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Part of me wants to do something about "Red", since I've thought about 'red' and what 'red' is, but I'm not sure that I can do all that all over again, so I'll do this instead-- "Fearless". (And I just got the songbook for it, so I suppose that that must count for something, in terms of investment.)
At any rate it is something by Taylor Swift. She is, as many clever people know, a girl. She's a very pretty girl, and cute and creative, and classy. She's also, for lack of a better word, very clean, and, for lack of a better word, very different.
Anyway, the album "Red" (2012) is in some ways a little bit more developed than "Fearless" (2008), and it probably has catchier singles-- "I Knew You Were Trouble" and "We are never ever getting back together". "Red" has somewhat of a better exit song, "Begin Again", and it might be a little bit lighter on the whole-- although with "The Lucky One", or "I Almost Do" it's a bit ambiguous and sometimes a little hard even to decide if the song is melancholy or not, or hopeful or melancholy or both-- but the two groups of songs are a little hard to compare. All you can really say is that they are both by Taylor Swift and both ultimately about love, and all that puts them together into their respective groups is sometimes simply just that they were written at about the same time.
That is, the songs are varied, and it's more about her personality-- would it be too much of a stretch to give her a vague similarity to Ally Dawson from "Austin & Ally"?-- which is her charm, rather than some sort of master plan. There are a few decent singles, "You Belong With Me" and "Love Story", but you don't have to find it an earth-shattering album to enjoy it. (I once heard "You belong with me" in the mall; whether that was better or not than hearing "We are never ever getting back together" in a limo is not easy to rank. But I have a tendency to over-think-- e.g., What if I had to make that mistake and it was the right thing to do? This could be extended at numbing and confusing length. But you get the idea.)
But anyway, it's certainly music by a girl, containing rather varied feelings. Because of a similar contrast I can't help but be reminded of "Take Me Home" where One Direction is by turns happy, then consoling, whereas she is sometimes swinging between being happy and despairing. (I am a princess; I am not a princess.)
But since generalization amid such fluctuation often does little to show what it really is about the way that she looks and sounds and is that makes her what she is-- it is certain that her hair is not like Katy Perry's, but, aside from that, it is hard to say what makes someone what they are, and different from another, or what makes some person like Billy Joel or Elton John better than the other one....
So, since generalization about fluctuation is just that, it might be better to take each piece, rather than the whole thing.
Which is difficult.
"Fearless" is a happy song; it's about not feeling bad. By lending its name to the album, it means to cast a happy aura over the whole, despite certain difficult passages, since she is really optimistic at heart. And so there's this song, about things not getting in the way and things being okay-- "you take my hand and drag me headfirst/Fearless", and this ability to be fearless on her man's part allows her to be fearless too, and have some happiness without encumbrance-- "it's a first kiss; it's flawless, really something-- it's fearless."
This is followed by "Fifteen", a much more cautious song, and very unlike "22" (from "Red"). It's about being a young girl, basically. She has to deal with a much older world that makes very little sense, and which she is not understanding. It's the sort of song that lightly drips doubt over your faith in love by relating some of things that happen-- "Abigail gave everything she had to a boy who changed his mind and we both cried." It's certainly a girl's song, but maybe it ends before you really start to wonder why you spend your money on music instead of wizard-of-gore type movies in the name of faith in love, if even Taylor Swift.... But, you know.
In another sort of about face, this is followed by "Love Story", which is more of a princess song, rather than the sort of thing you'd take to a women's issues and co-dependency session. ;) "You'll be the prince and I'll be the princess; it's a love story baby just say yes." Probably the memorable lines from the whole album-- this is the happy place. And the song is a little story, complete with escaping the parents, meeting the parents, and reuniting with the lost lover. Well, it's a little difficult to explain since it's more of a impressionistic story than a more narrative one. It works, though. "This love is difficult, but it's real."
The next segue is a little gentler, into "Hey Stephen", a flirty song in which Taylor Swift advertises herself and her ability as a songwriter to attract attention to herself. She flirts with the guy by telling him how much she likes him. "I can't help it if you look like an angel.... I can't help myself."
And then all of that just sorta goes away, and "White Horse" happens. It's basically a song about, not, finding the love of your life. "I'm not a princess; this ain't a fairytale.... this ain't Hollywood; this is a small town.... now it's too late for you and your white horse to come around." So forms a relationship that she comes to regret, and then escapes from it.
