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Ok My ranking would be about a 6.5 or 7ish after some listens and some time with it. I'll post my lengthy thoughtsstream on Discord for now and do a more concise bit here later, but for now here's my go at Track rankings (did one for each part and overall) ;)
TTPD First part: 1. Fortnight 2. The Alchemy 3. But Daddy I Love Him 4. Clara Bow 5. My Boy Only Breaks His Favourite Toys 6. I Can Do It With a Broken Heart 7. The Tortured Poets Department 8. Down Bad 9. Fresh Out The Slammer 10. I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can) 11. Florida! 12. loml 13. Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me 14. So Long, London 15. Guilty as Sin? 16. The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived TTPD The Anthology: 1. So High School 2. I’mgonnagetyouback 3. The Prophecy 4. The Bolter 5. Cassandra 6. The Albatross 7. Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus 8. I Look in People’s Windows 9. The Manuscript 10. I Hate It Here 11. Robin 12. The Black Dog 13. How Did It End? 14. Peter 15. ThanK you aIMee TTPD + The Anthology OVERALL 1. So High School 2. Fortnight 3. The Alchemy 4. But Daddy I Love Him 5. I’mgonnagetyouback 6. The Prophecy 7. Clara Bow 8. My Boy Only Breaks His Favourite Toys 9. The Tortured Poets Department 10. I Can Do It With a Broken Heart 11. Down Bad 12. The Bolter 13. Cassandra 14. The Albatross 15. Fresh Out The Slammer 16. I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can) 17. Florida! 18. loml 19. Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus 20. Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me 21. So Long, London 22. Guilty as Sin? 23. I Look in People’s Windows 24. The Manuscript 25. I Hate It Here 26. The Black Dog 27. How Did It End? 28. Robin 29. Peter 30. The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived 31. ThanK you aIMee
Ok a few more points, I had a bit of mixed bag with this one, on very first impression a lot of it did seem to blend or remind me of past Taylor songs/production or even other artists that Jack and Aaron had worked with, although they were still catchy in and of themselves and had some variance in melody still, so it can be seen in two lights at the same time iykwim. and Also Jack and Aaron respectively still came out with some standouts like Fortnight and So High School which had some different flavours on this record. Some of the songs were a little more on the shorter side, or some of the lyrics which could be attributed to the same topics about the 3 relationships of late (and sometimes some songs seemed like they could be a composite) maybe went on a bit much and had some clunkier moments/sounding a bit too wordy like it could be perhaps trying to play up the whole 'Tortured poets' angle theme a little, whilst others I thought she wrote more evenly well on. OTOH theres also the level of perhaps tiresome saturation with it all to some that dont particularly care for it and finding ultra personal lyrics kinda fatiguing with her atm. Theres a sliding scale of where Taylor has gotten to with the fame and her personal life becoming a circus in the public eye, and I wrote a bit more about how that might be viewed as either being self aware and tongue in cheek (particularly with some of the song titles and lyric moments on this album) leaning in to pander to her audience (some sections of which are perhaps a little enthusiastic shall we say at times) and she knows really eat all this up, or, she could be caught in that out of touch relatability with regular life since she became famous young and built up all this backstory of her love life and feuds with Kimye etc all her career, either which way if you want to remove all that from your interpretation of the lyrics, songs like Guilty as Sin, Who's afraid of Little old me, Smallest Man and Thank You Aimee (with some caveats because some parts seem pretty specific) might become a little more palatable I guess YMMV. haha.
