Taylor Swift's "reinvention"
 

After seeing this: .

- She sounds awful.
- The backing vocals are even more awful.
- She's focusing more on the scenery than on the music, her old live clips sound way better.
- Turned into a pop artist that will do shit music.

I also think that the change on her voice has something to do with the way she sounds now.

Such a shame, her second and third albums were just great.

Her new song is such a shameless rip off of Pharrell's Happy its unbelievable

Cursed are the video pop tarts -- and their pre-teenybopper demographic -- for they have inherited the music industry.

Every time I hear Pink, I think about the great rock singer she could have and should have been. But her record label pushed her into a pop direction because it was more profitable. As for being interested in scenery, I heard that the Mexican government is mad at Miley Cyrus for twerking with their flag. I hope she isn't expecting the country and western scene to welcome her back with open arms.

I have the same feeling about Demi Lovato. Her two first albums were pretty good.

I don't think Taylor's singing all those choruses. Even worse, I think her band is lip synching, too.

Here's Pink covering Me and Bobby McGee and Babe I'm Gonna Leave You. Now you just try to convince me that she's happier singing pop half-naked from a trapeze!

I love Taylor Swift and I love her new single and stop talking shit about my future wife.

Haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.

Aloha !

How does Shania feel about that? Or are you starting a harem?

Salaam Aleikum,
Sebastiaan

Shania Twain pulled me up on stage because she couldn't resist me. Taylor Swift is more my age AND is just as good as Shania.

Good luck with her not dumping you and writing a song about your relationship.

Still worth it.

Aloha !

Having seen Erik's dedicated performances on youTube I'd say there's quite a chance of him dedicating a song or two to her instead.

Salaam Aleikum,
Sebastiaan

I'm an excellent singer.

Reinvention accomplished -- and you got plagiarized by Fox News AND Rolling Stone, to boot:

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes. David Bowie sang it, and now Taylor Swift is doing it.

The former country star announced she's joined the pop music world with the release of her new single "Shake It Off" and upcoming album 1989.

The typically modest singer also showed off her sexier side on the cover of Rolling Stone magazine. The 24-year-old stuck a sultry pose in a wet white tank-top on the beach...

...Another way Swift is reinventing herself? No more songs about ex-boyfriends...."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..."

Then shouldn't a pop tart be the LAST thing she should be striving to become? That kind of stuff is MANDATORY if you want to get headlines and sell albums, LOL!

Out of the Woods it's pretty good. I also like Style, I Wish You Would and This Love. But the album is average at best, at least compared to Fearless and Speak Now.

I tried listening to her new album. It lasted for about 10 minutes until I switced to something more enjoyable. Boy was it horrible.

Which is really sad, because I used to really like her. Fearless is still a classic album to me as far as modern pop goes. Even Red, while it was very poppy, still had enough songs with substance. None of which I heard while fast-forwarding these new songs. What a shame.

Perhaps I'll give it a more fair chance next time around, since it's mostly getting rave reviews, but not anytime soon.

My cousin made me listen to her latest album cos she said it was very 80's sounding (and she knows I love most things 80s). I actually REALLY enjoyed two tracks. "Out of the Woods" and "I Wish You Would".

Other songs I don't mind include Style, Blank Space and Welcome to New York.

Yeah, those two are pretty good.

I am pleased to say that I am closed minded enough musically that I have never heard a Taylor Swift song, and nor do I plan to. In saying that, I would still be happy to do the intercourse to her.

Having to lower the tone :D

She removed all of her records from Spotify.

Yep, what a stupid move. And they say it's because she doesn't feel music should be "free".

Ice

What's funny is that I started listening to her because of Spotify Radio. They put me the piano version of Forever and Always and I thought "hey, this is good".

It's a retarded move, also, she went platinum and had the most sales in 10 years, it's not like she's not selling records.

Some are saying that the reason for this is that they're trying for another platinum album. If it's not on Spotify, people need to buy it. I don't think so, but it's a way to try. I hope it's going to bomb. :) Not because of the music but because of the 1989 attitude towards music business.

Ice

Exactly...........

This is what artists don't get. Fans are going to buy the record anyway, the guy that likes to have their physical CDs are going to get it anyway and so is the guy that loves downloading his iTunes EPs; but the average joe that doesn't give much of a **** about Taylor Swift isn't going to buy it, doesn't matter if it's on Spotify or it isn't.

At least with Spotify they get some revenue and playings for the Billboard Top 100.

OMG. This is nuts.

I really don't understand the hate. It's actually such a good pop album.

One thing that I noticed when taking a break from this board was how closed minded so many people on this forum are to music that isn't Bon Jovi sounding. Yet still somehow like albums like What About Now. If Bon Jovi were to release a good pop album, THIS is how you do it. Fantastic album, every song.

I really enjoyed this album too. Every song.

I don't normally listen to pop, but the awesome sales week she had got me curious. The last album I remember being this big a deal was Adele's 21.

Why Taylor Swift's '1989' Could Be The Last Platinum Album Ever

Taylor Swift has unveiled quite a few surprises of late—moving from Nashville to New York, ditching the country format that elevated her to superstar status, and even trying her hand at rapping in new album 1989.

“I like to look at albums as being sort of statements,” she told Billboard. “Visually, sonically, emotionally, I like them all to have their own fingerprint. This time I’m kind of just doing whatever I feel like. I felt like making a pop album, so I did.”

Perhaps more surprising than all of these developments is the fact that Swift is on pace to sell more than 1 million copies of 1989 in its opening week—a feat no solo artist has achieved since Swift herself did it two years ago with Red.

The shocking part is not that Swift is doing this, but that any artist is doing this. It’s not just that there hasn’t been a single platinum opening week this year. There hasn’t been a single platinum album this year, unless you count the Frozen soundtrack.

