You know what really grinds my gears...

[tifosi77]

[skullman80]

She has universal appeal based on the sold out concerts she's had for the last year and a half. She literally is what universal appeal is IMO. I don't love her music, but she has written some really good and catchy songs.

That’s not universal appeal, that’s a dedicated fan base. Trump is a good comparison in that his fans are rabid but there’s a lot of people who actively don’t like what he’s putting down

...and her fan base is huge. Like really huge. She has massive worldwide appeal across basically every continent in the world.

In 149 concerts spread over 21 months, she drew in 10 million attendees, with ticket sales surpassing $2 billion. These are the first official figures confirming the true scale of the tour.

https://magazine.weverse.io/article/vie ... the%20tour.

[Troy Loney]

Popularity doesn’t necessarily mean wide appeal, especially with, like I said, how splintered culture is in 2024. This is a really subjective discussion because it comes down to how you define talent, particularly in music, but just because Shake It Off was a massive hit doesn’t really make it that interesting. Even reading the critical reviews of it on wiki are interesting because it feels like a collective “meh”

Shake It Off" received mixed reviews upon release.[37] Although positive reviews found the production catchy, critics deemed the track repetitive and lacking substance compared to Swift's works on Red.[26][38] Randall Roberts from the Los Angeles Times's lauded the sound as "perfect pop confection" but found the lyrics shallow, calling them insensible to the political events at the time: "When lives are at stake and nothing seems more relevant than getting to the Actual Truth, liars and cheats can't and shouldn't be shaken off."[25] In congruence, The Guardian's Molly Fitzpatrick wrote that the lyrics fell short of Swift's songwriting abilities.[39]
Giving the song a three-out-of-five-stars score, Jeff Terich from American Songwriter regarded Swift's new direction as "a left-turn worth following". While Terich agreed that the lyrics were dismissive, he felt that critics should not have taken the song seriously because it was "pretty harmless".[18] In a positive review, Jason Lipshutz from Billboard wrote: "Swift proves why she belongs among pop's queen bees ... the song sounds like a surefire hit."[40] In a review of the album 1989, Alexis Petridis praised the lyrics for "twisting clichés until they sound original".[41] In the words of Andrew Unterberger from Spin, while "Shake It Off" was musically a "red herring" that feels out of place on the album, it thematically represents Swift's new attitude on 1989, where she liberated herself from overtly romantic struggles to embrace positivity.[42] Swift herself acknowledged the song as an outlier on 1989, and deliberately released it as the lead single to encourage audiences to explore the entire album and not just the singles.[43]
Retrospectively, Hannah Mylrea from NME considered "Shake It Off" an effective opener for Swift's 1989 era, which transformed her image to mainstream pop.[44] While saying that "Shake It Off" was not one of the album's better songs, Rob Sheffield from Rolling Stone applauded it for "serving as a trailer to announce her daring Eighties synth-pop makeover".[45] Nate Jones from Vulture agreed, but described the song's bridge as "the worst 24 seconds of the entire album".[26] In his 2019 ranking of Swift's singles, Petridis ranked "Shake It Off" third—behind "Blank Space" (2014) and "Love Story" (2008), lauding its "irresistible" hook and "sharp-tongued wit".[46] Jane Song from Paste was less enthusiastic, placing "Shake It Off" among Swift's worst songs in her catalog: "Swift has a pattern of choosing the worst song from each album as the lead single."[47]

I think about it like this: since she’s a massive pop star, let’s compare her to the GOAT. Does she have anything remotely approaching Thriller, Billie Jean or Beat It in terms of universal appeal? I don’t think so personally

Now, maybe that’s not her fault, because pop culture was much more concentrated in the 80s. But again, I don’t think she has many songs that everyone, regardless of demographic, would tap their feet to and sing. She appeals extraordinarily hard to women under 40 and any other demo it’s probably more “meh” than “I love her music”

Now you’re just showing your youth and naivety. The music industry today can’t be compared to those eras. Music is on demand now, we don’t have like three radio stations and mtv being the only mediums for consumption.

The level of sustained success she has experienced is basically impossible for a new artist (need like the boss who has multiple generations of fans).

[Rylan]

I dont like Taylor Swift and find her music offputting, but she's definitely talented and capable of creating music and art that many, many people find enjoyable and connect with. That alone makes her a talented musician IMO.

