I don’t get it. Her music is sometimes catchy but otherwise unremarkable, from the songs I’ve heard. How does she break all these records and accumulate so much fame and wealth?
She’s pretty, but a lot of singer songwriters are, especially those with makeup and costume people, a support staff.
Is there something else to her that people like?
I’m confused about what makes her so apparently unique or phenomenal.
Update: there are so many things that make swift unique or phenomenal.
I’ve received tons of great answers from people that have helped me understand, like piecing together a jigsaw puzzle, many factors that makes swift different and consequently more successful than her peers.
Clever lyrics, top-tier production, sharing autobiographical and emotional points in her life very directly, apparent honesty with few or no public blemishes, creating a community of fans through Easter eggs and house parties and unconventional, but always personal methods, an early start supported by wealthy parents, she keeps winning against abusers, and her music itself is popular and fun.
Those are just a few of the puzzle pieces contributed here, and a dive into this post is a pretty good explanation of many of the factors that must be contributing to her phenomenal success and recognition, that set her apart from other pop stars, even pop stars who were phenoms in their own right.
This is a very educational post, thank you to everyone who has contributed.
-Very skilled songwriter. I don’t necessarily like all her stuff but I legitimately think she’s the best songwriter (meaning, composing music and writing lyrics) of her generation. Probably since Bruce Springsteen or Billy Joel.
-Very attractive and a good performer
-Well connected in the music industry let her get an early start/inside track
-obsessed with being popular. I don’t mean that in a negative way, but her primary objective with her music is to please as many people as possible. I think the documentary “Miss Americana” on Netflix explains that very well-at one point she straight up says “I just want people to like me” or something like that. That means her music/career has always focused on mass appeal as opposed to making more… limited-appeal music like most artists do at some point in their career
-she’s kept a remarkably clean image even through being famous for close to two decades. It’s very telling that the worst thing her haters can say about her is “but her plane uses a lot of carbon!” This means parents let kids listen to her, brands love her as a sponsor, nobody boycotts her, etc.
-one last thing, I think people love her songs because they feel like they’re true. Her songs have a very intimate, almost confessional quality that a lot of artists strive for buy often comes off as fake.
She’s just lately a decent songwriter. For most of her career, her songs were written for her by the heavy hitters behind virtually every top 100 hit. Her producer/mixer/writer Jack Antonoff still does most of the heavy lifting.
I am tired of seeing the sentiment that she’s some brilliant songwriter–she really only kind of plays the guitar. The reality is that if anyone is made to be a billionaire, and work with one of the best musical minds of our time (Antonoff), and collaborate with the other top song writers/ghost writers, of course, a decade later, they’ll be able to write songs. It was never some innate talent of hers, or else the songs she truly did write early in her career would have been the hits, instead of the mutually agreed upon worst on the album.
The American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift has written or co-written every song in her discography, with the exception of several cover songs and two guest features, alongside some songs released by other artists
Source?
this commenter is lying and the sources they claim to cite contradict their own claims.
Co-writing means nothing at the mega-pop industry level, and starts having little meaning far before that. But, if you are genuinely under the impression that it has meaning, I have a bridge to sell you.
The source for my claims of brilliant songwriters writing her entire early career is visible in Genius for everything pre-Lover.
By early in her career do you mean when she was like 18? I’m not saying she hasn’t had a lot of help. But I disagree with the idea that she’s just a figurehead. She is listed as a writer for pretty much all her songs, and you can usually tell a Taylor Swift song just by the sound/lyrics, which isnt something i can say for a lot of pop artists. If it was Antonoff the whole time then Bleachers would be more popular (relative to Swift).
your analysis is correct. the commenter you are replying to is like literally lying and i’m making an effort to point that out because they are getting far too many upvotes for someone whose sources contradict their own statements. check out my other comments if interested lol and have a great day 😊
No, she really only started to write with “Lover”. Prior to that, it was Antonoff, and prior to that it was a lot of different writers/ghost writers.
I also don’t think she’s just a figure head. I appreciate everything she’s done to get artists paid more, I think she’s a good role model for girls/women, etc. But, I do not think she’s a talented song writer. She’s not a multi-instrumentalist. And, she is a billionaire, hoarding wealth like all the others.
