After many weeks of cryptic hints and teasers being dropped, Taylor Swift released her sixth studio album Reputation on November 10th, 2017. This album gets a bad rep (pun intended) for being Taylor’s worst album. However, many people who share this opinion often are not familiar with Taylor’s music or the events leading up to the release of this wonderfully cathartic album. Similar to how I explained the reason behind Taylor recording all of her albums released before Lover in this post I will be explaining the significance of the release of the Reputation album, and how Taylor was able to use this album as a self defense mechanism during one of the most toughest times in her life.
After the very successful release of 1989, Taylor found herself to be the subject of conversation in almost every tabloid and newspaper due to a very public feud with another well known male artist from a very influential family. A lyric from this artist’s song claimed that he was responsible for Swift’s fame, in a very vulgar manner, showing a complete lack of respect for Taylor, and just women in general. Doctored tapes of illegally recorded phone calls were released by the artist’s wife to make it seem like Taylor was completely aware of this misogynistic lyric, and that she had given her full consent for the lyric to be included in the song (she had not). Overnight, Taylor was falsely being called a “snake” and a liar for what seemed like her duplicitous behavior. The original (still illegally recorded) recordings of the call were somehow released last year, and finally proved that Taylor had not been lying all along. Had the roles been reversed, during any of the times Taylor had been wronged by this artist, Taylor’s career would have ended right then and there. To name a few instances, if it were Taylor walking up on stage to interrupt the male artist’s speech while accepting an award, illegally recording a phone call, and eventually being exposed as a manipulator and liar, it would have resulted in her career being over before it had even started. The playing out of these events clearly illustrate the blatant sexism in the industry.
As a woman in the music industry, Taylor built her reputation and managed to continually stay relevant by reinventing herself to please both her critics and fans alike. In previous years, Taylor had been able to grow from any criticism, even responding to sexist criticism, to please both her critics and her fans. For example, after winning a grammy for fearless at 20 years old, when people doubted her songwriting abilities, she responded by writing the entirety of the Speak Now album by herself. When she got criticized for continuing the high school narrative in her albums, she responded by releasing RED, an experimental album with more adult themes. Then, people criticized RED for sounding “too poppy” and “not country enough” as well as her continuing obsession with the boys in her life. She responded by releasing 1989, which was a complete genre shift which included songs about moving to New York with her friends, and songs about her friend’s lives as well.
Being a people pleaser, Taylor always equated her happiness, fulfillment, and success with being able to satisfy and make everyone around her happy. However, looking around her, Taylor saw people who she believed to be her closest friends betraying her, and no one on her side supporting her. She found herself in a position where almost everyone was attacking the one thing she had tried to keep untarnished throughout her entire career: her reputation. So, in her usual Swift-like fashion, she decided to satirize her perceived image by writing songs from the perspective of “snake-like” duplicitous character people were making her out to be.
Taylor was able to take the worst lies and rumors being thrown at her and turn them into an alter ego to fight the false perceptions of her. She was able to grow and accept the fact that she cannot please everyone and find who her true friends and supporters are. Not to mention, she did all of the aforementioned actions while making the best selling album of 2017, and performing the highest grossing US stadium tour till date – which I think is the ultimate “when life gives you lemons” story.