Posted April 19, 2024 | Story by Ashley Mascaro | Photo from Rolling Stone – Beth Garrabrant
After Taylor Swift announced her new album, “THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT,” at the 66th Grammy Awards, fans have been counting down the days for its release.
Now, the day has finally arrived.
Swift’s 11th studio album was released on April 19, which came with a surprise: a secret second album consisting of 15 new songs released at 2 a.m. titled “THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT: THE ANTHOLOGY.”
“I’d written so much tortured poetry in the past 2 years and wanted to share it all with you, so here’s the second installment of TTPD: The Anthology. 15 extra songs. And now the story isn’t mine anymore… it’s all yours,” Swift wrote on Instagram before releasing the second album.
“THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT” consists of 16 songs with the second side, “THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT: THE ANTHOLOGY” consisting of 15 songs, making this a 31-track album with a runtime of two hours and three minutes.
Fans originally speculated that this album would be entirely about Swift’s breakup with British actor Joe Alwyn in April 2023 after their six-year relationship since Alwyn had a text group named “The Tortured Man Club.” But of course, there were more surprises to the meanings behind the lyrics of these songs.
There are also songs aimed at Matty Healy, whom Swift had a brief romance with throughout Spring 2023 after her split from Alwyn and current boyfriend Travis Kelce, whom she started dating in Summer 2023.
The album opens up with “Fortnight” featuring Post Malone, which Swift announced on April 18 would be the first single of the album. There were high expectations for this single after an AI-generated version went viral on TikTok. Having two of the most popular artists come together to make a song was nothing short of magical.
On the second track, which is the album’s title track, there are several references to Swift’s brief rekindling with The 1975 member Matty Healy, including mentioning his good friend Lucy Dacus and Swift’s good friend Jack Antonoff.
“So Long, London” was one of the tracks pointed directly at Alwyn, and this details how Swift was leaving the British city after spending six years living there to avoid the public eye for a multitude of reasons, including to give her and her then-boyfriend some privacy in his home country.
After facing engagement rumors for years, “loml” was Swift’s way of expressing her relationship with Alwyn and how they never got past the dating stage. “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart” follows with the sadness she felt beginning her world-famous Eras Tour right as she was splitting from Alwyn, but she was still able to perform as she always would.
The guy on the Chiefs also was featured on the album, “The Alchemy,” which mentions several football terms throughout the track and how Kelce runs right over to his girl instead of going to get his trophy after he won Super Bowl LVIII back in February.
One of the songs that stands out the most is “So High School,” which is another song for Kelce and details the video of him playing “Kiss, Marry, Kill” with the names Swift, Ariana Grande and Katy Perry. This video has resurfaced on the Internet since the beginning of their relationship, and it is something she has not forgotten about. His answer was that he would kiss his future girlfriend, and Swift references that she sees all three for the two of them, which got Tayvis fans getting butterflies.
Her feud with Kim Kardashian and her ex-husband Kanye West back in 2016 inspired a diss track towards Kardashian called “thanK you aIMee.” Swift references West by calling him “ex-husband” and their daughter, North West’s, TikTok videos to Swift’s songs.
The closing song on the album, “The Manuscript,” is believed to be mentioning her past relationship with John Mayer as she discusses age throughout it. Mayer was 32 when he dated Swift, who was 19 at the time, in 2009.
Overall, this album is one of Swift’s best and leaves fans in their emotions after more details of her relationships have been revealed. As she said in her Instagram post, “This period of the author’s life is now over, the chapter closed and boarded up.
Rating: 10/10
Reviewer’s favorite songs: “So High School,” “The Prophecy,” “The Alchemy,” “Guilty as Sin?”
Reviewer’s least favorite songs: N/A
Ashley Mascaro is a second-year majoring in broadcast journalism. To contact her, email aem6398@psu.edu.
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