Good morning. Who’s in your earbuds today? No judgment, this is just you and me. But if it’s those geezers off The Rest is History I’d suggest you swipe across to your Taylor Swift playlist, just for the next while. And if this is entirely new ground for yourself, don’t worry, that’s what I’m here for and my recommended entry point is the album Reputation: try counting up the mean references to arch-antagonist Kanye West.
“But I’m immortal now,” Swift sings on the title track of her most recent album The Life of a Showgirl, and it’s hard not to take her at face value. Describing her as a cultural titan risks understatement – the 36-year-old superstar, who grew up on a Christmas tree farm in Pennsylvania, is one of the highest selling female recording artists of all time, accumulating a net worth of over $2bn dollars.
A consummate storyteller, she has rewritten narratives about artists’ rights, growing up in public and millennial love – as well as Shakespeare. In her song Love Story, she gave Romeo and Juliet a happy ending.
As Guardian culture launches a mammoth breakdown on how Swift changed pop 20 years on from the release of her first single, Tim McGraw, I spoke to Guardian deputy music editor Laura Snapes about those mis-sold masters, Easter eggs and why a happy marriage isn’t the end of the road for this fearless romantic’s creative journey. First, though, this morning’s headlines.
Five big stories
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UK politics | Keir Starmer’s premiership has been pushed to the brink of collapse after the shock resignation of John Healey as defence secretary undermined his security credentials and risked shredding his remaining political authority.
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Belfast | A monitoring group repeatedly warned the Police Service of Northern Ireland over the past eight months that anti-immigration activists were circulating the addresses of properties that were targeted in this week’s Belfast riots.
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Middle East | Donald Trump claimed that Washington and Tehran were on the verge of signing a peace agreement, but Iran’s foreign ministry said a final decision on an agreement had not been reached.
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UK news | A 14-year-old girl has been charged in connection with three stabbings at a school in North Manchester, police said.
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US news | Elon Musk’s SpaceX is set to launch the biggest stock market float in history amid warnings that it may be overvalued.
In depth: ‘A very intimate-seeming relationship with her fans even on the biggest scale pop music has ever seen’
Laura Snapes has followed Swift’s evolution from the clean corkscrew curls and cowboy boots of her country roots to the sleek and bejewelled pop showgirl of the Eras tour, and the indie-inflected detours in between. And she recognises Swift as both a creative powerhouse and an acute business person who maintains meticulous control over her public image.
“Her career is talked about alongside Madonna, Michael Jackson, the Beatles,” says Laura. “That success is not just about sales or awards, of which she has very many, but the cultural impact, which is immeasurable.” Few A-list pop stars, she adds, have sustained their success for as long as she has.
As befits a megastar of her stature, Swift rarely does traditional interviews these days. But what I want to know first is what it’s like to be in the same room as her. Laura, who has met Swift several times in formal interviews and more casual settings, describes her style as “very easy and normal to talk to”.
“One time she was leaning against the kitchen counter, swigging white wine and we were talking about Sally Rooney.”
I KNOW!!!
I have to take a moment to gather myself after this vignette but Laura, who would hold a masters in Swiftology should one exist (please don’t write in) is more blase about all this stuff, and skips on to offer her assessment: “That’s like a microcosm of how she’s able to have a very intimate seeming relationship with her fans even on the biggest scale pop music has ever seen.”
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The industry
“She’s made people think about musicians’ rights for the first time ever,” Laura tells me. As well as holding Spotify and Apple Music to account over royalties for streamed music, Swift famously took on industry executive Scooter Braun, who she claimed bullied her and other clients, after her former label sold him the master recording rights to her first six albums.
In a renegade display of self-belief, she rerecorded those albums note for note, releasing them anew with the suffix “Taylor’s version”. They achieved blockbuster success, hollowing out Braun’s investment and ultimately inspiring Eras, the highest grossing concert tour in history. And then she bought the recording rights back.
Swift’s business literacy is deliberate – she recalls that when her friends were watching the Disney Channel she was taking notes on VH1’s Behind the Music. “She was learning what happened when careers went off the rails,” Laura says. “She has changed the way that young women get to grow up in public. Previously that obsolescence was built in: you hit 27, you’re seen as old hat.”
But Swift has also set the template for younger female pop artists like Olivia Rodrigo, says Laura, who have owned their master recordings since day one because Swift showed them that negotiation was possible.
Nor is she a woman to make the change then leave others trailing in her sequined wake, actively boosting younger artists like Charli xcx and Sabrina Carpenter, both of whom took coveted support spots on her tours.