She is listed as a writer for pretty much all her songs
I don’t know anything about anything in this Taylor Swift conversation but Elvis was listed as a writer on all of his songs but wrote none of them. It was a requirement of his management that if he performed it, he got a writing credit.
i am sick and tired of this misogynistic bile. i do not write this comment for your sake commenter, but for the sake of anyone who might be swayed by your bullshit rhetoric.
let’s break this down:
“sHe ReAlLy only PlAys ThE GUitaR” you can’t even get that factoid right. Taylor Swift plays at least four instruments.
“she doesn’t write her songs herself and the ones she does write are mutually agreed to be the worst”—
outright false:
Many critics selected “Dear John” [on which Swift is credited as the sole songwriter] as Speak Now’s best song for its production and emotional impact. Such critics include Jon Caramanica in The New York Times (lauding the blues production for expanding beyond Swift’s country-music comfort zone),[15] Mikael Wood in Spin (saying it was “epic pop-country poetry”),[17] and Willman in The Hollywood Reporter (underscoring the “chills-inducing climax”). wikipedia
too late for you? Our Song (2006, written solely by Swift) was one of the “Award-Winning Songs” at the 2008 BMI Country Awards, which honors the year’s best songwriters.[35] It featured on Rolling Stone’s 2019 list of the best female country songs from 2000.[36]
“Jack Antonoff does the heavy lifting” Antonoff is a FUCKING incredible artist and I do not deny that, but who sings the songs with a critically acclaimed voice? who performs the music live to meticulous, hours-long choreography? spoiler: not Antonoff, buddy! you might be shocked to hear it was a woman.
Next time you want to just lie on the internet maybe ar least try to find some supporting evidence instead of making empty assertions like a freshman in high school. Like damn. 🗿
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Thanks! Those are all interesting points and I have never heard of that documentary but love documentaries, so I’ll definitely be checking that out.
Especially since you’re the first person who’s mentioned how much she wants to be popular, or how much she is focused on that.
That’s very interesting and obviously seems very relevant, thanks.
I think people love her songs because they feel like they’re true
Her very first hit was about being a farmer’s daughter.
And Tom Clancy was never a Russian submarine captain or spy
Do people like Tom Clancy novels because “they feel like they’re true”?
Sorry if you missed the point, but what I intended to say is that, artists frequently create pieces that they haven’t actually experienced.
Your point was completely obvious but Tom Clancy was a very poor choice to illustrate that point. Of course some artists produce works that have an essence of truth despite being fiction; perhaps Taylor Swift is such an artist, but Tom Clancy definitely isn’t.
Fair, I was going to say look at “I was only 19” by red gum, but that wouldn’t work for an international audience, so I tried to go with a non fantasy author that is recognisable
Not sure what song that is off the top of my head, but I didn’t mean “true” in the literal sense. More like, people feel like the songs give them a glimpse of the real Taylor swift. That’s particularly true of her more recent albums I feel like. For example, “Folklore” is told largely through stories about other (fictional) people, but it feels like a reflection of emotions and experiences she really has been through. It’s all very parasocial and I’m not sure how much of it is genuine, but my point is it FEELS genuine.
Not just that, but Republicans hating her so much made her even more popular.
I wanted to chime in, since I’m in the unique situation of not being a “Swiftie” but still having an above-average knowledge of Taylor Swift due to being married to a Swiftie.
For starters, her songs are very relatable for women. Especially in women around her age, she was routinely writing songs that spoke to the emotions during each periods of their lives. My wife, for example, was in middle/high school when Taylor was releasing her romantic country songs, and met me right around when Taylor released Lover. This is all because Taylor is extremely autobiographical with her lyrics and was writing about what she was experiencing at the time. She wrote lovesongs in Speak Now because she was in high school and early college when she produced the album. She wrote Lover because she had met a man who, at the time, she perceived to be a man she could spend the rest of her life with. Since Red, very few of her songs are about hypothetical situations. Almost all of them are about her real experiences as a person and as a woman, with the exception of folklore and Evermore, and that speaks to women in a very strong way. Her lyrics and reasons behinds songs are deep, much deeper than most give her credit for.