And then that unhappiness goes away as quickly as the happiness did, and it's time for "You belong with me" which despite being full of longing and even disappointment, is filled to the brim with hopefulness. The photo in the CD sleeve is worth seeing, because it's quite different from the sort of creatively pretty shot that she normally posts, if that makes sense-- Taylor Swift with bubbles in the air and tea in her glass on a picnic in the grassy park (the back cover of the sleeve), no, here she throws her lot in with and becomes the bespectacled shy girl in the clarinet section who can't bear to look, at that guy she wants who's with the sort of pretty brat who's such a type of a serviceable villain, and especially for some people, I guess. Anyway, the song is a message she sends to that guy, to let him know that he would be better off with her. (In this sense, I guess it could be considered a sort of distant cousin to 1D's "I Would".) (It's also the sort of song you can listen to again and again, over and over again, for a long while; "Back in the USSR" was like that for me too, but, anyway.) Still, maybe it's the sort of song that it's a little easy to listen to, or at least hear, without really understanding. Basically, it's about what make relationships really work-- what matters and what doesn't. It's easy, maybe, to sing the "She.... I...." parts without really thinking about it-- the point is that the cheer captain's status glitter didn't add up to much. "I know you know better than that; hey what are doing with a girl like that?" What mattered was a shared taste in music, an understanding of each other's hopes, dreams, feelings-- a sort of kinship of spirit. "She doesn't get your humor like I do.... I'm listening to the kind of music that she doesn't like, and she'll never know your story like I do." The real connection of music is worth more than surface impressions, and status isn't what matters to a genuinely healthy relationship with real compatibility; "Walk in the streets with you and your worn out jeans; I can't help thinking this is how it ought to be." It's a good song. "If you could see that I'm the one who understands you; been here all along so why can't you see; standing by waiting by your back door; all this time how could you not know baby-- you belong with me."
And then the mood changes again, with "Breathe". In a way, it's about not knowing what to do. She doesn't want the relationship to end, but there's no way to save it, no matter what either of them do. "And we know it's never simple, never easy." And so all she knows is that she has to breathe; "I can't breathe without you.... but I have to." It could be called a song of regret-- of ending.
The mood worsens somewhat with "Tell me Why", which is about an argument. It's a little unpleasant, since "you might think I'm bulletproof, but I'm not"-- she needs to tell him that she's hurt by some of the things that he said out of his anger. (It's a long way from "Hey Stephen" and "I can't help myself.") She's tired of his bad attitude and his behavior makes no sense to her. "Tell me why".
And then things get more worse with "You're Not Sorry". This isn't what you want to hear, naturally. But it is true that apologies do not always have to accepted just because they are offered, and that some people really are bad. "Don't want to hurt anymore". It can be important.
Things pick up somewhat with "The Way I Loved You", although in an odd sort of way. The song is a little confusing-- although probably because the feelings that inspire it are as well. "He is sensible and so incredible, and all my single friends are jealous." But she would rather be with a past love, since she misses "screaming and fighting and kissing in the rain". It's an odd, juxtaposition, I guess. I suppose the point is that sometimes love demands the insane from us, which seems impossible and cannot be explained, and it's not always about what other people seem to think it is.
"Forever & Always" is a little ambiguous too, although it is mostly unhappy. The thing is that it refers to, "I was there when you said forever and always", but the promise of forever is remembered when it is all collapsing, the whole relationship, ending. And so, nothing is working. "Oh, it rains in your bedroom; everything is wrong-- it rains when you're here, and it rains when you're gone." And so that's bad. "And then you feel so low that you can't feel nothing at all." Although the thing is that it's not a very bitter song like some people might make; it's just honest.
The next song is a bit of a surprise-- "The Best Day" which is about a 13 year old girl's relationship with her father. "Don't know if Snow White's house is near or far away, but I know I had the best day today." It's quite a princess song, and in the most innocent of innocent ways. It's hard to explain Taylor Swift, but I think that this is an important part of her makeup. I read somewhere that the Beatles wrote "Eight Days A Week" on "Beatles for Sale" (when they were being overworked) because their driver made a comment about working eight days a week, and so they turned it into this sprightly little song about *loving* eight days a week. That was the way they were-- no matter what happened to them, somehow their response was always to sing their love. And with Taylor Swift, even after singing about broken promises and foolish faith, albeit softly-- then the next thing she wants to do is to make herself a child again, so that she can have all her faith back. "I don't know how long it's gonna take to feel okay, but I know I had the best day with you today".
And then it ends with "Change". It's a happily vague sort of song about good growing and crap receding. It's a hopeful song. And things do change. The world is different now from how it was even in 2008. "Twilight", for example-- people call it trite, but it didn't used to exist; romance is becoming more popular, more.... here.
But anyway, it's a pretty good album. The songs are okay, and if there's no super obvious reason for why which one comes when it does, I suppose that that's common enough. After all, there's no explaining everything, is there.
(8/10)