[meow]

So how much of her music is she actually creating? Like is she actually locking herself in a studio for a month and pounding out an album?

[Troy Loney]

I don’t think she’s writing the drum and bass lines to each song, but she’s probably writing all the lyrics and the chord progression

[MWB]

Still trying to figure out how popular doesn’t mean wide appeal.

[count2infinity]

Still trying to figure out how popular doesn’t mean wide appeal.

The best I can understand the argument is: "unless everyone likes it, it's not wide appeal".

[shoeshine boy]

So how much of her music is she actually creating? Like is she actually locking herself in a studio for a month and pounding out an album?

I'm not sure how much of that matters. even if someone else wrote every single song, it doesn't mean that she's not talented. if it did, most of Country music would be considered not talented.
I like some of her songs but I'd never pay $1k to go see her in concert but from everything I've heard, she puts on a helluva show and sings and dances her butt off for 3+ hours. that's talent.

[nocera]

She does a lot of the writing. She has released/played the demos where it’s stripped down to how she originally wrote it on guitar or piano. I’m sure early on she was much more produced and performed things written for her, but that’s not really the case anymore.

[nocera]

Christmas music is trash and is overplayed when it gets played once.

Fairytale of New York is fantastic and I'm okay if it's played all year round.

I'd love to know how this behavior came to be. Somehow I missed it the first time around and I've never been able to listen to the song the whole way through because it's, to me, rubbish. It must be a very strong 'you had to be there' thing.

I don’t have some long argument in favor it. It really just comes down to the super subjective “I like it.” Outside of that song, I’m only a fan of the classic Christmas from Bing Crosby, Sinatra, Darlene Love, Dean Martin, Burl Ives, etc.

[mac5155]

Holiday stress and drama begins... mom wants to know if we can come over Christmas afternoon. Wife insists we aren't leaving the house on Christmas day and says mom can come over. But mom doesn't want to pick me over my brother's house (understandable). I'm unfortunately in the middle with no care on what we actually do cause Christmas is just another day to me. so I take my wife's side because I have to (and should) but it still sucks.

[count2infinity]

We went from trying to visit both families around thanksgiving and Christmas to my family for thanksgiving and my in-laws for Christmas to “ya know what… they can just come here if they want to” over the course of about 7 or 8 years.

[mac5155]

It's easy for my wife to have this mindset though cause she has her mom and her mom has her. That's it. So her mom can come over and it doesn't impact her negatively in any way. It'd be easier if everyone took vacation or the holiday was on a weekend but alas here we are.

[tifosi77]

Re Music

Taylor Swift is a credited writer on almost every single song she has ever recorded, and is often the only credited songwriter. (Yes, that means she is going in and figuring out drum beats and basslines and woodshedding in the studio for weeks or even months to turn out an album.) This was particularly true earlier on because she didn't come of age as a musician in the 1950s where artists were signed to labels that required them to play material written by others and do glorified cover albums. She was a singer-songwriter, and she wrote the songs she sung. As she has gone on the opportunity to collaborate with others has massively expanded, and so you see cowriters and producers with credit on some of her later repertoire. But the first three or four (or five even?) of her albums were almost entirely her own artistic voice alone.....and even with the more 'crowded' credits on her later material she's still self-producing, which means it's ultimately her creative guiding light.

That is why she is a billionaire. Because she is an almost solitary driving force behind the most widely popular music of the 21st century, and she owns everything. (She even re-recorded her early albums - pretty much note-for-note - to undercut her first label's control of her master recording rights)

I do not turn my nose up at pop music, but I will say it's generally not for me. However, trying to claim that Swift has no broad appeal is frankly too dense to believe is coming from a place other than insincere desperation for engagement (even/especially if it's negative).

[MalkinIsMyHomeboy]

“Taylor Swift has broad appeal! Just ignore all of the posts in this thread from white men aged 30-55 who say that her music isn’t their cup of tea”

I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree on the concept of “broad/wide appeal” but the silly “only someone who’s trolling could hold this opinion” posts are lame. According to this survey, 21% of men and 26% of women consider themselves Taylor Swift fans (the image won’t show unless I have a paid account but the data is at the bottom of the page) . Is that “broad appeal”? To me, no. But if you disagree with that, that’s fine. Anecdotally Ive only knew one man who claimed to be a Swift fan

[count2infinity]

I am not an Nsyc fan, but if bye bye bye pops on the radio, I’m singing along.