Additionally, she is extremely good at marketing. Many of her songs and albums have Easter eggs in them that only true fans will be able to find. She also drops a lot of cryptic hints, which her fans love to dissect and interpret to try and predict major releases or announcements. It’s just good fun for them, and it increases the hype significantly. Also, her concerts are not just live music, they’re a whole show. The Eras concert is 3 hours long, and she is singing and running the entire time. She rarely lip-syncs - I say rarely because I’ve heard claims that she does but I have never seen it - and gives it her all every single concert. Her band and many of her dancers and support staff have been with her for a decade or more now, and they have continued to routinely put on shows to the best of their abilities without fail.
Finally, she is, most Swifties believe, a genuinely good person. The worst thing I’ve ever heard of her doing is loaning her private jet out to her friends and families which caused her to break the news because her jet was causing a lot of emissions. Beyond that, she seems to be a grounded woman who genuinely loves her fans and the people around her.
If you take nothing else away from this post, this is the most important fact: She is relatable to women. She sings about her lived experiences, many of which are relatable to her fans.
Thanks, I really appreciate your perspective.
A lot of what you said rings true and certainly fits in puzzle piece-wise with everything else
My wife has just informed me of the latest Easter egg, to further explain the marketing prowess and give an example.
She has changed her profile picture to black and white, rather than full color. While trivial to non-Swift fans, this is a red alert to her die-hards. I haven’t heard many of the theories yet (my wife often distills them down to the most reasonable for me, thankfully), but her favorite so far is that it is signaling her intent to release the “Taylor’s version” (re-recording) of her album Reputation, which is one of her most popular albums and has a black and white theming. This is the kind of puzzles and theory crafting thst many Swift fans find so enthralling
Ha, okay, so there’s a whole puzzle culture to everything she presents. Yes, that would attract a lot of people as well. Thanks
Kanye interrupted her acceptance speech with some crazy shit.
From there on, it was just maintaining the momentum.
I do think this is a good point, that she got a cultural relevance boost from this.
Tbh, I’m not a swiftie, but ever since the Kanye thing I’ve hated Kanye and been partial to T swift.
Kanye is just such an asshole. I don’t see how anyone can like him.
It’s very difficult for me to listen to any Kanye West music no matter how much he’s pumped up since I heard him talk on rogan’s podcast and sounded literally insane, and that Taylor Swift thing was unbelievable, in the actual sense of that word.
i love kanye but he hasn’t been the same ever since his mom died and it went downhill during coronavirus lockdown. he used to be a personification of self confidence but I don’t think i can say the same anymore. wish he gets proper help.
And all these years later, Jay Z was just complaining on stage that his wife should have won Album of the year after Taylor won it again.
She was one of the few singers who appealed to love-crazy teenager girls a couple of decades ago.
I went to a Daddy-Daughter school dance with my kid a few weeks ago, she’s in Kindergarten, so it was just a new experience for her going to a dance, we had a good time. However, it’s been a while since I’ve been to any sort of dance function at all (in school or out), but I’m pretty sure that more than half the songs were all Taylor Swift songs. I don’t know if that’s indicative of white people dance music selections in general, or if this was specific to that function and who they thought the girls wanted to listen to, but her music apparently gets played alot.
I think her popularity might be tied to her relatively clean image. Apart from the serial dating, the racist boyfriend thing, and the wasteful jet planes, she’s still fairly clean in the eyes of popular America, she apparently hasn’t had a big sex scandal or nude photos leak. Hell, when fake photos of her started spreading everywhere recently, that’s when politicians started talking about reigning in and regulating AI Art, and that’s been around for years now (even photoshopping images has been a thing for ages).
Funny enough though, my daughter actually hates Taylor Swift.
Ha, yeah, I agree with you that the clean image certainly helps lend an air of credibility to her success
Don’t really see her as being massively more popular than people like Michael Jackson or Madonna at their peak. She’s like 18 years into her career at this point, like a snowball accumulating more and more fans.
Of course it helps that she had rich parents to be able to grease the wheels in the early stages of her career.
The music is alright. There’s a decent amount of it, and it’s fairly varied. It’s called pop for a reason.
Madonna has 300 million sales over her career, and Taylor Swift has 200 million sales and almost twice as many awards (from the numbers I am finding on websites) at about half her age.
