"Style" by Taylor Swift, Sunday, February 14, 2021

 

I have a few confessions to make before getting into this post. First, I have only listened to folklore once or twice, and I've only listened to a few songs from evermore. As a music blogger, I have to do better. However, I'm waiting for the albums to hit me. I'm sure they will. Most music that sticks with me hits me at just the right minute. And there's a lot of music to be impactful from decades of classic rock to thousands of pop records over the last few decades. Second confession, I've liked Taylor Swift since her Fearless days. I had heard of her from "Tear Drops on My Guitar," but I got into her when I heard she had covered Luna Halo's "Untouchable."  Taylor Swift became Nashville and the music industry's darling and it seemed that everyone had some love for the teenage star. But teenagers grow up. 

James Dean in Rebel without a 
Cause, 1955 Photo by Laura Loveday,
Flicker.

YOU COME TO PICK ME UP, NO HEADLIGHTS. In 2014, the soon-to-be 25-year-old singer shook off her squeaky clean image (pun not intended) and turned to more mature subject matter. Her second single, "Blank Space," satirized her love life based on the rumors she heard about herself. This was the start of a new Taylor Swift. Apart from sounding like the prelude to a traffic accident, "Style" is the first time that Taylor Swift's lyrics get a little sexy. Style for Swift means a classic 1950s and '60s look from the Golden Age of Hollywood. Allusions to James Dean, imagery of removing clothes, and bright red lipstick make this song may be enough, but the video makes the lyrics crystal clear. Furthermore, the song is said to be a clever pun on the relationship between Swift and Harry Styles. Still, unlike her shock-pop contemporaries like Lady Gaga, Nicki Minaj, Lana Del Rey, and Katy Perry, Taylor Swift didn't get explicit. Taylor Swift was not a spokeswoman for purity culture, which the Christians listening to her country records would have preferred. But instead in 1989--with the exception of "Blank Space"--sex is treated as something that adults do. It's glamorized, but it doesn't take the audience to the gutter. The conversation, of course, is different about male celebrities.

COULD END IN BURNING FLAMES OR PARADISE. Today is Valentine's Day. I wrote about thirteen love songs and one break up song. I used the songs as a tool to recall my memories about the songs themselves or what I was experiencing around the time that I listened to those songs. For me 2014-2015, were pivotal years in my life.  This album came out in October of 2014. I remember listening to "Shake it Off," but it wasn't until the summer of 2015 that I really got into this record. I learned so much about myself those years which started my journey discovering what faith, sexuality, love, and balancing a career means to me. This album was a soundtrack for that time as I dealt with falling in love and breaking up. It helped me feel normal in a way that most of the shame-based music I had listened to since high school hadn't. I had to realize that everyone has a different path, and the ways in which I had been counseled were not right for me. I couldn't fit myself into the mold. This lead to years of hating myself. I appreciate the media that I consumed in 2014-2015 because that was the time that I truly learned to value myself. Thanks Taylor!

Read the lyrics on Genius.

VOX explains why this song is so catchy using music theory: