody look. Taylor and Jake Gyllenhaal. Cute couple alert!

jake-gyllenhaal-taylor-swift-thanksgiving.jpg

taylor-swift-jake-gyllenhaal-new-york-city-12082010-12-430x645.jpg

taylor-swift-jake-gyllenhaal-new-york-city-12082010-04-430x514.jpg
 
GirlsAloudFan said:
Sweet. I'm glad you're giving it a shot. I know this shit is way out of your wheelhouse.
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It was basically what I expected: an innocuous pop record. It's certainly not worth bashing because there's nothing terrible about it at all. Just not much that grabbed me on first listen.
 
Not enough to piss him off in the Random Music thread, huh?

Point being, posting stuff just to get a rise out of people isn't cool.
 
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If I had posted something to get a rise out of anybody, I would now say, "Point taken." But, since I didn't, here we are.
 
Laughing out loud that a picture of a muppet is somehow being misconstrued as a breach of board etiquette. How is that not just a genuinely funny image...?
 
If you can turn back time so that the window for editing has not expired, make sure that every other Swift-mentioning post outside of this thread gets edited, and then make it so that there is a problem to solve, I am game.
 
that movie scared the hell out of me when i was 8.

anyway, for some inexplicable reason, "mine" was stuck in my head today. just the chorus, because that's all i know of it, and that's particularly odd because i'm pretty sure i've only heard the song twice. i was kind of amused by this as i drove to my least favorite place in the world to complete my christmas shopping, but i did laugh a little to myself and think, "i know GAF is responsible for this."

i'm pretty much of the same opinion that feep (oh yeah, totally using that nickname now) expressed when he said he listened to it. so that's pretty much all i'm going to say aside from note, i said i've heard the song twice. i listened to it once when i had to investigate the source of such unbridled enthusiasm, and then i think i listened to again because i don't know...i kind of like it? not the kind of thing that jumps out as utterly amazing in my opinion, but it's catchy. it's pleasant to listen to. and that's all pop music really needs to be, i suppose.
 
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