Taylor Swift fans were eagerly anticipating the announcement of what we all thought was going to be reputation (Taylor’s Version) during the Grammys this weekend, but what we got instead was news of an entirely new album dropping in April.
The Tortured Poets Department will mark Swift’s 11th wholly unique studio album in 18 years, and her 15th if you take the five re-records into account (assuming we don’t get surprised by one of the remaining two in between now and then).
On Monday, she shared the track listing and cover art to social media, whipping up a frenzy of excitement as everyone pored over the song titles, looking for meaning when our context is still so limited.
And since one person’s guess is absolutely as good as anybody’s at this particular point in time, it only seems right that we go ahead and come up with the absolute gayest possible interpretation of the album and its songs. For science. Or something. Sorry, anonymous alleged "associates" of Taylor Swift who love to write in to notorious entertainment news site, CNN Business, hope we don't offend your lil hetero sensibilities too much here!! To be clear, we are NOT saying Swift is queer, we are just living in a theoretical world where every single song on her upcoming album is written from a queer perspective — you know, the same way she likes writing from a male perspective.
Okay, lez go!
A fortnight represents two weeks, which is roughly the amount of time it takes U-Haul lesbians to move in with one another after the first date.
The titular track could be a reference to Swift’s ex-boyfriend’s group chat, or it could be yet another nod to celebrated poet and queer icon Emily Dickinson and/or Dead Poets Society which definitely has a queer interpretation.
GiphySure, this one straight up mentions “boy,” but it also sounds chaotic as hell. You know what else is chaotic? Queer people.
GiphyDid Taylor forget the phrase “down low?” I mean, if you’re feeling low, you’re feeling bad. It seems entirely possible this is exactly what happened. No worries girl, we got you.
One can only assume this song is told from Rachel Weisz’s perspective as she leaves London (and Rachel McAdams) at the end of Disobedience.
You’d be hard-pressed to find a single Swiftie who doesn’t think this song title is a reference to The Little Mermaid, especially considering Taylor herself dressed up as Ariel for her New Year’s Eve party rolling into 2019. BUT, let’s not forget the queer origins of the original Hans Christian Andersen version of the fairytale, hmm?
Clearly this song is aboutOrange is the New Black, I don’t know what to tell you.
GiphyWhat’s the one thing you can’t say in Florida? Gay!!! Fuck you, Ron DeSantis!
Oh, come on, do we really even have to explain this one?
If we take this as a play on Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (a safe bet, considering Elizabeth Taylor starred in the 1966 film adaptation and Swift adores referencing her), then we can note three things here: 1) that playwright Edward Albee was gay, 2) the play was bashed upon its release because critics thought it was secretly about gay couples (Albee denied this), oh, and 3) Virginia Woolf herself was romantically involved with fellow author Vita Sackville-West. There’s even a whole movie about it.
GiphyUhh, you know who can fix anything? Because they're really good with tools?? Lesbians.
GiphySadness is also inherently gay; sorry, I don’t make the rules.
Look, Taylor is allowed/obligated to have one Scooter Braun-coded theme song on each album, and clearly this is the one.
Clara Bow!! Are you kidding?!! Okay, but seriously, Bow was ~the It Girl in the silent film era. There were rumors that she slept with both men and women, and that she had something going on with Dorothy Arzner, who directed The Wild Party — Bow’s first talkie and a notoriously lesbian-themed movie. What’s also vaguely interesting is that immediately upon the announcement of the tracklisting, searching for info on Bow’s sexuality immediately highlighted the above passage and website, which has now been booted to the second page of Google results.
