Taylor Swift's Midnights Tallies Up the Old Haunts
A review of Taylor Swift's tenth record, a muted, pensive affair
The eyes burn from staring at the screen. The text blurs, split into two in the tired vision. The limbs are heavy, and every breath is deeper than the last: it’s time to sleep. But in the darkness, there are thoughts, snippets of them, really; something someone said, something you wish you had told someone, an useless bit of imagination that cannot be called a story just yet. And then it appears, sudden and clear: a thought, a memory, a sensation so piercing that you’re wide awake. This is nothing new. It is yet another ruined night.
This is the world of Taylor Swift’s tenth record Midnights, and with it, she brings back the twinkling synths that have opened the gargantuan 1989. But the return of pop doesn’t necessarily mean that Swift is ready, or willing, to play the big superstar on her records like she used to. Much like folklore and evermore, the production was kept as a small affair: Swift and long-term confidante Jack Antonoff have produced and written every track on this song, only occasionally assisted by names like Swift’s partner Joe Alwyn (credited once more as William Bowery), friend Zoe Kravitz, former collaborator Sounwave, and new names Jahaan Spears, Lana del Rey, Mark Anthony, Keanu Torres. Aaron Dessner, who has helmed most of the former records, is notably absent save for the deluxe tracks called “3am edition”, because Swift knows too well that the desperation only gets worse the longer you stay awake. After all, it is our memories that give our existence its unbearable weight.
In 2020, amidst the poisoning confusion of the early pandemic, Taylor Swift turned to imagination to get out — out the city, (back) into the woods, a quiet that is less hostile than the nauseating reality of being by yourself in your room 24/7. To that end, she has come up with characters, stories, even anthologies in the case of folklore highlight the last great american dynasty or a touching send-off to her own grandmother on follow-up evermore, marjorie. Her meticulous attention to detail and continuity translated beautifully to snippets of imaginary lives, and only rarely did they touch with her own, as equally publicized as a serial story of old. The internet was notably absent on both records, save for bookends the 1 and the lakes (a bonus track). But the fantasy didn’t last long, and as the pandemic — the lives of many discarded in the name of economic progress — was pushed to the backburner, so did Swift turn to herself, return to the big city. It’s no surprise to hear “going viral” in the bridge of opener Lavender Haze, nor talks of city, nor of the town that stops people in their tracks before they even begin. Taylor Swift is back, and so is everything else that makes her her.
Taylor Swift is a writer mostly concerned with herself. She will live through something and put it down to paper not only to have the last word, but to purge the thought out of her brain. Sometimes, it’s a reply that was never sent; other times, gossip; a fantasy never enacted. Be that as it may, she is trying to take control of the narrative as a public figure — and usually, she succeeds (not always straightaway, but eventually she does end up right, which only vindicates her more). On Midnights, there is no new situation to take control of. These are the “and one more thing!” of last words in song form. These are stories weathered and smoothed over by time. As such, people become archetypes: besides Swift’s well-used pageant queens and sonny boys, there are now vigilantes, anti-heroes, masterminds, “kids” (sexy babies?), and monsters, and they are usually embodied by Swift herself. Good and bad things happen to people in the name of “karma”, which she claims she’s on the good side of, but only after introducing herself as the “problem” on reluctant lead single Anti-Hero. Seen through the bigger picture, the villain has been slain by the damsel in distress who has become a fierce femme fatale. The lover is safe in her home, cradling her in her arms. Love is lavender, a kiss maroon, and devotion a sweet nothing where her mind doesn’t run in circles for once. But depression will hear none of the happily ever after that Swift so desperately yearns for. As a result, the ghosts she’s purged out of her head have now infested her home. Stories don’t end just because you ignored them to completion, so the writer must turn to the pen again and write new stories about these stories — the after. We get the sense that the only weapon Swift has is also the very thing that manifested them in the first place.
