It honestly takes a special kind of narcissist to turn a country-wide solar eclipse into hype for your new album. Honestly, we should have seen it coming. This is Taylor Swift, after all. On Friday, Taylor deleted everything from her social media accounts, oh-so-obviously telegraphing that something big was about to happen. Then, as the national media prepared for wall-to-wall eclipse coverage, Taylor Swift dropped her new music video:
Wait, what? That’s the wrong video. Here’s the right one music video:
Honestly, I could see Tay jamming out to that. It’s a banger. We would say that she was culturally appropriating though, because we’re haters. Here’s the real video Taylor dropped just as the eclipse was about to happen on the West Coast:
— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) August 21, 2017
This is a snake. Taylor’s posting snake sh-t to let us know that something’s coming. Kim Kardashian was the one who first called Taylor a snake and Kim really got it stick. Ever since The Receipts of 2016, Taylor and the snake emoji are simpatico. So of course Taylor is trying to turn a negative into a positive, and simply owning the fact that yes, she’s a manipulative snake. If I thought that was her 2017 brand, I would be all for it. But I genuinely feel like we’re going to be in for MONTHS of interviews about how badly she was treated and how Tom Hiddleston and Calvin Harris and Kim Kardashian and Katy Perry all victimized her and traumatized her.
Lainey theorized that Taylor’s new music will be coming out later this week, or that Taylor will suddenly turn up at the VMAs on Sunday with a performance of a new song. Did you guys remember that Katy Perry is hosting this year’s VMAs? And did you remember that the VMAs are airing at the same time as the Game of Thrones finale? While Taylor would love to trump Katy and she would love to be the biggest deal at the VMAs, I think Taylor is self-aware enough to realize that dragons trump snakes. I’m just saying… if I was in Taylor’s position, I would sit out this year’s VMAs and make the album promotion happen on another day. Then again, she did try to make the eclipse all about herself, so anything goes.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
She knows PR. I cannot name her song and she is never naked, but she is still famous world wide…
The thing is she’s often scantily clad, it’s just that she’s so completely devoid of sex appeal that she always seems more covered up than, say, Miley.
I agree there. But she NEVER rubs her crotch and such on stage. Those are the things that made Miley seem so gross, & I never found Miley very sexy when she did those things either, just gross.
She’s so vanilla to me you might as well whip her up into soft serve and put her into a basic ass waffle cone
That’s kind of hilarious. Good for her for embracing it! I hope it’s in a tongue-in-cheek owning it way and not a whingey “everyone has wronged me” way.
This.
What are the chances? Ten bucks and a Target hot dog says that it’s about Kanye and Kim.
Exactly…this girl knows how to hold a GRUDGE!!!
I mean she’s a special type of narcissist so this would not surprise me at all. Luckily I’ve never been a fan of Taylor swift (personally or professionally) and I’m not about to start now.
Can’t wait to see how this rollout happens. She’s going to shed her former identity for a new one. She’s a snake personified
I get cross-eyed trying to parse the levels of meta narcissism in most celebrity shenanigans but I have to hand it to La Swift. She’s a master. I wonder if there remains a real person behind it all or celebs disappear so far up their own fundaments curating their own lives and other people’s opinions of them, image and actual person just blur into one?
I know people that went to school with her and she was always this vain. Again mentally she never matured past 15. From the blinds I’ve read surrounding the “squad” a lot of the models are especially over her and Selena. PR ops but they don’t really like her beyond that. I believe it honestly.
And I think everyone has a shelf life. I guess the trick for a celebrity is realising when you’ve reached your Best Before date – because smoke and mirrors won’t cut it permanently.
I think that’s part of the reason she can’t ever quite fully disappear, she always needs to have the last word. And it always needs to be “Everyone is sooooo meaaaaaannn to meeeee”.
