Stream Taylor Swift’s New Album, “Evermore”: NPR

Taylor Swift

Pete Garbrant / Courtesy of the artist

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Pete Garbrant / Courtesy of the artist

Taylor Swift

Pete Garbrant / Courtesy of the artist

There are more places folklore came from. After the surprise release of her eighth studio album in July, Taylor Swift again announced a new record in no time – in this case, forever, On the eve of its launch at midnight on December 11th.

On social media, Swift referred to the album as folkloreSister scored. “Honestly, we couldn’t stop writing the songs,” she said Wrote. And while fans have long referred to each of the star’s album cycles as eras, Swift says not so fast this time.

There was something different with folklore,” she explained. “While making it, I felt a lot less abandoned and very much like back.”

On foreverSwift reunites with Aaron Desner, Jack Antonoff, Justin Vernon and WWB from The National – aka William Bowery, aka Joe Alwyn, as confirmed in her latest Disney + movie Folklore: The Long Barak Studio Sessions. New collaborators enter the fray too, with a full feature from The National (“Coney Island”), vocals support from Mumford & Sons’s Marcus Mumford (“Cowboy Like Me”) and a track featuring the two HAIM sisters (“No Crime”).

Production options for folklore – the programming of tobogganing and the complex gauges commonly found in Dessner’s work – keep going forever. And the recordings are clearly in lyric dialogue: In the opening album “Willow,” and on complex acoustic guitars, Swift sings, “Show me the places others have given you.” surgeon. ” folklore, forever Evokes sweeping scenes with specific details: a tented tennis court; Ladies’ lunch.

There is a continuity in the stories told – for example, mud-covered truck tires for “this damn season” – that return to Swift’s early settings. In “marjorie,” she draws on her family traditions, and pays tribute to her maternal grandmother Marjorie Finlay, who is herself a singer. On the topic of “No Body, No Crime,” HAIM steps in to help spin a story of suspected marital infidelity, revenge on the fornicator thanks to a boat license and a bit of elbow grease (perhaps a tribute to the “Farewell Earl” of chicks?)

The folklore–forever It was an era marked by artistic freedom. Untied by a pop convention, and perhaps with the newly discovered commercial resilience – with success folklore As evidence of the survivability of the surprise release – Swift is able to explore abstract turns of phrases (the “gold rush”) and unlock narratives (“the problems of champagne”). In both albums, she was allowed to play with sound and texture in a way that seemed unfamiliar to contemporary pop radio music.

Whatever the next – whether it’s an ongoing exploration of folklore–forever The aesthetic, or something else entirely – a reminder: The next time Taylor Swift says,Not much is happening at the momentThere’s always more up her sleeve.