Terrifically Tortured

A Review of Taylor Swift’s new album “The Tortured Poets Department”

Grace Joseffer, Editor-In-Chief • June 5, 2024

Taylor Swift’s “The Tortured Poets Department” (TTPD) features 16 songs and released on April 19, 2024 at midnight. Swift then surprised fans with a deluxe album a few hours later, “The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology,” featuring 15 more songs which the media coined as a “double album.” Swift has done this before with her album “Midnights.” She released a “Midnights: The 3 a.m. edition” a couple hours after “Midnights.” She even released clues cueing fans into predicting something was coming along with the album drop, which you can read more about from Newsweek and Capitalfm.

There has been controversy over who the album is about. Still, this album was more of Swift venting and letting go of negative energy surrounding her due to personal events while saying goodbye to people she lost in her life, including her most recent ex-boyfriends. The album is not one of her best, but it still is a really good album. Swift has released a mediocre album that I enjoy; however, it will fail to make it to my top five. I want to acknowledge some songs that are as good as her best but the album just is not consistently amazing to me. That is not to say that the more I listen to it, the more I find hidden gems that I missed before and I notice something new. TTPD might end up being one of my favorite albums in a couple of months. However, I am going to the Eras Tour in Germany, and while I will be excited to see the TTPD set, I will not be dressing up as this era. Here is my review of each song on the album:

“Fortnite” (feat. Post Malone)

This song is not my favorite from the album, but it is still pretty solid. I would not have personally released it as a single. In Swift’s song “Hits Different” from her “Midnights: 3 a.m. Edition” album, there is the line “or have they come to take me away” which connects to the beginning of “Fortnight” as it starts with “I was supposed to be sent away/ But they forgot to come and get me.” Post Malone is featured on this track, and you can hear how beautiful his voice is. Swift and Post Malone’s voices sound and blend well together. Post Malone was given the bridge of the song, which is always the most coveted part of Swift’s songs and usually is my favorite.The song sets the tone for the album and conveys that Swift meant for this album to be darker and a change from the usual tone and content of her songs. The darker tone can be seen in the lines such as “Your wife waters flowers, I want to kill her.” The tone is quite monotone and somber, there are breathy moments of the song that add to the vibe. There is a music video that is cinematically beautiful and even features Ethan Hawke and Josh Charles from “The Dead Poets Society,” which is a cute little easter egg.

Favorite lyric: “I love you, it’s ruining my life”

“The Tortured Poets Department”

This song is really fun, I love the story it tells, and mentioning the typewriter is so cool. It is the album’s titular track and is not very somber like the title suggests. The tone is peppier and conveys a love story. This song is admittedly not her best lyricism because sometimes she creates the most articulate, well-written lyrics that can deeply emotionally hit you. Although not all songs need to be an artist’s best work, they just need to be fun or great to listen to. She makes a lot of references in this song to many things and people like Charlie Puth (American singer), Dylan Thomas (a Welsh poet), Patti Smith (American singer and poet), the Chelsea Hotel (a hotel located in New York City that has hosted many celebrities from Mark Twain to Madonna, including both Dylan Thomas and Patti Smith), Lucy Dacus (American singer-songwriter and producer), and Jack Antonoff who is a producer on the album and has produced on many of Swift’s albums. It has a happier tone but does have a similar sound to “Fortnight.” I love the variations of the tone, and the bridge is a lot of fun and I like it a lot. I also like the dimension and variation of it with the tone shifts and background vocals.

Favorite lyric: “You’re not Dylan Thomas, I’m not Patti Smith/ This ain’t the Chelsea Hotel, we’re modern idiots”

“My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys”

This song is perfect for all the delusional girls who stay with their partners through good and bad times. It tells a great love story about being with someone even when they do not want you around. I love her voice on this, and the beat in the back is really powerful and a great steady force throughout the story. I really enjoy the lyrics, which are truly incredible. I really love this song.

Favorite lyrics: “I’m queen of sand castles he destroys”

“I felt more when we played pretend/ Than with all the Kens”

“Down Bad”

This song is peppy, positive and amazing and then you will listen to the lyrics and realize it is a sad song. Swift described this song as a metaphor for love in that the song shows the story of someone being abducted by aliens, loving her experience, being taken back to earth, and desperately wanting the aliens to come back because you truly loved where the aliens took you. The song conveys loving someone despite not being able to have them. There is even a section where she says, “How dare you see that it’s-” and she cuts off before finishing with “over,” which is a really heartbreaking section of the song. The song is really nice and I feel like a lot of people can relate to it.