IDGAF about Ye Olde Swifty, but that broad is a marketing genius
Some people keep saying that but they provide zero evidence. She screwed up royally with Kanye and Hiddleston. And all this talk of transformation? She’s gone from a fake Southern country singer to an equally fake fake New Yorker. How is this being equated to Madonna levels of image reinvention? All she did was buy a new condo in a different city and drop the fake accent.
She continues to write the. same. material. I don’t really care if it has a guitar or a pop beat.
I am not impressed either.
No one is buying what she’s selling with Baby Joe.
I don’t think it’s a snake , I think it’s more a dragon and her fans are expecting another part of it today . TBH I cannot wait for new music from TSwift, and P!nks albums due this autumn too so I’m happy .
I didn’t know Pink had a new album coming out and now my morning is made! 🙂
Oct 13th if I’m not mistaken, I like her new song but I’m hoping for something more on the album, she’s so underrated I think.
I thought the same thing! Just made me think of Game of Thrones..is she making an appearance as Mother of Snakes? XD
yea, it’s not a snake.
I am totally expecting a cameo from her in next week’s game of thrones, lol
I also think it’s a dragon and she has a cameo in GoT like her buddy Ed.
“She took the insult as a compliment. Shit! She could become invulnerable. ”
Peep show applicable to Tay show.
https://mobile.twitter.com/peepshowqotd/status/715642425889406978?lang=en
Also, Radiohead did it first. Still effective though.
Doubt her fans know who are Radiohead…
I… like both… I’d pretend to be more ashamed if this wasn’t the internet, but hey here we are.
Does radiohead count as dad rock now?
SO THIS!!!
Yes, I belt out Exit Music (for a Film) AND Shake it off!
I think there are things more shameful than this.
And, full disclosure, I’m fascinated by her PR and marketing game.
Save a few missteps she is good and I liked her answer in 73 questions with vogue about the advice she’d give to someone who wanted to enter show business: get a good lawyer. I like that she wasn’t “believe in your dreams”, “drink fairy juice”, “wish upon a star”.
THIS is the real Swift IMO. Pragmatic, business savvy. I wish she would embrace it more.
Dad rock? I listen to older artists, most of them now dead. But art is timeless. And i don’t see younger ones paying attention to that artistic part. They are marketing, pr, fast music, fast fashion. They have so much to learn.
I loooooove Radiohead. I saw them at Red Rocks in Colorado, and it was the best musical experience of my life.
I do think a well made song is a well made song. Pop songs can be just as well made as something more complex. “Catchy” can seem so easy, but a million songwriters try and fail at that goal everyday. There is no secret receipt for a great hook. The production on her Red album was incredible. I was in a store, held captive to listening to Trouble, and I had to admit: damn, that is a very well made pop song.
Didn’t Radiohead delete and then almost immediately release a new single? Taylor remains the ultimate tease. I’m betting her fans are loving the drama and the anticipation.
Everything is copy! A good 90% of her inspiration is from haters lol
Sometimes I feel like we are a bit too judgmental with Taylor Swift. Is she really a that bad? Okay so she’d had a bunch of boyfriends, how does that make her toxic? Lots of artists have publicity stunts done to stay in the spotlight, why would Swift be any different. I do believe we are being extra severe with her I really do. Just saying.
Its about her using feminism to make album sales and then keepin her mouth shut for acutal womens issues or on Trump. Notice also how her squad always defended her, how often did she stand up for other women?
Also the whole innocent white woman gets brutalized by the brutish black man narrative certainly didnt help her.
Also dont fake date and use those showmances for your songs and then be upset when someone makes jokes about it. Clooney and DiCaprio had to live with jokes too and they dont incorporate their love life into their work like she does.
To be fair. She kicked that radio host’s arse. She sounded very mature and i feel like more women realized what is not appropriate. Its Angelina effect.
She does not need to stuck her nose in politics. And we all know Kanye is not really sane person. Even his friends are no longer friends with him. Give her credit for standing up for herself and donating money to abused women.
Clooney didn’t exactly shrug off the joke, he got married to Unicorn Amal…
Well that about sums it up!