Part 2 mini thoughts: Back to the songs musically, I liked the groove of several songs like imgonnagetyouback (similar wordplay isnt that big of a deal for any copright/interpolation although the timing is sus I tend to agree), The Alchemy, Down Bad etc. There were some vauguely Country Taylor sounds on ones like But Daddy I Love Him, I Can Fix Him. She sounded a bit Lana esque in the vocals on bits of Fortnight and So Long London. So High School was a bit cheesy in the lyrics (but also hitting that nostalgic funnybone with the references to American Pie and GTA lol), but the musical vibe I liked and it reminded me a little of something 90's like Kiss Me by Sixpence or something. I read somewhere The names in Sam Marcus and friends (lol) could be reference to Matty's supposed being Bi and Taylor wondering who he's with now just thoughtfully or something, Cassandra I explained is from Greek mythology, 'Cassandra Truth' is used in tropes and metaphors to describe where someone raises warnings and stuff that could be valid, but they arent believed/dismissed kinda similar to boy who cried wolf fable. Its been debated whether Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist was supposed to be a sarcastic in joke between them or something haha Although maybe he could capitalise off it maybe by putting something out. Anyways I think This was as I said a bit of a mixed bag but between just TTPD and Cowboy Carter in terms of AOTY contention, I think CC exucuted its vision a little more focused like, although there was rumours some of the Grammy voters didnt actually listen to Midnights and voted just based on Taylor's big year with TIME and the Eras tour and everything. But also YMMV on awards shows actual merit, but also theres still some room left in the eiligibility period and what else could be nominated, but I'd give it to Beyonce out of these two. I also think that Midnights (Standard version) 'pop's a little bit more than TTPD as a whole, just that theres a lot of tracks here (and possibly a few more laid back songs sonically) spreads it out a bit so on the surface/taken as a whole it dosent seem as in your face IYKWIM. Anyways that'll do for now. Another fun ep!
Got a reaction suggestion. Not sure if uv heard of Fujii Kaze, a really cool Japanese artist. Consider checkn him out. Esp his song Workn Hard or Garden. Most his videos hv English subtitles n r sung in part English. Oh also he did a cool npr tiny desk performance that was damn good too. Anyhoos just throwing his name out to ya. He’s really big abroad n growing.
ORDER MY BOOK WEREWOLVES HIDE RIGHT NOW!
All Formats on Amazon -
a.co/d/avP5Jxk
Other Digital Storefronts (Apple Books, Barnes and Noble etc.) -
books2read.com/werewolveshide
Ok My ranking would be about a 6.5 or 7ish after some listens and some time with it. I'll post my lengthy thoughtsstream on Discord for now and do a more concise bit here later, but for now here's my go at Track rankings (did one for each part and overall) ;)
TTPD First part:
1. Fortnight
2. The Alchemy
3. But Daddy I Love Him
4. Clara Bow
5. My Boy Only Breaks His Favourite Toys
6. I Can Do It With a Broken Heart
7. The Tortured Poets Department
8. Down Bad
9. Fresh Out The Slammer
10. I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)
11. Florida!
12. loml
13. Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me
14. So Long, London
15. Guilty as Sin?
16. The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived
TTPD The Anthology:
1. So High School
2. I’mgonnagetyouback
3. The Prophecy
4. The Bolter
5. Cassandra
6. The Albatross
7. Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus
8. I Look in People’s Windows
9. The Manuscript
10. I Hate It Here
11. Robin
12. The Black Dog
13. How Did It End?
14. Peter
15. ThanK you aIMee
TTPD + The Anthology OVERALL
1. So High School
2. Fortnight
3. The Alchemy
4. But Daddy I Love Him
5. I’mgonnagetyouback
6. The Prophecy
7. Clara Bow
8. My Boy Only Breaks His Favourite Toys
9. The Tortured Poets Department
10. I Can Do It With a Broken Heart
11. Down Bad
12. The Bolter
13. Cassandra
14. The Albatross
15. Fresh Out The Slammer
16. I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)
17. Florida!
18. loml
19. Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus
20. Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me
21. So Long, London
22. Guilty as Sin?
23. I Look in People’s Windows
24. The Manuscript
25. I Hate It Here
26. The Black Dog
27. How Did It End?
28. Robin
29. Peter
30. The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived
31. ThanK you aIMee
Ok a few more points, I had a bit of mixed bag with this one, on very first impression a lot of it did seem to blend or remind me of past Taylor songs/production or even other artists that Jack and Aaron had worked with, although they were still catchy in and of themselves and had some variance in melody still, so it can be seen in two lights at the same time iykwim. and Also Jack and Aaron respectively still came out with some standouts like Fortnight and So High School which had some different flavours on this record.