Favorite lyric: “How dare you think it’s romantic/ Leaving me safe and stranded”

“So Long, London”

The beginning of this song reminds me of “Death by a Thousand Cuts,” but then it shifts to a beat which I believe references “Call It What You Want,” another famous Swift song. This song is a goodbye to her ex-boyfriend Joe Alwin, whom many of her love songs on her album “Reputation” are about. This song is truly heartbreaking because it shows that she really fought for this relationship but could not make it work, no matter how hard they tried. The lyrics are really sad because of the haunting imagery she uses and the lyrics really can punch a hole in your heart because of how emotional they are. These are definitely some of my favorite parts of her songwriting. This song is one of my favorites from the album and is in my top five! It is probably one of my favorite Taylor Swift songs.

Favorite lyrics: “And I’m just getting color back into my face/ I’m just mad as hell cause I loved this place”

“And you say I abandoned the ship/ But I was going down with it”

“But Daddy I Love Him”

This song has an upbeat background track with some sad lyrics, but this song has an overall happier tone to the song. “But Daddy I Love Him” could refer to the iconic scene from Disney’s “The Little Mermaid” movie. The song references growing up but also going after someone who people tell you will be bad for you. This song minorly reminds me of “Love Story” from her album “Fearless” because “Love Story” starts with her saying she really wants this relationship to “Even my daddy just loves him” later in the song. The chorus is really amazing and can lift your mood when listening to the song. There were even viral reaction videos on social media to the “I’m having his baby/ No, I’m not, but you should see your face” line. It broke the fourth wall and gave Swifties a heart attack for a minute. thinking this was potentially a pregnancy announcement.

Favorite lyrics: “He was chaos, he was revelry”

“I don’t cater to all these vipers dressed in empath’s clothing”

“Fresh Out the Slammer”

This song is really sad and seems to connect to “Fortnight” because in the “Fortnight” music video, she seems to be in a mental hospital. It has some dull moments, but also a really smooth flow. There is less vocal range shown in this song, but it is still a lovely song. It is not one of my favorites.

Favorite lyric: “Now, pretty baby, I’m running back home to you”

“Florida!!!” (ft Florence and the Machine)

While I love Swift’s collaborations with Ed Sheeran, this is my favorite collaboration song she has ever done. I love Florence and the Machine, and this is a match made in heaven. The song is amazing and has an incredible flow. The song is about running away to Florida because that is where people tend to run if they need to create a new life for themselves, such as after doing something illegal. Florence’s part in the song sounds amazing, and the entire song has an underlying ethereal tone. This song is one of my top five favorites from the album. The lyrics tell a great story, and the bridge with the back and forth vocals has me fangirling so hard over how amazing the song is. I just love this song so much.

Favorite lyrics: “Your home’s really only a town you’re just a guest in (take me to Florida)”

“I need to forget, so take me to Florida/ I’ve got some regrets, I’ll bury them in Florida”

“Guilty as Sin?”

This song is perfect for daydreamers and those who fantasize about relationships. It is for the delusional girls or those longing for a past relationship. I love the lyrics, and the overall vibe of this song is very flowy, but it also has an upbeat backbeat. The song’s chorus is really amazing and the overall song is really nice.

Favorite lyric: “They don’t know how you’ve haunted me/ So stunningly”

“Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?”

This song is by far my favorite from the album. It has a vibe similar to “Reputation,” one of my favorite albums from Swift. I love the vibe of the song and all the lyrics. This is one of my favorite Taylor Swift songs ever. It has been so hard trying to pick a favorite lyric from this song because I could say every single lyric is my favorite. I love the dynamics of her voice in the song, the background track, and the layering of her voice when she sings “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me.” This song is Swift’s message about how she has changed over the past 20 or more years of her career because of the industry or personal reasons. I absolutely adore this song. This song could maybe reference that “Reputation (Taylor’s Version)” is coming soon, but I might be delusional.

Favorite lyrics: “I was tame, I was gentle ’til the circus life made me mean”

“You wouldn’t last an hour in the asylum where they raised me”

“At all costs, keep your good name”

and pretty much all of the chorus

“I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)”

This song is not my favorite from the album. It is a horrific song, but I think it is supposed to be that way. It tells the story of a woman who loves a man and really wants to fix them, but she realizes at the end of the song that maybe she cannot fix him despite wanting to. The message could be seen as a warning that you should not pick someone to be in a relationship with because you can “fix him” because it just is not going to work out well for you in the end. The song sounds kind of boring throughout, but she has good vocals and the song is overall okay.

Favorite lyric: “Come close, I’ll show you heaven/ If you’ll be an angel, all mine”

“loml”

This song is incredibly heartbreaking and gives the love of my life (loml) a new meaning. The song has amazing lyrics, songwriting and metaphors throughout the song. It is about how Swift could not make a relationship work and conveys a deep sadness towards the loss of the relationship. Her lyric, “Never quite buried” conveys that their relationship was not over for a while because they really tried to make it work despite not working. Swift has a really sad tone in her voice and at parts it almost sounds like she is about the cry which really sucker punches you in the heart. The bridge is really amazing, and the tone is quite somber, but also bitter at times which can be seen in the line, “What a bland goodbye.”

