We’re at a fascinating point in the Covid-related world of quarantine art and entertainment. Stuck inside this mobile, we crave a constant influx of television, film, music, art and theater – new work, not in rerun form and more so than ever before – to get us through the pandemic’s off-and-on lockdown. No artist’s work has mercurially changed to best define (and be defined by) the quiet solitude of the nine-month (and counting) lockdown than Taylor Swift, the soon-to-turn (as of December 13) 31-year-old native of West Reading, PA. And no artist can command such immediate turn-on-a-dime attention with a simple, surprise release announcement than Swift.
Not Drake, not Bieber. Not Beyonce, not Springsteen. Not BTS, not Arianna. Not the Rolling Stones. I’ve been at this a while. I know.
That would be tonight’s midnight release of “Evermore,” the self-described “sister” album to her lushly pastoral latest, Grammy-nominated release, the at-home-during C-19 written and recorded, “Folklore.”
As we speak, national and international A&E pages, sites and magazines are stopping their presses in the wake of several sets of social media posts from Swift (herself, as opposed to her team, which makes it all the more personal and prompt) featuring everything from her Instagram mosaic of what the cover will look like, to its first video (“Willow” which will drop on her YouTube premiere page along with Swift herself so to answer fans questions), to the primary reasons she’s dropping it now.
Ever since I was 13, I’ve been excited about turning 31 because it’s my lucky number backwards, which is why I wanted to surprise you with this now. You’ve all been so caring, supportive and thoughtful on my birthdays and so this time I thought I would give you something! pic.twitter.com/wATiVSTpuV
— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) December 10, 2020
Most definitively though, Swift is releasing what promises to be the bucolic “Evermore” right now because she can and because we need it. The supple and newfound folksiness to her pop tones, in tandem with a fresh, organic shimmer in her lyrics and her music. Music again (like “Folklore”) penned and co-produced by dosage MAGAZINE fave Jersey Jack Antonoff and the National’s Aaron Dessner. With contributions from her beau, British actor Joe Alwyn. HAIM (on a tune titled “No Body, No Crime”). Bon Iver (who sang on “Exile” from “Folklore”) and The National backing her as a unit on a track titled, “Coney Island.”
This morning’s social media posts went something like this…
The 2021 Grammy nominations
Of course, after all of her more personal posts, there’s the sales pitch. There’s always a sales pitch. Even when we need it most.
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