'Lover' is a Refreshing Return and Re-Introduction to the Taylor Swift We Used to Know (Album Review)

I long for a time when the words Taylor Swift were not polarizing. I miss when being a fan, whether diehard or casual (or a “Swiftie” if you prefer—which I don’t), wasn’t considered problematic in a myriad of ways. Being a fan, at least by our modern definition, means having to defend everything that person has said or done—and no public figure has been harder to defend in recent memory than Taylor Swift (or perhaps Madonna).

Swift’s questionable actions or comments actually fail to transcend the resulting discourse around her; in other words, Taylor Swift might have dug her own grave from time to time, but only because we handed her the shovel. It seems as though our contemporary popular music landscape just could not allow a female musician to seamlessly travel the worlds of both country and pop music without some bumps in the road—even if Swift, at times, allowed them to happen. “I come from country music,” she told The Guardian in a new interview, and one of her most honest ever. “The number one thing they absolutely drill into you as a country artist, and you can ask any other country artist this, is ‘Don’t be like the Dixie Chicks!’ … They were made such an example that basically every country artist that came after that, every label tells you, ‘Just do not get involved, no matter what.’”

When she left country music behind in favor of the completely pop-focused 1989 in 2014, Swift was working her hardest to win the popularity contest that is popular culture—perhaps caused by, in part, her yearning to escape the misogynistic slut-shaming she experienced at the hands of mainstream culture critics during her last official country album, Red, in 2012. But no list of celebrity friends or feuds would help her win that contest, especially when she discovered that it’s in fact a battle. Even if she brought it on herself, as the public opinion at large has come to preach, I don’t think anyone considered the extent to which the bullying and criticism began to affect her, warranted or not. “[W]hen people are in a hate frenzy and they find something to mutually hate together, it bonds them,” she said. “And anything you say is in an echo chamber of mockery.”

In 2017, when she re-emerged with Reputation following a dramatic series of public feuds and Internet bashings, Swift proved to us her practical ability to wear the shoe on the other foot—even when that campy breed of “become everything they say you are” doesn’t necessarily target her strengths as a performer. But she was still allowing herself to be honest and vulnerable in ways we had never seen before, which says a lot from an artist who has made her name on narrative ballads and love songs. And now, on Lover, Swift’s seventh studio album, Swift is looking at the drama in the rear view mirror—in fact, it’s so far away that we kind of forgot it existed—and returning to her roots in the closest she has ever been to honestly embracing her unapologetic self.

If anything, Lover will surely benefit from being the first Taylor Swift album that is unburdened by expectations, as Billboard puts it. Considering both 1989 and Reputation had a lot to live up to, so to speak, Swift finally feels secure in her standing as a pop artist on Lover. If we had to endure the childish albeit catchy call-outs on “Bad Blood” and the old Taylor Swift dying on “Look What You Made Me Do,” Lover’s singles “ME!” and “You Need to Calm Down” feels like the rainbow after the storm. The entire album, in fact, feels like a rainbow—one that celebrates love, happiness, and liberating oneself from past worries. Maybe the old Taylor isn’t actually dead after all? Swift was also particularly eager to begin a new era, since not only did she sign a new record deal with Republic Records and Universal late last year, but it would also mark the first album that she legally owns. But none of that seems important now—despite the continuing controversy surrounding her former label head selling Swift’s old master recordings to Scooter Braun—as Lover remains delightfully untainted by any of the drama this time around. (She swears she doesn’t love the drama; it loves her, remember?)

Lover sounds like a sequel in part to Reputation while also being a smile and a nod to the future. Since Swift has long since been accused of “playing the victim” and becoming a symbol of “white victimhood,” she continues to subtly address those labels with her signature tongue-in-cheek, achingly poetic lyrics. On “The Archer,” she says she’s been the archer and she’s been the prey. “Who could leave me, darling? / But who could say?” It yet again begs the question, who really knows the truth? Better yet, who deserves to know the truth? She also addresses, between the lines, her failure at being more publicly outspoken, politically and otherwise: “I never grew up / It’s getting so old.” She returns to her roots on tracks like “Cruel Summer,” “Paper Rings,” “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince,” “Death By a Thousand Cuts,” and “Afterglow.” (Swift also continues to make copious use of time spent recording with Jack Antonoff—who also produced large portions of 1989 and Reputation—but interestingly enough, Lover contains no contributions from Max Martin). She asks us to consider if her publicist would have to work as hard if she were a man on “The Man”—a song which feels particularly relevant in the Me Too and Time’s Up era. She sings about a particular English love on “London Boy,” returns to her country roots and songwriting on “Soon You’ll Get Better” (a collaboration with the Dixie Chicks), and delivers quite possibly one of the best love songs of her career on the title track, “Lover.” (Dare I say it even compares to the Speak Now days when she wrote entire albums by herself?)