You’re better than this, mimh.


I think. Maybe not.

[NTP66]

Clicking on ‘Unsubscribe’ in an email that resolves to a broken link.

[MalkinIsMyHomeboy]

Still trying to figure out how popular doesn’t mean wide appeal.

To me, wide appeal refers to a variety of demographics (men and women, young and old, all ethnicities, etc). She’s popular in that she dominates the young women category and they are absolutely fanatical about her but I don’t consider her appeal to be wide in that many men, especially in older demos, listen to her music at all

[MalkinIsMyHomeboy]

I am not an Nsyc fan, but if bye bye bye pops on the radio, I’m singing along.

Me too. But I’m not singing any Taylor Swift song (because there’s not one that I like). But I am singing abcdefu but Gayle (because I like it). Go figure

[nocera]

Still trying to figure out how popular doesn’t mean wide appeal.

To me, wide appeal refers to a variety of demographics (men and women, young and old, all ethnicities, etc). She’s popular in that she dominates the young women category and they are absolutely fanatical about her but I don’t consider her appeal to be wide in that many men, especially in older demos, listen to her music at all

Her show at Heinz was essentially millennial women and gay dudes, with some kids sprinkled in. Oh and me.

There were also plenty of dads who looked like they were having a blast, singing and dancing along with their kids. It really was a great show.

[AuthorTony]

21% of men and 26% of women consider themselves Taylor Swift fans

How broad is broad? 1 out of every 4 or 5 people seems pretty broad to me. I've always felt like music is more of a generational thing than other art forms. You used MJ as an example earlier on. I certainly don't recall my dad (who would have been in his late 30s/early 40s during MJs heyday) signing along with my Thriller album. Something like a third of the population is over 50, and I sure don't recall any of my grandparents (who would have been 50s-60s) being MJ fans.

Were people born around the time of WWI fans of The Beatles or the Stones? Look at someone like Madonna who was probably the biggest female pop star of "my" generation. Are there many tweens/teens or event twenty-somethings today who declare themselves fans of her music? Swift's been around for 20 years and is probably more popular now than ever. That's pretty awesome staying power for a singer.

[tifosi77]

A musical artist having a 20-year career like that is extremely out of the ordinary. Bands might milk the touring circuit as they and their fans age gracefully. But in terms of putting out new music that's popular and critically successful and culturally relevant two decades after debuting.... yeah, that's super super rare.

That sort of thing didn't even really happen in the recording industry on any meaningful scale until some of the artists from the 60s emerged. And I would argue that the reason it did start then is because that was the sea change in the industry where artists were afforded the opportunity to write more of their own repertoire and gained more control over their output. To Tony's point, contemporaneous fans of The Beatles and Stones were teens and early 20-somethings - which not surprisingly has almost always been the core demo driving music trends (new artists tend to be 5-ish or so years older than their audience) - but their parents weren't exactly going nuts spinning 45s of popstars from the 1940s, which would be the 20-year equivalent of the TSwift example, when Meet The Beatles came out.

[Rylan]

Still trying to figure out how popular doesn’t mean wide appeal.

To me, wide appeal refers to a variety of demographics (men and women, young and old, all ethnicities, etc). She’s popular in that she dominates the young women category and they are absolutely fanatical about her but I don’t consider her appeal to be wide in that many men, especially in older demos, listen to her music at all

you quoted statistics that show only a 5% difference between men and women. She's got wide appeal, just not universal which is how I interpret what you are saying. And truth be told, things like water, oxygen and food dont have universal appeal...so...yea

[mac5155]

"mrs mac, what are we going to do regarding my family christmas? they want to do it on christmas day. I know you dont want to leave the house though."
"we'll do whatever"
"ok"
...
"yes, momma mac, we will be over early afternoon"
...
"mrs mac, I informed mama mac we will be over early afternoon"
"WHAT?!? I TOLD YOU WE WERENT LEAVING THE HOUSE!!"
"well mrs mac you said 'we'll do whatever' when I asked the other day?"

gosh darn i love the holidays. sooo magical. especially with a 2 week postpartum wife.