Two years ago, American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift asked her "Swiftie" fans to fight for her musical legacy and women's rights during a battle with renowned music manager Scooter Braun, who owns her first six albums released under Big Machine Records.
Sometime later, Swift ended the war by re-recording all her albums to regain ownership of her music. Last week, her fourth album Red was released, following the surprise single Wildest Dream from her first pure pop album 1989.
Looking back at her debut, Swift has evolved with every album, from the fearless curly-haired country girl to a woman who shares her stories of life and love as a global music icon.
With her self-titled debut album Taylor Swift, the 16-year-old Pennsylvania girl had already proven herself a talented songwriter with the ability to turn teenage life and unrequited love into relatable lyrics with catchy tunes like Teardrops On My Guitar and Our Song.
Not surprisingly, her high school-era songs topped Billboard's chart. After this phase, writing songs inspired by her personal life became Swift's musical identity.
In 2008, her sophomore album Fearless was released and appealed to a wider audience as Swift mixed country music with pop elements. However, the main theme in Fearless was not different from the first album. Many tracks are about heartbreak and young love, like a fairy tale in Love Story. Yet, they express a feeling of hope, aspiration and love from a more mature perspective with tracks like Fifteen, White
Horse and Change.
With strong, passionate and wistful lyrics, her songs became big hits and teen anthems. Moreover, Fearless received four Grammys and became the most awarded country album of all time. This marked her success in the US music industry and suddenly Swift was a country-pop superstar.
Due to the extensive touring schedule for Fearless, Swift did not have any co-writers and wrote her third album Speak Now entirely on her own. The concept in Speak Now was to express emotional honesty, which shows further refinement of her maturity from past relationships. Swift elaborated her infatuation for her beaus through heart-wrenching, melancholic, impassioned lyrics in Back To December, Dear John and Last Kiss. Still, the melodious dream-pop in Long Live and Enchanted recall her image as an innocent, sweet girl trapped in a fairy-tale romance.
Like her previous albums, Speak Now was wildly successful. Swift became the youngest female artist with the fastest-selling album after shifting over a million copies in the first week.
Swift's next album was Red. It was her huge transition from country roots to full-blown pop, mixed with rock and dub-step elements. Swift had obviously entered a new era as a grown woman with a new long straight hairstyle, leaving her country sweetheart image behind. Still, Red touches upon the same themes as Swift has never gotten over her ex-lovers. Like the colour red, her breakup vividly evoked both unpleasant and heart-warming memories. She turned these complex emotions from fading romance into more tempestuous, emotional centrepieces like All Too Well, Begin Again and Treacherous.
However, Swift's messy dating life gradually led to media backlash against her unequivocally innocent image. Her image for 1989 led to Swift cutting her hair and becoming one of the biggest pop stars, enjoying life in New York with famous female friends. Inspired by 80s synth-pop, Swift transformed her classic tales of heartache and betrayal into fun, satirical lyrics with hip hop-beats like Shake It off, Black Space and Bad Blood.
Her album 1989 was the pinnacle of success in her career until bitter feuds with other singers like Katy Perry and Kayne West and ex-boyfriend Calvin Harris. Her troubled relationship portrayed a revelatory vision of Swift as "Regina George in sheep's clothing", the villain character from the teen movie Mean Girls. This time, Swift couldn't regain her former perfect image or "the Old Taylor". Instead, she re-pictured herself as a snake, leading herself to the dark age of her sixth album Reputation in 2017.
Conversely, her last album with Big Machine contained soft synth-pop love songs like Gorgeous, New Year's Day and Delicate rather than breakup records. However, it is the first time an album didn't receive any Grammy nominations. Still, she did not give up and started a new chapter with the world's largest record label Universal Music.
Her last pop album Lover is a revival of the romantic old Taylor from darkness and bitterness to a brighter, more playful music painted in soft pastels. Bubble gum songs Me and Lover re-solidified her confidence, spirit and love. More importantly, Swift broke has political silence to endorse the US Democratic party and speak up for victims of sexual assault. She took a tough stance on LGBTI rights by dedicating her music video You Need To Calm Down to supporting the Equality Act. She delivered her feminist messages through The Man to empower women and girls. Finally, Swift beat the "King of Pop" Michael Jackson's record at the American Music Awards after earning six awards, including Artist of the Decade in 2019.
During the pandemic, Swift started experimenting on two indie-folk albums, Folklore and Evermore, abandoning her old style of electronic-pop music with fun, repetitive lyrics. Inspired by classic pieces of literature such as Jane Eyre and Rebecca, Swift created her own tales of long travels in a forest. With her deeply resonant voice, she wove narratives into mellow ballads mixed with chamber pop. Her big hits like Cardigan from Folklore and Willow from Evermore have made Swift the only artist to top Billboard's album and single chart at the same time.
Apparently, Swift has been on top of the music game for nearly 15 years since her arrival in the entertainment industry.