Much of the recent disdain surrounding Swift, in addition to her aforementioned celebrity feuds with Kanye West and Katy Perry, has been her lack of political activism—her failure to publicly endorse a candidate for the 2016 U.S. election led to the Internet furiously declaring her a Republican and Trump’s darling, despite having virtually zero evidence to support those claims. If there is one thing our mainstream popular culture holds dear, especially in these trying political times, it’s a public figure using their voice to hopefully denounce what P!nk refers to as “so much wrong going on outside.” And late last year (ironically, exactly around the time Swift left her country label in favor of Republic and Universal), she finally tried her hand at becoming political by endorsing two Democratic candidates for the 2018 midterm election, putting an end to the Trump supporting rumors once and for all. And, after encouraging her followers to register to vote in a post on Instagram, Vote.org reported that 65,000 people registered to vote in the hours following—an unprecedented surge so close to a deadline.

Taylor Swift during a Pride Month performance in Los Angeles on June 1, 2019 (Photo: Michael Buckner/Hollywood Life/Shutterstock)

And yet, even as Swift is finally using her voice for good and using less of it to incite drama, it seems as though people are still not happy. In June, Swift shared a letter written to Senator Lamar Alexander asking him to support the LGBTQ community via the Equality Act, and the music video for Lover’s second single “You Need to Calm Down”—whose lyrics address homophobia and Internet trolls—urges fans to do the same by linking to a Change.org petition. But for many it’s still not enough—and it seems as though nothing she ever does will be enough. Perhaps Taylor Swift has committed too many public gaffes in recent memory for a woman to ever reach an accepted narrative of forgiveness in mainstream media. One review referred to “You Need to Calm Down” as feeling “insincere, forced, [and] unnatural,” implying that Swift was just another white female celebrity looking to profit from supposed activism during Pride month. But the history of Swift’s tendency for acts of kindness and generosity tell a different story—one that is largely lost in the sea of her mistakes. In 2011, she donated $70,000 worth of books to her hometown library, she donated $50,000 worth of the proceeds from her single “Welcome to New York” to the New York Department of Education in 2014, and she has a long history of donating money to fans in need. But these facts are ignored or forgotten in comparison to what Swift has done wrong—making it almost systematically impossible for her to ever make it right in all of the eyes of the public.

Above all, even considering any polarizing controversy, Lover feels like a warm hug from a girl we used to know and love, before pop music politics and a lot of other stuff got in the way. The album also feels like a reminder: despite it all, Taylor Swift is very good at what she does. No matter which way she turns, she is clearly an extremely versatile musician—just watch her Reputation Stadium Tour concert film on Netflix if you don’t believe me—and continues to prove, time and time again, her outstanding knack for hooks, melodies, and poetic lyrics; you know, the ones that make you long for a love that never existed? She might not be for everyone, but her talent is undeniable. Much like Madonna, all the time spent discussing why she’s polarizing takes away from time we could be spending talking about how great she can be.

“It isn’t love, it isn’t hate, it’s just indifference,” Swift sings on Lover’s opening track, “I Forgot That You Existed.” If the album were to have one central theme, I believe this to be it. Swift referred to the album being about “a celebration of love, in all its complexity, coziness, and chaos,” and the closing track “Daylight” ends with a voiceover that says she wants to be defined by the things that she loves. But to me, Lover is in fact about indifference—a place Swift has finally reached as an artist where she can exist as whoever she wants to be, with whoever wants to be along with her for the ride. Taylor Swift’s transition and growth over the last five years brings to mind that of Cady Heron in Mean Girls. She’s gone from a homeschooled jungle freak, to a shiny Plastic, to most hated person in the world, and now she’s an actual human being. Of course, the haters are still gonna hate, hate, hate, and always will. But you know what? It’s about time that they calm down.

