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.
Because she’s not only good at producing the right music, she’s good at business and has the right connections to launch them.
Thanks, I’m very curious about this. What are some salient examples of her business prowess?
My favorite…
Guy owns her masters.
Taylor says “can I buy my master’s?”
Guy says “nope”
Taylor says “ok” then then re-records all of those albums again in a complete “fuck you”
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?
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.
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.
-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.
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. 🗿
