When the about on official documentation, I knew the world had gone mad.
It wasn’t a political matter they were addressing but, inexplicably, reassurance for concerned fans who worried she might miss the due to her tour show in Tokyo the night before.
Proving themselves to be devoted Swifties, the embassy peppered their statement with album title references like Speak Now and Fearless.
Yes – this, coming from the embassy of an actual country, is as wild as it sounds.
But the unjustifiable obsession with Taylor doesn’t stop there.
Her relationship with Kansas City Chiefs starthat NFL bosses have been forced to address the amount of camera time she’s had during games, while other figures from across the league have been keen to share their opinions on the Chiefs’ most famous fan.
But wait, it goes on…
There are actual articles about whether US President Joe Biden – yes, president of a superpower – might need to attend an Eras tour show to swing votes in the upcoming election.
It’s impressive that one popstar yields that much power over the world but, out of all the singers out there, is Taylor really the one who warrants the level of obsession that swamps her to the point that presidents, embassies and entire football leagues are brought into the conversation?
Sorry, but the answer is no.
Taylor isn’t the messiah or the second coming of Jesus Christ.
That’s not to take away from her achievements; as a woman in the male-dominated music industry, she’s certainly taken great strides to make her voice heard in the room and has pulled some corker power moves like removing her catalogue off Spotify over the platform’s pitiful pay.
However, when you strip away all the hoopla and focus on the music, I really struggle to find anything particularly special about her or her music that justifies the intense way everyone is fawning over her right now.
It feels like everywhere you turn, someone is talking about Taylor.
Sure, she can write a catchy song (the Red and 1989 eras produced a few bops) and tell a decent story but it’s hardly Earth-shattering.
Even though I’m not a Taylor fan, I can appreciate she’s talented and has fans, just not to the extreme extent that it feels people are losing their minds.
Not that there’s any comparison between the two but, when you have an artist like Beyoncé – who not only pushes herself outside of her comfort zone delving into rock, country, pop and everything in between; uses her music to empower Black women; makes power moves in front and behind the scenes; and puts on a breathtaking career-defining tour like Renaissance – it feels cruel that she’s often cast in Taylor’s shadow.
Not that that’s directly Taylor’s fault…
The two artists have publicly shown support for each other over the years but there’s no denying that, when it comes down to it, the industry (bigwigs) will favour Taylor first.
Case in point, Taylor winning the Grammys’ album of the year four times despite Beyoncé being the most-awarded artist in history and never triumphing in that category. That’s not just a kick in the face for Beyoncé, but so many other artists who may have also released a brilliant album that year but missed out.
It just goes to show that in the music industry, it’s much easier for the clean-cut white woman to prevail over the Black woman who has no doubt had to work harder to be seen.
Especially as Taylor is not without her controversy.
Many will defend Taylor and say that so much of the conversation is about who she’s dating but, it’s hard to ignore that a lot of her music is said to be written about her famous boyfriends.
Her new album, The Tortured Poets Department, is widely believed to be inspired by her ex Joe Alwyn as he had a WhatsApp group chat with Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott called The Tortured Man Club.
Swifties also reckon song titles such as Down Bad, But Daddy I Love Him, I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can), and I Can Do It With A Broken Heart are loosely aimed at him.
It’s no secret that many of our favourite musicians use their real-life relationships and break-ups as material for their music, and Taylor is said to have written music about the likes of Harry Styles, Jake Gyllenhaal and John Mayer in the past.
But there’s something about her style of doing it that just feels petty; especially with her new material believed to be a dig at her ex.
If her new album is truly targeted at Joe, who has barely ever uttered a peep about her, it just feels very schoolgirl playground of her to then address their former romance through digs.
But then, it makes sense why I don’t ‘get’ Taylor and the hype around her.
So much of her music feels targeted towards that young love, teen angst and that’s fine, it’s just not for me.
Still, there’s nothing that can justify the extreme adoration for Taylor that has the world gagged. That, I definitely will never ‘get.’