Jeffrey’s favorites from Lover: “I Forgot That You Existed,” “Cruel Summer,” “Lover,” “The Man,” “The Archer,” “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince,” “Paper Rings,” “Cornelia Street,” “Soon You’ll Get Better,” “Afterglow,” “You Need to Calm Down,” and “ME!”

Book Review: 'Bad Feminist' by Roxane Gay

"When you can't find someone to follow, you have to find a way to lead by example."

Roxane Gay's Bad Feminist had been on my TBR list on Goodreads for over three years, and a physical copy of the book sat on my TBR pile for nearly two. As a self-described feminist who has enjoyed a wide variety of other feminist essay collections that have cited Bad Feminist as inspiration, I was very interested - I just never made the time to get to it; something else would always get in the way. And all I have to say about it now that I've finally read it is: what a problematic, convoluted mess.

I think a large majority of self-described feminists identify at least in some part with the definition of "bad feminist" that Gay describes in the book's introduction. Feminism isn't easy, especially when we still live in a very male-dominated and misogynistic society and culture where misogyny is very much ingrained into our psyches. In other words, I feel like even the most diehard of feminists have experienced some sort of internalized misogyny in everyday life. That being said, I'm still not entirely sure what Gay's goal was with Bad Feminist - was it to point out how problematic our society and culture still is when it comes to feminism, was it about how she herself is indeed a bad feminist, or was it a book of contradicted rants about how everyone else is a bad feminist and she wants some sort of medal for pointing it out? For me, I believe, it is the latter. I really did not enjoy Gay's prose. She strikes me as someone who thinks hating popular things makes her a more interesting person. And I get it, the vast majority of popular things are misogynistic and anti-feminist. I GET IT. But, for the most part, that doesn't seem to be what Gay is pointing out. Bad Feminist is full of contradictions to the point that it made my head spin.

The thing that bothered me the most was that Gay constantly points out that she is not the target audience for the pieces of fiction or media that she has chosen to pick on. She rants relentlessly about the HBO television series Girls and how it's a very non-intersectional view on women in their twenties (in other words, it doesn't consider the perspectives of people in that age category outside of privileged white women). And that is more than completely fair. Girls was at times a very problematic series for those reasons and more. But she just continues to go on and on about things that clearly weren't made for her. I get it, these things are problematic regardless of who they're made for. Believe me, I get it. But she nitpicks at the smallest things and even does additional research to back up why these things bother her.

To top it off, she rants about her issues with the films The Help and Django Unchained and doesn't even really describe what she thinks is wrong with those films, except for stating her opinion that she thinks white people who loved The Help were "longing for a better time." I know that recent period drama films like The Help have come to be viewed as though they were made from liberal white guilt of how black people were treated back then, and I get that it's frustrating for black people to often have their struggles exploited and watered down by big budget Hollywood films. But you know what? It's better than nothing. Filmmakers who put the time and money into making films like those are at least trying to understand and sympathize with the struggles that minorities like African Americans have gone through, often at the hands of white people. The end results may not be perfect, but it's something. At least they're trying. It's better than nothing. I would like to know what exactly Gay does enjoy watching, because she seems to find fault with everything - even things that we could say were in fact "made for her," like Tyler Perry films or series on BET. And, again, I get it. Even things that are made for you are not perfect. Nothing is perfect. But I know for a fact that people are trying, and we have to put our faith in that as "bad feminists," something Roxane Gay clearly does not do.

As much as I believe Bad Feminist was fairly well written, I don't think it knows whether it wants to be an essay collection or a memoir. The first few chapters read as though they have nothing to do with what Gay just so eloquently described in her introduction. They are interesting and well written, sure, but what do they have to do with being a bad feminist? This is something I've come to dislike in a majority of recent essay collections that are published and sold under a certain premise - being a bad feminist, for example - and then include way too many personal anecdotes that have nothing to do with what you promised us in your introduction. This was my main problem with Heather Havrilesky's What If This Were Enough? and I got similar vibes while reading Bad Feminist. If you are going to include personal anecdotes in an essay collection, you have to at least make sure they tie in with what you are writing about. Otherwise, save it for your autobiography. And based on how special Roxane Gay feels she is for pointing out everyone else's flaws in Bad Feminist, I can only assume a similar autobiography is forthcoming. 2/5 stars.

Book Review: 'Like a Love Story' by Abdi Nazemian

"I am somewhere else now. I exist only inside my own anxiety, imagining what my mother will say if she finds out who I am. But the violence around me pulls me back to this moment."