As far as I can find anything, it looks like Madonna sold half as many albums by the time she was in her mid-thirties.
I’m not convinced, especially after some of the answers in this post by other commenters, that just because they’re both pop stars, their success is mutually definable or explained.
Her songs are produced by the CIA and contain subliminal messages that make her irresistible.
Yvan Eht Nioj
CIA are here and down voting you. Stay frosty.
I’m with you dude, she has a completely unremarkable to me as well.
In terms of her songs and dancing, definitely.
But I really think this threat has pointed out why she’s so successful.
Squeaky clean image so she can be played everywhere, great marketing, high production, clever lyrics, a lot of community outreach, autobiographical social media and songs, and I finally understand why people talk about her business acumen after I listened to a podcast about her eras tour and how much was self produced.
She’s knocking it out of the park on every front she can while focusing solely on the music industry.
Definitely an interesting phenomenon.
I’m still not wild about her music, but I was very curious how someone so young can become so successful when she sounds so similar to all of the other artists I’ve grown up listening to.
I’m personally not a fan. But I am a fan of her making the right-wing nut jobs apoplectic.
That is 100% my favorite part of her career, besides the f*** you record labels, i’m re-recording my entire catalog, which is pretty cool
She also is helping bring down the Ticketmaster monopoly. That’s where she earned my respect.
What has she done, regarding Ticketmaster?
Honestly I don’t remember the details, and when I google “taylor swift ticketmaster” I get fairly predictable results. There was some drama about them screwing her over, and her screwing them over in return or somesuch. I do know that ticketmaster has held a significant monopoly on event ticketing for over a decade now though, and has only recently begun to get investigated.
Sorry I can’t be more use, I’m not a swiftie and I tend to dislike pop culture in general.
Note: apoplexy means malding.
10 points for apoplectic
I’m with you, OP. There has to be something we’re missing, right?
I think people in this thread have offered a pretty good mosaic of all of the things that lend to her inordinate success.
It’s been really interesting reading everyone’s answers and then looking for corroborating evidence in her music, videos, cultural touchstones and so on
I used to dislike Taylor Swift along with all other contemporary pop stars. Maybe even a little bit more, because she had the audacity to call herself Country: Spitting in the face of personal heroes like Kristofferson, Nelson, and Cash.
Then I stopped being an edgy teenager, Swift released Shake it Off, and I had to recognize it was a fun song to dance to. In an ironic kind of way of course, but nevertheless.
And then, in 2015, Ryan Adams released his cover album of Swift’s 1989, playing every single song on the album in a folksy way. I dug it. And with it, I had to appreciate that Taylor Swift is one hell of a songwriter: I loved the songs, I just don’t love the sound of pop music all that much. That’s personal taste, not everything I dislike is bad.
Then Ryan Adams fell from grace with metoo, so fuck him. At least it triggered Father John Misty to publish (and later remove) his legendary covers of Swift in the style of the Velvet Underground.
Fast forward to 2020, and Taylor Swift dabbles with music I can actually enjoy listening to with her album folklore. Pretty cool. I actually got my expectations up for her next album, evermore, low-key hoping that it would be musically inspired by the Battle of Evermore. Sadly I was wrong, but again, it’s a matter of personal preferences.
What matters more is the fact that she’s reinventing herself from album to album - she’s successful in one formula, and she just ditches it and moves on to something different. And every time she does it, she seems to be even more successful than the last time. Her growth as an artist is astonishing.
Finally, she’s just cool. Fuck the labels - she’ll just casually re-records her entire discography in order to take back control of her songs. She’s caught up in all kinds of stupid celebrity drama, but it tends to be the rest of the industry falling over like toddlers trying to drag her into shit for PR while she acts like the only adult in the room. She also scores points for casually hanging out with Billy Bragg and encouraging people to vote and shit.
Swift was hardly the downfall of country; the amount of autotuned trash from both sexes now is off the charts. I can’t make myself listen to a country channel for the rare genuine song because I start to rage at the horrid garbage they play the rest of the time.
I’m fine with pop, there are plenty of pop songs I’ve liked, and I can recognize how since of her songs are fun, I’m curious why she receives dozens of rewards.