All of this leads some industry observers to suspect that 1989 could be the last platinum album ever .

“I would like to believe that this recent achievement could be a sign of more to come,” says entertainment attorney Lori Landew of Fox Rothschild. “[But] I tend to believe that it is more an aberration that can be attributed to a super strong and loyal fan base.”

As my colleague Hugh McIntyre pointed out, five albums had gone platinum by this time last year. Justin Timberlake’s The 20/20 Experience led the way, moving over 2 million units by the start of the fourth quarter.

This year is a different story, and the reasons are fairly straightforward. Recorded music sales have been on a steep decline over the past decade or so, first because of piracy, and more recently due to the rise of streaming.

The latter, of course, is an improvement over the former: artists and songwriters do get paid for streams. While rates leave much to be desired, services like Spotify and Pandora are far better for musicians than Napster. And they’re just as easy, if not easier, to use—which is why streaming is well on its way to replacing the digital download.

According to Nielsen’s midyear music report, digital sales dipped 13% in this year’s first six months as album sales dropped 14.3%. That went hand-in-hand with a 42% increase in streaming.

“Since streaming sites and rogue torrent sites make it easy for any teenager to access millions of songs for free, it comes as no surprise that young people, who are the music industry’s core consumer, are not paying for physical or digital singles or albums,” says veteran music lawyer Bernie Resnick. “Without the support of the most important segment of the customer base, it becomes extremely difficult to sell enough units to qualify for gold or platinum sales awards.”

Swift, however, was able to energize her largely Millennial fan base by shrewdly using a range of promotional tactics. In addition to the requisite late night talk show appearances, there were unusual tricks like hosting private listening sessions for fans (and making Rice Krispies treats for them) and including Polaroids with hand-written lyrics in each physical copy of 1989.

That sort of connection has been at the core of Swift’s incredible success over the past five years, which have seen her annual earnings rise to an all-time high of $64 million in 2014. Like any good innovator, she hasn’t been afraid to tweak a working model in hopes of improving it.

Swift’s departure from country, an increasingly viable commercial genre, was certainly something of a risk. And though some songs on 1989 smacked of other pop songstresses like Lana Del Rey (“Wildest Dreams”) and Katy Perry (“Welcome To New York”), the album—especially the lead single “Shake It Off”—felt like pure Swift. It was a logical next step for an artist who already had a foot firmly planted in pop.

So will 1989 actually be the last platinum album of all time? It certainly seems possible. Still, it’s more likely that the RIAA will change its definition of platinum to encompass streams, just as Billboard‘s Hot 100 chart has. For now, though, Swift may have the platinum crown to herself for quite some time.

“As far as virtually everyone else is concerned, it seems like this kind of debut is beyond reach today and will remain so until the RIAA catches up with how music is currently consumed by the majority of new music lovers,” says Landew. “While Swift’s debut gives us hope that music lovers can be moved to want to own new music, buying trends would seen to indicate otherwise.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/zackomal...um-album-ever/

So I guess I wasn't the only one to hear the "Starbucks lovers" line in Blank Space LOL :D

http://nymag.com/scienceofus/2014/11...ift-lyric.html

This album STILL holds up to me, and I listen to it multiple times a week. It is an incredible pop album.

It was obviously an incredibly stupid move ;)

I didn't say it wouldn't sell. And I still say it was a stupid move. Removing all her albums from Spotify means a lot of people (myself included) will not listen to her songs anymore. It's not supposed to be JUST about the money, I've always liked people who want their music to be heard. Swift seems to want people to pay for her music, not listen to it.

The only reason they did this was to get the "last ever" platinum album. A PR stunt and a way to generate more revenue. I don't appreciate it.

Ice

2017 UDATE: Taylor Swift's RE-re-invention?
 

After that Kanye West "I made the bitch famous" business, you'd think that Swift would be a little more vigilant about how she comes across ethically. But noooo...

She didn't "decide" to "pull any trigger," her record label did: she was going on Spotify along with everyone else at Universal whether she liked it or not. And just as Swift had counted on no one being able to prove that Kanye had read her any song lyrics, she is now counting on no one noticing that: a) Spotify did NOT come crawling to her with an offer she couldn't refuse, and that b) the deal will very likely help her sell enough additional units to put her over the one hundred million mark. So much for her pioneering artistic integrity and "rewarding" her fans -- and because she's once again deliberately lied by omission, giving Swift the benefit of the doubt as to whether she was also trying to rain on Perry's parade cannot be an option.

Just shake it off, Taylor -- haters are going to hate! http://rocktivity.com/Graphics/fro.gif

Great news! As a fan of Taylor and massive Spotify user, I'm very happy about this, obviously.

She was the last truly massive superstar in the business to take this stand against streaming services, so it's a massive victory for streaming in general. The other notable names against have mostly caved in (Radiohead, The Black Keys, AC/DC) too.

Now all there's left are some semi-relevant legends, like Neil Young and Bob Seger.

Contrary to the insinuations of her public statement, there was no longer a stand for Taylor to take.

Spotify sat down with her parent record label Universal and cut a deal on behalf of everyone on it -- she was going into streaming no matter what. But rather than gracefully (and quietly) accept defeat, she's trying to make it sound like it was the result of the "generosity" of her "decision" to settle her differences with the streaming services out of "consideration" for her fans.

But wait -- there's more for Spotify users to be happy about.

Spotify has settled a lawsuit which will mean higher payouts for artists, publishers, and outside composers/lyricists alike, and they've set up a fund that will pay them retroactively. In addition, Spotify's deal with Universal means that all three major record labels are now on board. I presume that's the reason why I had no problem finding Bob Seger and Neil Young through my (free tier) Spotify account -- unless there's some geoblocking going on.