For about a year now, I've been met with the growing suspicion that I'm starting to outgrow most of the YA genre. For some reason, I once believed that I would never outgrow YA because most of the titles I picked to read always resonated so profoundly with me (but then again, I also once believed that I would never outgrow anything, which just isn't realistic). I also know there's a stigma around adults reading YA books since they are not the targeted age category, and I do not intend to imply that only YA is only suitable for sixteen-year-olds. Read whatever you want, no matter how old you are. But for me, I can no longer shake the feeling that YA isn't really the genre for me anymore. Even when a new title comes out that sounds different or groundbreaking, I can barely get through any of them without silently saying to myself, "Okay, calm down, you're sixteen. Wait until you get real problems." I guess I'm just in a different space now that I'm in my twenties and now that I've been able to let go of a lot of the different anxieties associated with youth. That being said, I still can't help myself when I come across a new YA title on Goodreads that sounds like something I will love. I'm just more inclined to request it from the library now rather than spending money on it (read my essay for Book Riot about why you owe it to yourself to abandon books you're not enjoying for more on that!)

In New York City in 1989, the world is complicated place for three teenagers. Iranian immigrant Reza knows he's gay, but is deeply conflicted by his cultural values and images in the media of gay men dying from AIDS. Judy is an aspiring fashion designer who doesn't fit in anywhere except with her Uncle Stephen, who is sick. And Art, Judy's best friend, is their school's only out and proud teen who rebels against his conservative parents and attempts to capture the AIDS crisis through his photographs. Like a Love Story brings these three lost souls together in a story that celebrates activism, loving who you are, and dancing to Madonna.

I really loved how Like a Love Story focuses on the AIDS crisis and I appreciate how a number of reviews have called it a groundbreaking and masterful portrayal of something we still struggle to find the language to talk about over thirty years later. It doesn't personally rank as my favorite YA book to tackle AIDS (that would certainly be Carol Rifka Brunt's Tell the Wolves I'm Home), but I'm still happy to have found another open and honest portrayal of the realities of the crisis in the YA genre. Above all I appreciate how personal this story feels for the author, as you can tell in a number of queer YA novels written by men (such as Angelo Surmelis' The Dangerous Art of Blending In). I especially appreciated how such a personal and honest narrative was written by a queer man of color, considering that right before reading Like a Love Story I read Sarah Henstra's We Contain Multitudes, another queer YA novel that was problematic in its attempts to tackle homophobia, which was written by a straight, cis white woman. It was definitely refreshing to have topics such as AIDS, homophobia, racism, and cultural values written about by someone who has most likely experienced such things in real life. The author writes in such a palatable, straightforward way that still gives space for all the feelings that come with loss and love.

What I loved most about Like a Love Story was how it's exactly that - a love story, and a queer love story. The romance between Reza and Art didn't feel too forced or rushed like the majority of queer romances between boys in YA, and their love was ignited by a passion for activism, a love of art, and a love of love. It was also wonderful to read the perspective of a queer boy of color attempting to come to terms with his sexuality, based on his cultural values and the homophobic beliefs instilled in him by nature, as well as his coming out process. Another thing I loved about Like a Love Story was how it really reminded me of my love for Madonna? I say that as if it were something that is easily forgotten, but I often forget the impact that Madonna had in the '80s, especially in the LGBTQ community. Everything about her, her music, and her image was so inspiring and empowering for queer people then and now, and it made me grateful for the fact that I got to grow up to a lot of her music and that I got to start the process of finding myself and loving myself through her music. I actually went and listened to The Immaculate Collection after finishing this book, and danced my little heart out.

The only thing I didn't really like about Like a Love Story - and I can't really tell if this was a legitimate flaw or just me being snobby because I've outgrown most of YA - was Judy. I just found her to be really annoying and unlikable. I appreciated the perspective and representation of an unapologetically fat girl in a queer love story, but the chapters told from her perspective really pissed me off and brought down the party. I loved her Uncle Stephen and the short anecdotes told from his perspective, but I hated Judy. Maybe it's just me. But I probably would have enjoyed the book more as a whole if she wasn't in it. Then again, would it really have been a love story set in the '80s if a boy coming out as gay to his fake girlfriend didn't cause the girlfriend to become a melodramatic bitch who makes someone's coming out process all about them? I'm doubtful, honestly. Overall, definitely a new LGBTQ entry to the YA genre that is not to be missed. It's titles like these that make me not want to leave the genre behind forever. 4/5 stars.