Your point about successful in one formula, and then ditches it and moved on to something different
Do you think that happens with every album, or is there a specific example you’re thinking about?
Oh I want to add, it’s definitely very cool to re-record your discography.
How do you think she compares to Britney Spears, Madonna, or Beyonce? Like, Taylor Swift has become a pop star. You don’t have to love her music to see she has wide appeal. I don’t really like Madonna but you listen to a song and you are like “yeah I can see why people have danced to this for thirty years”
Okay, yeah so I think it’s the awards that I don’t really understand, since she doesn’t seem that unique to me compared to Ellis, Madonna or beyoncé, but she has the most awards out of them and far more awards than many other pop"stars", like a pretty crazy amount more.
Swift has 81 awards
Beyonce has 96, 31 of which are BET awards, which I do think is significant in this specific list since obviously Taylor Swift isn’t competing in that category.
But then let’s get to other pop stars.
Lady Gaga has 35 awards? The f*** like I can sing tons of her songs.
Adele has 40? Adele. Adele? Taylor Swift has twice as many awards as Adele?
Rihanna has 49 including her 19 BET awards
Billy eyelash like I don’t know whatever, after that it’s all like a dozen awards or a couple dozen each.
Taylor has 81 awards, even without any BET awards?
How does Taylor Swift have twice as many awards as Lady Gaga or other similarly huge artists?
I’m not a huge fan or anything, but I think she’s a really talented musician and really good at managing her fame. She keeps a strong relationship with her fans, her music spans numerous genres, and her father is a wealth manager.
Watching her Tiny Desk concert helped me get more into her music so I could enjoy it with my daughter.
You are asking an infinitely difficult question of why she is so incredibly popular, I don’t think I can tell you why she’s more popular than, say, Beyoncé. Except maybe that she is more consistent. That said, I’ll give you my perspective on why I like Taylor Swift.
I’m a dude and my music taste is pretty diverse but I mostly grew up listening to metal and punk. That said, when I left my ex (for the second time). It felt really good to listen to We are never ever getting back together on repeat. Most breakups I’ve had, had songs that have helped me through and leaving a toxic relationship… It just felt really good to repeatedly sing those words over and over.
I don’t know if it’s actually true but I’m a guitarist and I’ve heard the phrase “Taylor Swift is the Beatles of the 21st century” meaning her music releases currently have the largest impact on guitar sales and popularity. If for nothing else, I respect her a lot for performing live with a guitar. She doesn’t do anything crazy but you don’t have to have crazy guitar skills to make good music. I personally enjoy learning her songs every now and then because a) they are relatively straightforward to learn but still encompass nice playful elements, b) I am mostly interested in becoming a better singer nowadays and her songs are definitely challenging for me to sing.
- Both folklore and evermore are really nice albums imo. Very nice and tasteful music. Last year I had a phase where I was having trouble finding music. I was sick of extreme metal, I was sick of hardcore techno, and I listened to so much leftist folk and folk punk that I grew sick of it. All the music I listened to was always fast, intense and challenging. I just wanted nice songs that I can sing along to with real instrumentation. I realised I don’t mind pop music but I like real instruments because they feel more real to me (fwiw lol, please don’t take this as hatred for electronics, I also love techno as stated above). Well folklore and evermore offer just that for me. Nice songs with real instruments and beautiful instrumentation. I prefer folklore for being darker but evermore uses more guitar which I also like. My fav songs out of the 2 albums:
Folklore
- cardigan
- mirrorball
- this is me trying
- invisible string
Evermore
- willow
- champagne problems
- 'tis the damn season
I still want to express that I don’t always like her lyric writing. She uses brand names a bunch and I also feel like there are often references to American things which I just don’t know about.
Also, while I like folklore and evermore, I find them borderline impossible to listen to all the way through. All the songs basically strike the same mood, it’s nice relaxing music, but there’s not a big emotional arc throughout the albums for me. I tend to stop listening to evermore once I reach “no body, no crime”… God that song is awful lol.
Thanks, I’ll check out your recommended songs from folklore and evermore.
Think of a dish made by a world class chef, that food is probably exquisitely crafted using unique and fresh ingredients. There probably aren’t that many people out there who truly appreciate it, and probably a lot who just think it’s weird.