Not everybody would have the chops to such a task, much less do it, but Taylor Swift, the songwriter of her generation — perhaps the greatest active songwriter — has valiantly chosen to exorcise the exorcised. This is all fine and good, but on crucial and always noticeable moments, the pen (it is irrelevant which of the three Swift uses) runs out of ink. It’s clear that nobody has done a second read of these lyrics when beautiful lines (I saw flecks of what could’ve been lights / But it might just have been you) sit right beside the openly clunky ones (life is emotionally abusive — sure). Tellingly, the only other person that would agree on chronicling the after — and who has done so for the last two records, first to failure and then to success — is the featured artist Lana del Rey. Snow on the Beach is appropriately wintery when Swift sings it, and outright hazy when del Rey takes the steering wheel on the chorus. Therein lies the fundamental difference between the two: where del Rey will let a thought go and turn to other matters of melancholy, Swift will turn it over and over again in her head. It’s why when del Rey were to sing “life is emotionally abusive” it is just another fleeting thought she possesses, almost cool. Swift has proven herself a thinker so deep that everything she sings or speaks about is a little more serious than her intended tone. This is what holds back songs like Vigilante Shit or Karma, even deluxe track Paris, from full enjoyment. But in her defense, the pen holds up for the most part, acceptable for pop songs, squished up in bars and elongated where the situation requires it (usually whatever Swift is in the mood for, a modus operandi that works better in practice than in theory) On the other end of the lyrical spectrum, the you kept me like a promise but I kept you like an oath knockouts are relegated to the deluxe tracks: lines like I’m never gonna meet what could’ve been, would’ve been / what should’ve been you from Bigger than the whole sky prove Swift will slice like a knife through hot butter should the occasion call for it.
The familiarity of Midnights also extends to the sonic palette. As a producer, Jack Antonoff is largely the enabler and polisher to whoever he’s producing for, at least when it comes to the artists he works with besides the first person he’s ever produced for: Taylor Swift. With her, she is his enabler, and so soft beats, shimmering synths, and low drones permeate through most of the record, begging to be referenced to earlier records and higher highs, even records by other people Antonoff has produced for. Ahead of the release, insider Mr S compared Midnights to Lorde’s sophomore revelation Melodrama due to the sub bass, but to my ears, that is often too loud, too vibrant for what Swift is going for. Instead, the slower cuts of St Vincent’s Masseduction and Daddy’s Home are more appropriate, even down to Swift using reverbs much like how St. Vincent used reverb to fake peace on Live in the Dream, or display vulnerable moments like Slow Disco or the tail end of Savior. Though Vigilante Shit is compared to quite often to the work of Billie Eilish, it’s easier to compare it to anything from the Antonoff vault: Reputation era (Delicate) if one chooses to keep it strictly to Taylor, a muted Los Ageless from elsewhere, and yes, maybe here a Melodrama comparison is appropriate: Loveless if it had a lovelorn sister. The song that mentions the album by its title, Midnight Rain, arrives with heavy modulation of Swift’s voice (not unlike, again, Delicate). As a result of the beats being familiar, fans have taken to blame Antonoff — that or diss him by propping up Dessner — for the perceived lack of quality. To be clear: figuring out Antonoff’s production style within ten seconds or less isn’t a talent, it is simply accumulated listening. And to Antonoff’s defense, what else could underscore something that we already know than familiar beats, moments that sound clearly polished and better than the last time we heard them? Furthermore, if the deluxe tracks show adventurous styles — dream-pop on Bigger than the Whole Sky, organs on Paris, beats swirling like downtempo on Glitch — doesn’t it stand to reason that maybe the original was intended to be downtrodden pop with blurry instrumentation, concocted not just by Antonoff, but Taylor Swift herself?
Midnights doesn’t reinvent the wheel when it comes to Taylor Swift. It is quiet and muted, a complete body of work with no real lead single, announced with an outsized rollout and an upcoming movie, played in a genre that feels just a little behind on the charts. It’s not like she has to keep up, anyway: TikTok loves her for who she is, what she sings about, the big feelings she’s chosen to write about time and time again. Musically and lyrically, even in the photoshoot to the record she is back to her signature prim haircut and bangs, dresses in diamond and ponytails not unlike the 1989 era, it is Taylor Swift as she was — but fading at the edges like a memory. Who she was, what she has allowed herself to be, deals her a lot of grief. Trauma won’t make you stronger, just more jaded. Ask me what I’ve earned from these tears, she asks accusingly on Karma. On penultimate track, emotional centerpiece, and final John Mayer send-off Would’ve, Should’ve, Could’ve, she answers her own question: she has not earned the girlhood she wants back, she has not earned what she is left with now, and nothing she wants to have. An electric guitar simmers low in the mix as if to give voice to her pent-up anger. The anger doesn’t make her wiser, but as somebody in her position, her star inevitably pulls people into her orbit: You should find another guiding light / But I shine brighter, she sighs on the closer Dear Reader. Her voice is modulated and fades into the swirling darkness. It’s as if in the process of banning her haunts, Taylor Swift becomes a haunt in our own heads — not as benevolent as she seems, she tells us, but with no real malice in her intent, either. They will come back; sometimes with more fervor, sometimes less. For tonight, though, it will have to do.