Mabel Goes Low on 'High Expectations' (Album Review)

When English singer/songwriter Mabel—who has been described by many as the next Dua Lipa—released her single “Don’t Call Me Up” earlier this year, I was totally prepared to jump on the bandwagon. On that track in particular, her vocals soar, the glossy production makes you want to dance, and the lyrics that celebrate dismissing negativity makes you want to shout them at the top of your lungs. Her sassy lyrics and attitude left me eagerly waiting for more, since the world needs more sassy but bold bops like that. I often forget that highly anticipating something often leads to the opposite of what you want. Prior to the release of her full-length debut album High Expectations, Mabel had given us that and more. But what she ended up doing was reminding us that sometimes the end result will be better when we in fact lower our expectations.

High Expectations arrives just as Mabel’s latest single “Mad Love” has been reaching the Top 10, and “Don’t Call Me Up” continues to climb the charts nearly eight months after its release (and rightfully so). The Dua Lipa comparisons should be taken as nothing but a compliment, since—if we discount Ed Sheeran—Lipa has been one of the only British pop singers to generate an international following in the last few years. “Don’t Call Me Up” could easily be the sassy and bold cousin to the equally fun-loving “New Rules.” High Expectations was clearly crafted to follow the success of the former, since it is flooded with overly glitzy production and auto-tuned hooks. And everyone knows I have nothing against auto-tuned hooks, but in this case, most of the songs sound incredibly overproduced and impersonal. The album also definitely falls more on the R&B side, but it’s also not unique enough to not be considered a pop album—in a strange way that makes High Expectations hard to classify.

Nothing on High Expectations jumps out quite in the way “Don’t Call Me Up” still does whenever you hear it on the radio, which is most definitely the album’s biggest disappointment. But that’s also not to say the album contains pleasurable filler, either: if the inability to come up with another hit single that resonates the same way “Don’t Call Me Up” does is the album’s biggest disappointment, its biggest failure is its inability to establish Mabel with any sort of personality. There’s a lot of catchy overproduction on songs like “Bad Behaviour” and “We Don’t Say…” that makes tracks like those stand out, merely because they’re earworms, but other songs like “FML,” “Selfish Love,” “Trouble,” and “Put Your Name on It” don’t offer anything fresh or original in any sense of the word.

Been there, done that doesn’t even feel like the appropriate phrase, since it feels like most of the lyrics and production on High Expectations are so unoriginal that there isn’t any adjective or phrase to accurately describe it. Even “OK (Anxiety Anthem),” the album’s most personal offering whose lyrics contain the mantra that it’s OK to not be OK, also comes across as unoriginal and impersonal when a multitude of current pop singers are also crafting poignant ballads and bops about the ups and downs of mental health in our modern times—and Mabel’s attempt feels rather glib. In the Spotify age of music where it is simultaneously very easy and very difficult to make an impact in pop music, a sense of personality and originality are the base requirements. And Mabel delivers none of that on her debut studio album. Alexis Petridis from The Guardian put it best: “There’s a weird disjunction between [Mabel’s] lyrics, which are big on telling you what a caution-to-the-winds handful she is, and the music that supports them, which sticks pretty fast to the well-made pop-R&B playbook: ‘I’m not a people pleaser,’ she sings on ‘Bad Behaviour,’ over a backing that’s clearly intent on pleasing as many people as possible.”

Even though Mabel received songwriting credit on every song on High Expectations, it still feels as though she may have another shot at establishing herself with a more unique personality and a sense of originality in the future. As much as there are many artists who deliver critically acclaimed and era-defining debut studio albums, there are also many others who need an album or two before they find their footing. Shania Twain’s debut studio album from 1993 flopped horrendously and is largely forgotten in comparison to her second album, the indeed era-defining The Woman in Me. There may still be space and time for Mabel to mimic a similar transition, where she can rise above the overproduction and unoriginality of her debut album that feels as though it was crafted for the purpose of “selling out” (as many debut albums by women are made to do). The near future may seem secure for Mabel, as any number of tracks from High Expectations could be released as singles. But only time will tell if she has the ability to transcend selling out and playing the game, since it is those artists who come to be remembered in the long term.

Jeffrey’s favorites from High Expectations: “Bad Behaviour,” “Don’t Call Me Up,” “We Don’t Say…,” and “Mad Love”