Now think of pizza. It’s relatively cheap and broadly appealing. It wouldn’t be put in the same class as the food prepared by the chef, but a lot more of it gets consumed.
Taylor Swift is talented, pretty, affable, has a superior work ethic, and makes music that’s catchy and easily digestible. Like pizza, her music appeals to the broadest group of people.
I like this explanation, but I feel like there are plenty of other artists who fit into that category.
Is it just random that they had to pick one brand of pizza to go crazy over do you think?
She is a damn fine businesswoman. She was able to use social media to have a relationship with her followers and build a large audience. That’s one of the main reasons she became famous.
Also, there have been a couple of situations that benefited her fame, such as the Kanye incident
“Relationship”… More like getting liked because she is pretty.
Uh oh, someone is upset because a beautiful woman is also good at other things.
You are right - beautiful woman are always good at things. Can’t criticize them because that’s just out of bounds. :)
Cause that’s totally what I said 🤣
Luck and timing are big factors. There are many talented artists out there that work hard and make the kind of music that (in theory) should appeal to a large audience but never make it. Either at all or not to the level of Taylor Swift. If you make the right music at the right time, your chances increase but you still need luck.
Edit: what I’ve heard of Taylor is that she’s very good in making the right music at the right time. The songs fit the trends in music. But I’ve never listened much to her, so I don’t know for sure if its correct
Thanks, someone else compared her to other pop stars like Michael Jackson and Madonna, and all of those people were at the forefront of their particular movement.
I feel like Taylor Swift is just in the middle of all the other pop stars.
Appreciate it, I’m going to try and look into it from that perspective, maybe I just don’t understand the music world at all. I definitely don’t.
Don’t forget the money and connections. IIRC her father literally bought(?) or created(?) a label to sign her. There a lot more talented artists out there but she had the money and connections that gave her a very big headstart. Talent can only get you so far in the industry. It’s luck/timing and money/connections that allow you to break through.
The pizza has been carefully crafted by teams of experts to appeal to the largest audience.
As someone who couldn’t name a single Swift song up until a couple of months ago — From what I read she writes the vast majority of her songs, which is exceptionally rare for pop stars; especially from such a young age… The songs may be simplistic and formulaic, but the lyrics are decent for the age they were written at, and the work ethic and genre jumping is impressive. The most admirable thing about her is how she’s screwing venture capitalists by re-recording all the songs she wrote. I hope she starts redistributing all that wealth she’s extracting.
Just like pizza, artist go off after a while. (It just takes longer)
Except for all of the artists who don’t.
And a lot of the artists who do “go off” don’t get 81 awards in a decade and a half.
Those aren’t to many. I can’t name many though that made good music 2 decades ago and still do. Only the Stones spring to mind. I never even heard of Taylor Swift until last year.
I disagree with this. She’s a pretty amazing song writer, which is really uncommon for pop stars. I can see why someone would think she’s more like pizza if you only listen to the hits, but if you actually sit down and listen to a whole album you’ll find that there aren’t many songs that are just flat-out bad. Actually, one my favorites by her is a B side. You can actually track her progress as a musician from fairly generic country artist to someone who has a really unique and uncomplicated sound. I mean, I get why people go for the “simple = easy”, but that’s simply not the case. It’s really difficult to write a song that is as clean and as well put together as she does and still have it be good. To continue your food metaphor, Taylor would be like sushi; there doesn’t have to be a ton of ingredients to be incredibly delicious.
Then you also have to consider that she’s Gen Z, has been doing this for 18 years, and has managed to stay fairly relevant most of that time. Like she really is the only Gen Z pop star who has managed to stay in the limelight without dropping out of being a complete tool (Justin Bieber).
You also have to consider that for a long time she had a carefully crafted public image as a champion of the LGBTQ+ community. Whether she actually is or isn’t doesn’t really matter (I personally think it’s a lot of rainbow-washing) when you have bops like “You Need to Calm Down”. Or the fact that she features a bunch of trans people in the video she directed for “Lavender Haze”.
music good
I think like most of the other answers, this plays a part, but since there are so many other artists with good music, doesn’t really explain why there’s only one Taylor Swift.