Some of the songs were a little more on the shorter side, or some of the lyrics which could be attributed to the same topics about the 3 relationships of late (and sometimes some songs seemed like they could be a composite) maybe went on a bit much and had some clunkier moments/sounding a bit too wordy like it could be perhaps trying to play up the whole 'Tortured poets' angle theme a little, whilst others I thought she wrote more evenly well on. OTOH theres also the level of perhaps tiresome saturation with it all to some that dont particularly care for it and finding ultra personal lyrics kinda fatiguing with her atm.
Theres a sliding scale of where Taylor has gotten to with the fame and her personal life becoming a circus in the public eye, and I wrote a bit more about how that might be viewed as either being self aware and tongue in cheek (particularly with some of the song titles and lyric moments on this album) leaning in to pander to her audience (some sections of which are perhaps a little enthusiastic shall we say at times) and she knows really eat all this up, or, she could be caught in that out of touch relatability with regular life since she became famous young and built up all this backstory of her love life and feuds with Kimye etc all her career, either which way if you want to remove all that from your interpretation of the lyrics, songs like Guilty as Sin, Who's afraid of Little old me, Smallest Man and Thank You Aimee (with some caveats because some parts seem pretty specific) might become a little more palatable I guess YMMV. haha.
Part 2 mini thoughts:
Back to the songs musically, I liked the groove of several songs like imgonnagetyouback (similar wordplay isnt that big of a deal for any copright/interpolation although the timing is sus I tend to agree), The Alchemy, Down Bad etc. There were some vauguely Country Taylor sounds on ones like But Daddy I Love Him, I Can Fix Him. She sounded a bit Lana esque in the vocals on bits of Fortnight and So Long London. So High School was a bit cheesy in the lyrics (but also hitting that nostalgic funnybone with the references to American Pie and GTA lol), but the musical vibe I liked and it reminded me a little of something 90's like Kiss Me by Sixpence or something.
I read somewhere The names in Sam Marcus and friends (lol) could be reference to Matty's supposed being Bi and Taylor wondering who he's with now just thoughtfully or something, Cassandra I explained is from Greek mythology, 'Cassandra Truth' is used in tropes and metaphors to describe where someone raises warnings and stuff that could be valid, but they arent believed/dismissed kinda similar to boy who cried wolf fable. Its been debated whether Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist was supposed to be a sarcastic in joke between them or something haha Although maybe he could capitalise off it maybe by putting something out.
Anyways I think This was as I said a bit of a mixed bag but between just TTPD and Cowboy Carter in terms of AOTY contention, I think CC exucuted its vision a little more focused like, although there was rumours some of the Grammy voters didnt actually listen to Midnights and voted just based on Taylor's big year with TIME and the Eras tour and everything. But also YMMV on awards shows actual merit, but also theres still some room left in the eiligibility period and what else could be nominated, but I'd give it to Beyonce out of these two. I also think that Midnights (Standard version) 'pop's a little bit more than TTPD as a whole, just that theres a lot of tracks here (and possibly a few more laid back songs sonically) spreads it out a bit so on the surface/taken as a whole it dosent seem as in your face IYKWIM. Anyways that'll do for now. Another fun ep!
What did SuperJersh say about Guilty as sin?????
Got a reaction suggestion. Not sure if uv heard of Fujii Kaze, a really cool Japanese artist.
Consider checkn him out. Esp his song Workn Hard or Garden. Most his videos hv English subtitles n r sung in part English. Oh also he did a cool npr tiny desk performance that was damn good too.
Anyhoos just throwing his name out to ya. He’s really big abroad n growing.
😩✍🏻📝🏢🎶🩶