QueenB…. Swifty is the only one I know of to donate $250,000 to Kesha during her time of need. She put her money where mouth is. Who else did that?
Yup, her version of feminism is that all women should support her, which is selfish and idiotic. Having said that, she gave a ton of money to Kesha during her career blackballing and handled the groping trial perfectly (though I suspect her lawyers deserve a lot of the credit for that).
Swifty is the only one I know of to donate $250,000 to Kesha during her time of need. <— Yup, and Taylor made darn sure you knew it too.
Not a Taylor’s work fan, but Clooney and DiCaprio are actors, she writes her own songs, so she talks about her life. Also, I don’t remember that Clooney and DiCaprio have been insulted like women in the same situation : there is a complete double-standard about these jokes : a man is a womanizer, a woman is a slut.
Also, men are using their private life in their songs, sometimes in a very problematic way (Eminem is the first one who came in my mind), but no one cares : they are not hated that much.
Most of female artists use the “feminist brand” , and have very contradictory behavior, for an exemple supporting famous pervs like Woody Allen, Terry Richardson, and never supporting women victims of abuses (Kesha, Amber Heard …)
I find Taylor Swift annoying, but she doesn’t deserve all of this hate, in my opinion.
The lowkey racist stunt she pulled on Kanye made me cancel her for life. Of course she can own That particular type of snakeness under a trump presidency. That broad is disgusting.
It was a stunt on Kanye but it wasnt racist
Yes it was. Dog whistles and everything.
Yes it was. The dog whistles were so obvious even this slightly hard of hearing human heard them loud and clear.
Yes it was racist — she used the destructive, pervasive, insidious narrative that “black = scary” to her advantage.
It was racist and ugly.
She’s thin, pretty and blonde. That’s all it takes.
So i am. But stop with stereotypes. Not talking about Swifty but in general. Do u think i got free passes for that in life? Nope. I had to defend every choice i made until i said fck it. And this thing about tall ans skinny blondes just hurts me. It does not hurt any man.
“That’s all it takes” for people to root for her downfall.
I think what she did to Kanye is enough of a reason not to like her. It was so self serving and such a blatant lie to try to paint Kanye as something he wasn’t… It felt really racist and just all around wrong. He informed her about the song. He called her up on the phone. Then she gets up on stage and acts like the big bad black guy was mean to her!! Uh, yeah Taylor, you knew about it.
Ok im no TS aplogist and correct me if im wrong but didnt kanye only tell her about the line about having sex with her and not about making her famous? That latter would piss me off, I wouldnt want any man taking credit for what i earned
It wasn’t a serious song, and the lyrics about her were the most inane stupid crap. She USED him to get a standing ovation at the Grammy’s for being so brave, all the while she was lying through her teeth. She knew about the song. Maybe not every minute detail, but she told him to rap about whatever he wanted, and he said he didn’t want to rap about her if it would hurt her feelings. She told him to go ahead with it, and then turned around and tried to make herself a victim. it was unfair, and Kanye didn’t deserve that.
Sorry but he needed to be clear, that is not a little detail that is taking credit for what she accomplished. Also lets stop giving Kanye a pass, remember he also tried steal Becks thunder also so there is pattern there.
UMYEAH- Nope, he told her about the famous line as well, except he didn’t say “bitch”. She even agreed with him saying he could sing that line because he didn’t know of her before the show, so it’s his truth. There is nothing to defend her on this.
UmYeah, no she knew about that line, they have a whole chat about it.