Favorite lyrics: “I wish I could unrecall how we almost had it all”

“You’re the loss of my life”

“I Can Do It with a Broken Heart”

This is the perfect song for depressed girls or those who just have anxiety like me. The song conveys how she felt when she had to perform in the Eras tour while going through her breakup/a hard time for her mental health. I feel like this song is perfect for all of those who are completing the International Baccalaureate program or Advanced Placement classes in high school because it shows you can accomplish difficult things on top of not feeling the greatest mentally. The pre-chorus is my favorite and the chorus is also really good, and this song is my second favorite from the album. Her line saying “try to come for my job” at the end is iconic.

Favorite lyrics: The entire pre-chorus (but the explicit version): “Cause I’m a real tough kid

I can handle it/ They said, “Babe, you gotta fake it ’til you make it” and I did/ Lights, camera, and smile/ Even when you wanna die/ He said he’d love me all his life/ But that life was too short/ Breaking down, I hit the floor/ All the pieces of me shattered as the crowd was chanting, “More”/ I was grinnin’ like I’m winnin’/ I was hittin’ my marks/ ‘Cause I can do it with a broken heart”

“The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived”

I have mixed feelings about this song. The song is Swift’s reaction to being loved bombed, it is assumed the song is about Matty Healy from “The 1975.” The beginning of it is boring, and the song is slow and I didn’t like it till I got to the second half of the song. I love the second half of the song. The song does feature some very emotional and great lyrics. I love the shifting tone and inflections throughout some of the lyrics. The slow build-up of the song leads to the bridge which is very hard-hitting and smooth. The bridge is amazing, but Swift is known for her amazing bridges. I do really love the bridge, which can overshadow other parts of the song that I was not crazy about. I really love the message in the song and the tone of anger that is conveyed throughout. The second to last line in the song, “And I’ll forget you, but I’ll never forgive” reminds me of one of Kendrick Lamar’s lines in his feature in “Bad Blood” from Swift’s album “1989” in which he says “You forgive, you forget but you never let it go.”

Favorite lyrics: “You kicked out the stage lights/ But you’re still performing”

“And I’ll forget you, but I’ll never forgive/ The Smallest man who ever lived”

“The Alchemy”

This song is one of my favorites. This song is rumored to be about Travis Kelce, a professional football player, who she has been dating for the past few months but that is not confirmed; this could be why there are football references such as “touchdown.” I love the lyrics, I love how happy she sounds in it, and her voice is amazing in the song. I love the flow and the sweet tone to it. I do not really have a good explanation for why I love this song, but I adore the lyrics and sound of the song.

Favorite lyrics: “That child’s play back in school/ Is forgiven under my rule”

“Honestly, who are we to fight the alchemy?”

“There was no chance, trying to be/ The greatest in the league/ Where’s the trophy?/ He just comes running over to me”

“Clara Bow”

This is a nice song, but it is not my favorite from the album . It is an okay song but it is pretty monotone throughout. Clara Bow, who the album is titled after, was an American actress and labeled the first “It Girl” which is where the term comes from. Swift’s voice is really pretty during it and sometimes has breathy moments. At times, there are moments where she goes against the backbeat or sings faster than the background track, this can sound really nice but also gives a rushed feeling to the track, in my opinion. The song is really nice and is a commentary about how women replace each other in the media. There are so-called “it girls” of each generation, and people who are really popular then get replaced by a younger generation. This song connects to one of my all time favorite songs of Swift’s, “The Lucky One” from her fourth studio album “Red.” “The Lucky One” is about the rise to fame, but also later being replaced by someone younger. Clara Bow has a somber tone to end the album with, but it is still a pretty sounding song.

Favorite lyric: “The crown is stained but you’re the real queen/ Flesh and blood amongst war machines/ You’re the new god we’re worshiping/ Promise to be … dazzling”

The dubbed double album, “The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology” has the original 16 songs along with 15 more songs. The double album features some of my favorite songs like “The Albatross,” “Cassandra,” “The Bolter,” and “So High School.” I really liked a lot of the songs like “Peter” and “I Hate It Here.” I do not really like “Robin” because I think it is too slow, and generally has a boring sound, but I know some people who really love it. I also do not really like “I Look in People’s Windows,” not for any particular reason, but it just doesn’t really stand out to me in any way.

Here’s my ranking of all the songs (including the anthology)! This was really hard to make and may not be accurate at the time you are reading this. Also, we probably have different music tastes and preferences.