Is It Time to Call Out Taylor Swift?
What position would she play on the Golden State Warriors?
It’s become extremely uncouth to say anything but praise about Taylor Swift, in fact there’s a strong contingent of the population who feels that not kissing her ass is an aggressive act of misogyny.
I have nothing against Taylor Swift’s songs, they aren’t for me, but I am nonetheless annoyed at her extremely contrived image, such as her decades long habit of informing the tabloids that she is “dating” a celebrity of dubious heterosexuality, this was before the Travis Kelce fiasco, who she coincidentally or not entered into a relationship with just as the NFL season was kicking off and he’d be on TV a lot.
She also reminds me of Tracy Flick or the girl every high school had, who thought participating in twenty seven extracurricular activities meant that you were a loser and she was on her way to becoming a billionaire.
No, I do find Taylor Swift annoying, but I find every pop star to be annoying, so it’s really nothing personal on that front.
The thing that bothers me, though, is that Taylor Swift really wants you to think she is not a pop star and that she is a dyed in the wool singer-songwriter along the lines of Joni Mitchell or Paul Simon.
The Independent, for example, just published a sycophantic article titled How Taylor Swift Mastered the Singer-Songwriter Blueprint.
I personally don’t remember Joni Mitchell changing sequined miniskirts in the middle of her set, but maybe I’m living in the past.
Still, is Taylor Swift a singer-songwriter? Any seventeen year old girl will be the first to tell you that she writes her own songs.
Here’s where semantics come into play. Yes, Taylor Swift does write her own songs, along with professional songwriters who write songs for other pop stars.
Traditionally, the singer-songwriter, the Bob Dylans, the James Taylors, the Neil Youngs and Lucinda Williamses, write their own songs by themselves.
That’s the whole point. It’s supposed to be a person with a notebook and a guitar.
Taylor Swift is credited as writing very few songs by herself. The vast majority are co-written by her and guys like Shellback, a behind the scenes Sweed who has penned songs for the likes of Britney Spears, The Backstreet Boys, Adam Lambert, Kesha, One Direction, Justin Timberlake, Katy Perry, and the Jonas Brothers, a veritable who’s who of dorky punchlines.
The difference between The Backstreet Boys and Taylor Swift? It could be vast. Or, it could be that she is holding a guitar and has incorporated some personal politics into her persona.
Breaking down the semantics another way: Technically, yes, Taylor Swift writes her own songs, as she is credited as a co-writer on them.
Have you ever heard of a guy named Quinndary Weatherspoon? Probably not.
Two years ago the Golden State Warriors won the NBA Championship, a team led by Stephen Curry, the best shooter in NBA history and one of the ten best players of all time.
Curry averaged twenty-seven points-per-game in those playoffs.
Also on the team was Quinndary Weatherspoon, who averaged two and a half points-per-game that season, and zero points in the playoffs, because he didn’t play.
Still, he was on the team, so he won a championship that year, along with Curry and the rest of the team.
I’m wondering if Quinndary Weatherspoon started walking around telling everyone, “Hey, I won a championship a few years ago. I’m an NBA Champion. I didn’t have much help, it was basically a one man team. I pretty much did it by myself.”
Would he get a pass, from the media, or would people look at him like he was adamantly believing his own bullshit?
I’m not saying Taylor Swift is Quinndary Weatherspoon, although Britney Spears and Justin Bieber and Beyonce are.
Singer-songwriters write their own songs, by themselves.
Somehow Taylor Swift is skating by on this one and nobody ever calls her out for fear of, what, being a part of the patriarchy? It’s pure lunacy.
I’m not the biggest Bob Dylan fan in the world, but he is an artist, a singer-songwriter, because some guy with a neck tattoo doesn’t write songs for him, Pitbull, Lil’ Nas X, and the chick who played Buffy.
What I’m saying is Shellback is Stephen Curry, and Taylor Swift is either a second banana or a role player, somewhere between Draymond Green and Andrew Wiggins.