No. 54 - Loving him was red (Kool Kids version) edition
Unearthing my 2012 interview with Taylor Swift who was on the eve of her pop cross-over
Back in 2012, I interviewed Taylor Swift for the Toronto edition of the now defunct Metro newspaper. I wrote an entertainment column for them for five years, but almost none of that content is available online. With Swift hitting Canada for the final leg of her Eras tour this month, I figured it was time to dig up this conversation and save it online for posterity.
The interview happened about five days before she dropped her fourth album Red. Swift was pretty famous at this point, but still known mostly as a country cross-over artist. That would change. Red was the transition point between her time in Nashville and her arrival in the broader pop milieu that she would dominate after 1989. Shortly after Red’s release, she basically went supernova and has never come back down to earth.
Admittedly, I knew very little about Swift or her music at this point. What was on my radar was the typical tabloid stuff: who she was dating, the Kanye incident at the 2009 VMAs. But in digging through his discography for the interview, I became a fan (though not a Stan) and my admiration for her continues to this day.
My memories of our conversation are a bit fuzzy — it was only 10 minutes on the phone, and came together very quickly so there wasn’t a lot of time to dig into things. What stands out was how practiced she already was at answering questions without revealing too much of herself, a key (though annoying) skill for any pop star looking to build a wall between their public and personal lives. I also remember the stipulations from her PR team: no questions about her dating life; no questions about the incident with Kanye; keep it focused on the music. Given that stipulation, I asked for an advanced copy of the record and was flatly told “no.” The record leaked the day before the interview, but still!
Local indie hero Owen Pallet did some of the orchestration on this album. That would have been a great local angle to pursue, but it was a fact I did not know until after the album came out because pirated copies don’t generally include liner notes. Publicists, please take note!
My stories for Metro were supposed to be 300 words with an additional 100-word sidebar (which you’ll see under the “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” video), so I didn’t have a lot of room to work with.
Digging through my notes from our conversation something that didn’t make the final piece was a discussion about how she works with collaborators. "Most of the time, I’ll come up with five to 10 different ideas that I’d record and bring to the writers, like Max [Martin] or Dan [Wilson] and tell them the background story behind the song,” she said. “It’s always really important that it feels natural and like a true collaboration. I want you to be able to hear their influence.”
She talked about the kinds of songwriting she was attracted to — “where the lyrics painted graphic pictures” — citing James Taylor, Tracy Chapman, and Joni Mitchell as examples. She also elaborated on her connection to country music and how it’s influenced her overall approach to songwriting, something that I’d argue continues to be present in her best songs to this day. “I’m always going to be a country artist because that’s home to me — the innate writing style of country music is what formed me as a songwriter.”
The song “Everything Has Changed” from the album was the first — but definitely not the last — time Swift collaborated with Ed Sheeran, who had released his debut album the year previous. He reached out to her about working together and the two became “fast friends.”
Finally, in the long arc of Swift’s career, including Snow Patrol’s Gary Lightbody on Red stands out since, even at the time, her fame overshadowed his. That gap has since grown into a chasm. But Swift describes the collab as “my friend Gary stopped by,” before revealing “I was totally starstruck when I met Gary his music has really influenced mine.” That whole quote is giving very 2012 energy.
You can read the original story below.
No matter how many pop hits she scores, Taylor Swift will always be a country girl.
“In my mind I’m always going to be a country artist because that’s home to me,” says the 22-year-old Nashville-based singer. “The innate writing style of county music is what formed me as a songwriter.”
Yet after penning all the tracks on her last record, Speak Now, on her own, Swift decided to team up with a with a who’s who of pop songwriters for her fourth album, Red. “I wanted to figure out a way to push myself into a different comfort zone.”
Along with writers like Dan Wilson, who co-wrote Adele’s mega-hit “Someone Like You,” Swift enlisted the help of Max Martin, the man behind Kelly Clarkson’s “Since You’ve Been Gone,” and Britney Spears “…Baby One More Time.” Together with Martin protégé Shellback, the trio co-wrote her own current smash, the infectious and decidedly un-country “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” “really spontaneously.”
“It’s really brought something different out of this album,” she says. “I think that there are definitely influences from every genre that I’m a fan of on this record.”
Swift rocketed out of the country scene four years ago with her second album, Fearless, and her story-driven lyrics about love and heartbreak. She was famously interrupted, mid-acceptance speech, at the 2009 MTV VMAs by Kanye West, and has dated a number of high-profile celebs including John Mayer, Jake Gyllenhaal and her current beau, Conor Kennedy.
Both UK singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran and Snow Patrol’s Gary Lightbody make appearances on the record, the latter of whom, Swift points to as a source of inspiration for her cinematic lyrics. “The more you let people into the details,” she says, “the more people feel welcomed into those experiences.”
Watching the music video for “We are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” it’s hard not to notice the group of musicians dressed up as woodland creatures. Those oversized animals are actually Swift’s backing band. She says the costumes were director Declan Whitebloom’s idea and when she told the musicians, “they looked at me dead pan like, ‘This is not happening.’” Yet while filming the single-shot clip the band “got loopy,” the results or which are on the screen. “It’s the most random thing I’ve ever done in a video,” says Swift. “It makes me laugh to this day.”
Ian Gormely is a freelance music journalist based in Toronto.
Hit up koolkidsmusicclub@gmail.com for questions, criticisms, and submissions.
Kool Kids Music Club is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.