Speak Now

About

“Real life is a funny thing, you know,” Taylor Swift wrote in the liner notes of 2010’s <i>Speak Now</i>, her third album and the third she’s rerecorded as part of a sweeping effort to regain her master tape. “There is a time for silence. There is a time for waiting your turn. But if you know how you feel, and you so clearly know what you need to say, you’ll know it.” Swift was in her early twenties when she wrote <i>Speak Now</i>, still finding her voice as an artist and as an adult. We all know what came next for Swift with 2012’s <i>Red</i>, but looking back, you can easily see and hear what’s on the horizon in these song. The grace of <i>Speak Now</i> is in how it makes simple work out of feelings that are anything but. Swift is vulnerable here, but she’s also self-empowered (“Mean”). She’s innocent, but knows when to take responsibility (“Dear John”). She’s wise enough to regret her mistakes (“Back to December”), but not too jaded see the best in people (“Innocent”). Does she want to grow up? Ye, if that means more agency and independence (“Speak Now”). But when you’re all alone in that new apartment, you still might cry—not just for the childhood home you left, but for the knowledge that you can never go back (“Never Grow Up”). The sound is big, but the details are extremely specific—at one point, Swift says her rival thinks she’s crazy because Swift likes to rhyme her name with things (pop-punk blowout “Better Than Revenge”). It’s that balance—the universal and the specific, the accessible and the obscure—that not only sets Swift apart from most contemporary pop songwriter, but makes her a guide for anyone trying to sort out the impossible avalanche of feelings early adulthood bring. .

via Apple Music

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