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The fans
Swift’s fanbase hits different demographics, from folk like me – old enough to have made up dance moves to Papa Don’t Preach, young enough to have one Taylor Swift song I can’t listen to without thinking of an ex – to the enchanted primary school kids I interviewed when the Eras tour hit Edinburgh in 2024.
In the early days, says Laura, Swift built her business on being available to fans, on email, social media, and in person after performances. She remembers one evening near London in 2019 when Swift stayed back meeting fans until 1am.
The detail-oriented songwriter has always enjoyed leaving secret messages for devoted fans in sleeve notes and lyrics, and these Easter eggs have become a way to maintain intimacy with fans as her enormity of her fame and the security considerations it brings make casual meet-and-greets impossible.
Dedicated fans still approach her work like the Rosetta Stone, Laura jokes, even though these hidden messages are now thoroughly mainstreamed.
What’s really interesting, says Laura, “is how the fans create the culture around Swift.” Not just the weaving of friendship bracelets and ardently curated outfits, but, as the Eras tour progressed, a new lexicon of audience interaction built up around responses to particular sung lines and shared memes.
Of course, not all of Swift’s message is hidden: fans love that she has the last word through their headphones. Famous diss tracks include Bad Blood (about Katy Perry, she stole her back up dancers!) and All Too Well (ex-boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal, he was emotionally distant AND WOULDN’T GIVE BACK HER FAVOURITE SCARF). She also takes on media double standards about her dating back catalogue in Blank Space.
Vocal in her feminism, Swift condemned the supreme court’s overturning of Roe v Wade in 2022 and endorsed Kamala Harris for president in 2024, signing off that particular Instagram post “childless cat lady’, a pointed reference to JD Vance’s delicate depiction of leading Democrats. And perhaps as necessary as her political education, Laura suggest she has “given women younger than her a sense of how you should expect to be treated in a relationship”.
“There’s a point where Swift’s breakup songs evolve from ‘you hurt me and that was bad’ to ‘you treated me poorly on a structural level, and that is even worse’.”
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The future
Swift announced her engagement to NFL star Travis Kelce to 38m Instagram likes and prompted some rumination as to whether marital peace might dull the creative wits of pop’s ultimate sceptical romantic. But Laura points out that Swift has been in a long-term relationship before – she spent six years with British actor Joe Alwyn – “and she wrote great songs about the intricacy of long-term love during that time”.
This won’t be her end game, Laura insists, even though the one record that has touched on her relationship with the man she is set to marry this summer, The Life of a Showgirl, has disappointed critics and fans.
She has just released a song for the soundtrack of Toy Story 5, which Laura raves about as “one of her best songs in years”. “Maybe she wants an Oscar,” Laura muses. That would leave her just needing a Tony to join the extremely short list of EGOT winners. She’s got three years left to beat Jennifer Hudson and become the youngest to achieve that feat. This being Taylor Swift, if it’s in the plan it may well happen.
Following the monumental Eras tour, Laura hopes Swift will return to live performance in a more intimate setting, like the all-day festivals she had planned after the release of the album Lover in 2019 but were paused by the pandemic.
“The scale of her career is such that I honestly think it would take three or four terrible albums in a row to dent her stardom,” says Laura.
“She is the default pop star.”
• PS – don’t blame me but there are 13 Taylor Swift song titles hidden in the newsletter above. Happy hunting! Reply to this email or get in touch on first.edition@theguardian.com to let us know which ones you spotted.
What else we’ve been reading
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You may have read David Batty’s beautifully written piece about meeting the woman who was forced to give him up for adoption as a baby. Now we’re asking UK adult adoptees to share their own experiences of how they navigated reunion with their birth parents. Libby
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I loved this photoessay by Raquel Cunha of amateur football pitches in Mexico. A spectacular view of the beautiful game. Patrick
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This is a searing read from Joan Smith on how David Sullivan’s Sunday Sport paved the way for the 21st-century porn industry. Libby
World Cup 2026
On the pitch
Mexico 2-0 South Africa | The co-hosts got the tournament under way with a 2-0 win over South Africa in the opening match. Pablo Iglesias Maurer was there to document the drama, while protesters clashed with police on the other side of the fence.
South Korea 2-1 Czechia | Son Heung-min’s South Korea came back from a goal down to snatch a thrilling 2-1 win over Czechia in their World Cup Group A opener, substitute Oh Hyeon-gyu grabbing the winner in the 80th minute.
Off the pitch
Border trouble | Côte d’Ivoire fans became the latest group to be barred from the US for the tournament on Thursday. Morgan Ofori has recorded a video explainer about the visa problems around the competition.
