On 1989 (Taylor’s Version), released Friday, Taylor Swift is singing the same old songs like it’s still 2014.
We’re not talking about “Style” or “Blank Space,” by the way (both still bops on this rerecorded version of her fifth album), but her pleas for the public and media to please stop focusing on her romances and sexuality. Swift, who recently made billionaire status, according to Bloomberg, remains sick of the attention her love life receives, despite her best efforts.
According to media outlets and leaked images posted to X, the liner notes of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) read, in part:
It became clear to me that for me there was no such thing as casual dating.
Or even having a male friend who you platonically hang out with. If I was seen with him, it was assumed I was sleeping with him. And so I swore off hanging out with guys.
Dating, flirting, or anything that could be weaponized against me by a culture that claimed to believe in liberating women but consistently treated me with the harsh moral codes of the Victorian era.
Being a consummate optimist, I assumed I could fix this if I simply changed my behavior. I swore off dating and decided to focus only on myself, my music, my growth, and my female friendships. If I only hung out with my female friends, people couldn’t sensationalize or sexualize that—right? I would learn later on that people could and people would.
Speculation and discussion about Swift’s personal life is nothing new, then or now (see the detailed chronicling of Swift’s current rumored relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce).
Now, as then, Swift makes a practice of not officially commenting on her relationships, which means we’ve heard from Kelce’s dad that he likes her and wishes them the best, but not from Swift herself.
The original October 2014 release of 1989 marked the start of Swift keeping mum on her love life. In a 2014 cover story for Rolling Stone, Swift said she’d sworn off dating for the time being, unhappy with the attention and commentary it had drawn.
Speculation and discussion about Swift’s personal life is nothing new, then or now (see the detailed chronicling of Swift’s current rumored relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce).
Now, as then, Swift makes a practice of not officially commenting on her relationships, which means we’ve heard from Kelce’s dad that he likes her and wishes them the best, but not from Swift herself.
The original October 2014 release of 1989 marked the start of Swift keeping mum on her love life. In a 2014 cover story for Rolling Stone, Swift said she’d sworn off dating for the time being, unhappy with the attention and commentary it had drawn.
“I feel like watching my dating life has become a bit of a national pastime,” she said. “And I’m just not comfortable providing that kind of entertainment anymore. I don’t like seeing slide shows of guys I’ve apparently dated.
I don’t like giving comedians the opportunity to make jokes about me at awards shows. I don’t like it when headlines read ‘Careful, Bro, She’ll Write a Song About You,’ because it trivializes my work.
And most of all, I don’t like how all these factors add up to build the pressure so high in a new relationship that it gets snuffed out before it even has a chance to start. And so I just don’t date.”
In a March 2015 cover story for Vogue, in which she was featured alongside then best friend Karlie Kloss, she said she was “irritated by the whole serial-dater play that people tried to make about me.”
“I just decided I wasn’t willing to provide them that kind of entertainment anymore,” she said. “I wasn’t going to go out on dates and have them be allowed to take pictures and say whatever they wanted about our body language. I wasn’t going to sit next to somebody and flirt with them for five minutes, because I know the next day he’ll be rumored to be my boyfriend. I just kind of took the narrative back. It’s unfortunate I had to do that. And it’s unfortunate that now I have this feeling like if I were to open myself up to love, that would be a career weakness.”
Fast-forward to today, when the list of names Swift has been allegedly linked to includes not only Joe Jonas and John Mayer, but also former “squad” members like Kloss and Dianna Agron.
And, much like it did in 2014, the internet has its own interpretation of Swift’s liner notes. While some see the purported statement and assume it’s about Swift’s sexuality, others have interpreted it as once again rejecting the fascination with her romantic life. Either way, the past nine years have proven that while Swift’s profile has grown, she remains the same artist we’ve come to know. 1989 marked a turning point in her career, her first purely pop album after starting firmly rooted in country music, making some changes in her sound for 2012’s Red, and then exploding in a mainstream pop fireworks show with 1989, reintroducing herself to her audience. Now, by rerecording and releasing 1989 (Taylor’s Version), Swift is underlining that point once again: She’s the same old Taylor, just nine years the wiser.
As she shared in a handwritten message posted to her Instagram at midnight on the album’s release date, “I was born in 1989, reinvented for the first time in 2014, and part of me was reclaimed in 2023 with the re-release of this album I love so dearly.”
A representative for Taylor Swift did not immediately return a request for comment.
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