I have this thing where I have to process new Taylor Swift albums by myself, AirPods in and in total immersion. Since Swift’s announcement at the 2024 Grammys, I have anxiously been awaiting and counting down the days to the release of her 11th studio album, “THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT.”
Based on the sepia tones, an album photoshoot reminiscent of Old Hollywood and the bold title, I was hopeful for a “Midnights” x “folklore” inspired sound. That is exactly what it was.
With painstaking storytelling on love and loss integrated with whimsical, built-up instrumentals, Swift did not disappoint. The album is a perfect-yet-painful look into the past two years of her life, yet she was on top of the world, entertaining millions of adorers for most of it.
“THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT” is the first non-recorded album Swift has released since the announcement of her split with long-term boyfriend Joe Alwyn in April 2023. Many fans, including myself, were eager to hear Swift’s side of the story. Swift is infamous for her diary-like, all-revealing songwriting, and this album was no different.
However, to my surprise and many others, much of the album hints more toward her summer rebound, Matty Healy of The 1975. After the Alwyn split, Swift was seen with Healy for about a month last spring. Many fans were outraged about Swift’s new boyfriend due to his problematic past, to which Swift possibly responds in the song “But Daddy I Love Him.”
While some lyrics seem like a stretch and could be about Alwyn, Healy or even Swift’s current boyfriend, Travis Kelce, some are so obviously about Healy. Anybody invested in Healy or The 1975 lore could not miss the lyrical parallels.
“Was any of it true? / Gazing at me starry-eyed / In your Jehovah’s Witness suit,” Swift said on “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived.”
During his “The 1975 – ‘At Their Very Best’” tour, Healy wore a classic black and white suit every night on stage and in much of the album’s promotion, similar to that of a Jehovah’s Witness suit.
Even the title track of the album is believed to be about Healy, presumably referencing singer/songwriter Lucy Dacus and the album’s co-producer Jack Antonoff — mutual friends of both Healy and Swift.
“Sometimes I wonder if you’re gonna screw this up with me / But you told Lucy you’d kill yourself if I ever leave / And I had said that to Jack about you so I felt seen / Everyone we know understands why it’s meant to be,” Swift said on the song “The Tortured Poets Department,” my personal favorite track at the moment.
Clearly, this summer fling the couple endured ran a bit deeper than just a fling, at least to Swift, but Healy was the one who called it quits. Since the album’s release, new “evidence” has come to light suggesting that Healy and Swift have had an off-and-on situation since roughly 2014.
It is rumored that Swift allegedly invited The 1975 to be the opening for The Red Tour in 2013, but the band declined due to their conflicting audiences. However, Swift still attended multiple The 1975 shows over the following years and remained friends, perhaps a little more than friends at times. At the beginning of 2023, Swift made a surprise appearance at one of the band’s shows and performed a cover of “The City.”
“I thought it was just goodbye for now / You said you were gonna grow up / Then you were gonna come find me,” Swift said repeatedly in the chorus of “Peter.”
In 2015, singer/songwriter Halsey and Healy shared a brief romance that reportedly inspired Halsey’s debut album, “BADLANDS,” and one of her biggest songs, “Colors.”
If Healy has two of the most successful pop girlies writing heartbreak anthems and albums over him, this begs the question: What in the world does Healy have going on? I so badly need to know.
As a fan of The 1975, I can somewhat understand the appeal. If given the chance, I, too, would probably fall for someone with a British accent who wrote “Robbers” and “Fallingforyou.” But other than that, his pretentious nature and impulse responses are a bit much and oftentimes too controversial.
Regardless, I do have to thank him for inspiring my new on-repeat album that will be the soundtrack of my life for the next several months and possibly years. Apart from the relationship speculations, Swift is a lyrical genius who has produced yet another heartfelt masterpiece. I am curious to see how the album will age compared to her past works and how she will integrate it into “The Eras Tour” setlist, but I can promise it will be dazzling.