Australia | The Socceroos have addressed growing anti-immigration sentiment in a powerful video message ahead of the World Cup, speaking of their pride in their heritage and playing for the national team.
Canada | Alongside Mexico, Canada have been overshadowed as co-hosts for the tournament. Today, they kick off their campaign against Bosnia and Herzegovina in Toronto. Do not miss our preview of their chances, which have been hampered by the fitness of Alphonso Davies and Moïse Bombito.
Today’s fixtures
• Canada v Bosnia and Herzegovina, 8pm (BST), Toronto Stadium, BBC
• USA v Paraguay, 2am (BST) Saturday, Los Angeles Stadium, BBC
Something for the weekend
Our critics’ roundup of the best things to watch, read, play and listen to right now
Film
Strictly Ballroom | ★★★★☆
Generations who don’t know why TV’s Strictly Come Dancing is called that need to catch up with Baz Luhrmann’s debut directing feature from 1992, which has been rereleased in cinemas from today. It is goofy, lovable and as sweetly romantic as you like. Strictly Ballroom laid down the narrative template for Strictly Come Dancing; the film’s pairing of the brilliant dancer and the gutsy ingenue became the professional/celeb partnership on TV. It was the feelgood crowd pleaser from Australia that made Luhrmann a star, and that “strictly” sounded a defiant note. Maybe every subsequent Luhrmann picture has its origin in ballroom dancing, it’s a dizzy swirl of fun. Peter Bradshaw
Music
Kelsey Lu: So Help Me God | ★★★★☆
Seven years separate the release of cello-playing singer-songwriter Kelsey Lu’s debut album from its follow-up. Lu has suggested the long gap was an act of artistic rebellion against a music industry obsessed with providing a constant stream of new product. So Help Me God suggests that their time away from album-making has sharpened their sense of purpose. The album’s guest list is as eclectic as Lu’s activities over the last seven years, but rather than jarring or showy, the appearances are beautifully sublimated. It’s an album that wears its weirdness lightly, that keeps moving in unexpected directions with an impressively graceful smoothness. It’s very clearly the work of someone who has their own vision and their own way of doing things. Alexis Petridis
TV
The Evil Lawyer | ★★★☆☆
If the title of this Thai crime-thriller-cum-courtroom-drama feels a little splashy, wait until you meet the scoundrel in question. Her name is Jittri and she is, at least at the show’s outset, a pantomime villain in a power suit, her hair even bigger than her ego. But don’t be fooled; one boo-hiss baddie does not a pantomime make. Directed by Nottapon Boonprakob, whose 2025 drama Mad Unicorn won a clutch of awards, this eight-episode series may be tonally erratic and at times faintly ridiculous, but it also has confronting questions about power, corruption and systemic injustice plus a gripping, twisty plot. Lucinda Everett
The front pages
“Healey’s shock resignation leaves Starmer on the brink”, is the Guardian’s front page today. The Telegraph writes “Healey torpedoes Starmer”, the FT says “Healey quits over defence budget hole in heavy blow to Starmer’s authority” while the Mail exclaims “God help us!”.
On the same story, the Times has “Cash row costs PM his defence ministers”, the Express says “PM’s defence plans ‘could make us less safe’”, and the i Paper leads with “Prime Minister failing to defend nation, claims UK defence secretary”. The Sun says “Thanks but no tanks” and Metro headlines “Our defence is in crisis!”
Today in Focus: The Latest
Defence secretary walks out with ‘blistering’ swipe at Starmer
John Healey has resigned as defence secretary over the government’s military spending plans, in another significant blow for Keir Starmer.
In a scathing letter to the prime minister, Healey said the long-awaited defence investment plan “falls well short of what is required for defence” and that he would have had to take decisions that “could make Britain less safe”.
Nosheen Iqbal speaks to the Guardian’s policy editor, Kiran Stacey – watch the episode on YouTube here.
Cartoon of the day | Ben Jennings
The Upside
A bit of good news to remind you that the world’s not all bad
Ghostbusters superfan Paul Gannon revisits the all-female reboot of the film a decade since it was release, asking whether the ferocious backlash was justified at the time. Coming before Barbie, Gannon argues that Ghostbusters: Answer the Call was ahead of its time, writing about how he has fallen in love with the film over time as the vitriol has lessened.
Sign up here for a weekly roundup of The Upside, sent to you every Sunday
Bored at work?
And finally, the Guardian’s puzzles are here to keep you entertained throughout the day. Until Monday.
