This is it. This is the moment that 2014 has been waiting for. By comparison to last year’s deluge of comeback albums from huge artists (Beyoncé, Daft Punk, Katy Perry, Gaga, Britney, Justin, Kanye and Eminem to name just a handful), this year has been a veritable desert. Instead, 2014 has mostly been the year of the debut. Until now. Unless Rihanna Beyoncé’s an album, this is the best we’re going to get. That’s no bad thing.
This is also the moment that Swift herself has been waiting
for. 2012’s ‘Red’ was the album that saw
her rise from country star to popstar, but ‘1989’ is her real pop
breakthrough. As she said herself at the
reveal of lead single Shake It Off a
couple of months back, the album has stemmed from “not wanting but needing to write a new style of music”. The result is not only her best album, but probably
the best pop album of the year.
That “new style”
is in fact late 80s pop, hence the album title (also her year of birth). Yet the 80s have been mined for years now by
pop musicians – all epic synth waves, bleeps and bloops and processed
beats. Is Swift simply playing catch up?
Oh no, this is no pastiche. She’s far too savvy for that. ‘1989’ is a consolidation of all the best pop
music from the past few years mixed with that unique Swift sound. Listening to the album, there are shades of
everyone from Katy Perry to CHVRCHES, Haim, Lorde and Twin Shadow amongst others. The intro of opener Welcome To New York immediately establishes the glittery synthy
sound; the sparse production of Blank
Space wouldn’t sound out of place on Lorde’s ‘Pure Heroine’; Style features plenty of soaring guitar
solos amidst pulsing synth bass that brings to mind Don Henley’s The Boys of Summer; and the widescreen
feel of Out of the Woods is Swift’s
twist on CHVRCHES style electro pop. And
that’s just the first four tracks.
Later, ballads like This Love and
Clean slow the tempo, fusing country
guitars with evocative, nocturnal moods (the layered vocals of the former are
an especially beautiful moment).
As if Swift
herself wasn’t a competent songwriter, one look at the credits is enough to get
pop fans excited: Max Martin, Shellback, Ryan Tedder and even Imogen Heap all
assisted with writing and producing ‘1989’.
That’s the dream team right there, the first two especially ensuring the
album has that polished Scandi quality that’s pretty much integral to all
modern pop music of note.
Amongst all of
this, though, ‘1989’ is still very much a Taylor Swift album – indeed it’s a
natural extension of her biggest hits from ‘Red’. The deluxe version of the album includes some
voice memos that give insight into her songwriting process. Strip back the production to just piano
and/or guitar and this is the same Swift that fans know and love. The lyrics remain as honest, truthful and
candid as ever, ensuring this is an album with heart and soul rather than just
another cold electronic 80s knock-off. Shake It Off is the only major exception
with its jokey lyrics (“this sick beat”, “hella good hair”), but even Swift
allows herself a pure pop moment of joy.
In fact, lyrics
are at the heart of Swift’s style. She
simply has an uncanny ability to capture youthful love in all its forms. Here, her lyrics certainly have greater
maturity and melancholy than before, but she’s now a woman of 24 rather than a love-struck
teenager. Known for writing about her ex-lovers,
Blank Space is perhaps her most
self-referential with its chorus lyric “got a long list of ex-lovers / they’ll
tell you I’m insane / but I got a blank space baby / and I’ll write your name”. New Romantics ends the deluxe version with a title that transcends both the 80s genre and Swift's own propensity for romance. Elsewhere, the lyrics have an urgent cinematic quality (Out of the Woods for instance) and are filled with poetic imagery (Wildest Dreams - “say you’ll remember me
standing in a nice dress, staring at the sunset”, or Bad Blood – “band-aids don’t fix bullet holes”). Mostly, Swift proves herself to be a master
storyteller through her lyrics. That’s
something that comes from her country heritage; now it’s simply applied to an
electronic pop aesthetic.
In that respect, ‘1989’
is an evolution, not a revolution. It’s
also the pinnacle of 00s pop, taking all the clichés of 80s music that have
influenced current trends and smacking a big Swift stamp across it all to rise
above the competition. It’s clear, then,
that she’s the biggest popstar of 2014.
And with good reason.
5/5
Gizzle’s Choice:
* Style
* Out of the Woods
* This Love
Listen: '1989' is available now.
