Well, here it is. Swifty’s new song and video premiered last night to enormous anticipation and fanfare.
I’m still thinking about it. It’s too early to discern whether or not the direction that Taylor chose for her new album is a wise one from a celebrity standpoint. My take, based on the very limited information I know and the one song I have, is that the album will be an interesting misstep.
The song does not flow well with the zeitgeist, IMHO. Shake it Off is a very fun, well made, light and airy pop confection, which does not fit well with these times of mass unemployment, race war, mental depression, and extreme stress.
These are times that identify with the nihilism and despair of the 90’s, not the lightness and confidence of the eighties. At least, that’s the case outside of Taylor’s .01% milieu. I’m sure that inside of the NYC / Huffington Post / Gawker / “Yes We Can!” bubble culture, things are different, though. Perhaps Taylor was trying to please both ends of the spectrum, the .01% and the 99.99%. If so, only the album will say whether or not her attempt will be successful. We’ll just have to see.
I was very surprised to see that the music video was directed by Mark Romanek. The first time I saw it I kind of brushed it off as being not really worthy of serious, artistic inspection. Maybe that was just me, though. My focus was, natch, on Taylor Swift. I’m often too infatuated with her to see around her.
It’s an honor to see some of my ideas and thoughts brought to life by Romanek. He was the first music video director that pop culture aficionados really paid attention to. Remember that special lifetime achievement award MTV gave him back in… 96? 97? It was during the Music Video Awards. They showed a montage of clips before the award presentation, and I think everyone was stunned to see that one dude had managed to direct essentially everyone’s favorite music videos. A legend for sure.
I’ll need to rewatch the video with an eye for art and imagery, and not just for OMG TAY IN GLASSES AND SHORTS!!!!1
Tay should work with Romanek to made a kick ass abstract video like the ones he did with Madonna. If Taylor is going pop than I want to see her with a giant cone bra that would scare even Madge.
But I digress, but not enough, so back on topic.
I don’t know. Maybe people will take to Taylor’s confectionery pop as a respite from their immense problems. But, I can’t see that because there’s already so much of that out there.
What people really need is someone, anyone, within the oligarchy who actually seems to live on planet Earth. Taylor was the hope for some of these people (me). If she isn’t, well, I’ll not sure, then.
For the lower 90%, the future in too many ways is not bright. For them, the six year old economic depression grinds on relentlessly with no end in sight. For them, the future is bleak and filled with regret, lost opportunity, and violence. What is happening in Ferguson is a small taste of what lies ahead for them.
A month ago, I wrote a violent, dire Taylor Swift fanfiction, Seeing Black, about a race war between blacks and whites. I didn’t publish it because I was suffering from that crushing depression and was wondering if I was going off the deep end. In light of what is going on these days, perhaps I should’ve.
I don’t know. Perhaps I’m expecting too much from Tay. Perhaps we all are. She’s not a politician or a social commentator. Perhaps the people should really direct their disappointment not at celebrities, who are after all just doing their job, but at the real perpetrators of our malaise: the politicians and business leaders who are so corrupt and uninspiring that people will actually turn to people like Taylor and give her more of a listen than they really should.
At any rate, I hope that Taylor does well and that her new album is quality. If it isn’t, in the absolute worst case scenario it will kill her career. There seems to be no second acts in the life of a pop star these days. These are times of extremes, and people are just so, so alienated and angry. Once they turn on you, there’s no coming back to respectability. You will stay a fixture, like Bieber, but you will never be really and truly liked or respected by anyone again. You will have money forever, but at the cost of being the laughingstock of the world for the rest of your life.
I don’t expect this, though. As I said, that is the worst possible case, and Tay seems more than able to dodge this- unlike so many of her peers, who can’t seem to do much of anything right in regards to their long term viability. Tay also seems a bit smarter than them overall, but she is, of course, increasingly suffering from the .01% syndrome I’ve discussed already.
Time will tell whether the .01% syndrome will overtake her entirely. If it does, I’ll sell my Taylor Swift memorabilia for what I can get and move on, and so will almost all of the rest of the Swifties.
I’d hate this. Being a Swifty has, thus far, been a source of real pride. I’d hate to see the term tossed into the same joke bin where people have disposed of terms like Beliebers, Madonnabees, the Kiss Army, etc.
We shall see.