Guys go back read the transcript like i did, he never told her about that line
Wow, it’s amazing how many people will agree to anything this chick tells them to believe in order to defend her. LISTEN TO THE TAPE. And may I remind you that her first- I repeat first- line of defense was to deny wholesale that she knew anything at all about the song or that a conversation had ever taken place? The song that she in fact said was “tongue-in-cheek” on a call with him? Only after the tapes came out did she backtrack and inexplicably claim that she felt great about the “we might still have sex” line but didn’t like the “I made that b*&*& famous” line. Because that makes sense. And is feminist. And is totally supported by logic and evidence. Except that it’s not.
http://people.com/celebrity/kanye-west-and-taylor-swift-famous-phone-call-transcript/ for those who want a refresher
I cannot stand Taylor Swift or Kanye West but not a single one of you know what was actually said in that conversation and you can listen to that “recording” a million times and you still never will. All parties admit that the “recording” was of a much longer conversation. You do not know what was discussed in the much longer period of time. You do not know what was edited in or out of the badly edited “recording” that was presented to you by a person who was not part of the conversation, who was not the person who recorded or edited the material, was not even present when the conversation took place but had a grudge and a tv show to promote months after the conversation and the alleged insult took place. The only thing that “recording” proves is that Kk had a badly edited (you can HEAR the splices) recording of somebody else’s conversation, not what was actually said by either party. As an attorney, this sort of thing drives me batty. You want to prove something by a recording? Full, unedited version from the people responsible for making and maintaining it who must testify to its legitimacy. Not this crap. BTW a caring spouse of someone who is displaying mental health issues steers the spouse away from this sort of thing instead of exploiting it to promote herself and her TV show.
FACT: Taylor Swift sent her publicist to Buzzed with an official statement claiming that he never called for approval, and that no conversation between them had ever taken place. She also told him that she didn’t agree with him releasing a song with misogynistic lyrics….such as the one that she actually APPROVED.
“Kanye did not call for approval, but to ask Taylor to release his single ‘Famous’ on her Twitter account. She declined and cautioned him about releasing a song with such a strong misogynistic message. Taylor was never made aware of the actual lyric, ‘I made that bitch famous.'”
You can get as technical and legal as you want with this, but the fact remains that she was caught red-handed not only lying about having never discussed the song with him in the first place, but also about having gotten feminist on the guy when she in fact said she found the lyric ‘tongue in cheek’ and ‘complimentary.’ She loses.
@lightpurple
I can’t agree with you enough.
She exploited Kanye’s mental illness and continues to do so. There are no words for her. None.
The night Kanye grabbed Taylor’s award & said Beyonce deserved it instead was shocking and just an awful move on his part, so I can’t put all the blame on Taylor for that feud. But what I don’t like about Taylor is the fact she sings about people she has a beef with, often exes, & then spills who it’s about. I can understand people sing about their lives, but it’s the hints which clearly signal who the song is about which miffs me. This obvious calling out by her might be through the name of song, a line in the song, a comment in an interview or awards show. But this passive aggressive behavior towards those she doesn’t like is not nice.
Agreed, everyone writes song about people and experiences but there is a lot to be said about being subtle which she rarely is
I 100% agree with you. There are going to be people that s”” on her no matter what. Always too something. Too many boyfriends, too vanilla, too fake.
She is extremely media savvy, but she is a also consummate professional. I can’t even remember a time she had to cancel a concert because she doesn’t want to disappoint. Even when a man grabs her ass she didn’t stop greeting her fans because they had been waiting. When have you ever heard of a time she was awful to her fans?
She isn’t nearly naked to sell things, and you never find a sex tape or a photo of her doing a line off a bathroom counter.
She writes her own music, she signed a publishing contract at the age of 14! She sells boatloads of records, and wins tons of awards. Even if you don’t like her music you can’t deny she doesn’t put out music that A LOT of people love.
The snake is shedding her skin
Ooo
I now want her to do a snake dance ala britney spears
Maybe she should get the snake charmer and do the Snake Dance
Speaking of Game of Thrones, Taylor Swift is a bit like the book version of Tyene Sand, Oberyn’s third daughter, all blonde hair and blue eyes and a super sweet exterior although believed to be his most deadliest child with a real gift for poisons.
They adapted her differently for the show where she’s seemingly composited with another daughter and only stands out from the other two because Cersei poisions her and she utters the infamous “bad pussy” line.
I’m indifferent to Swift really but when I saw the snake video, I thought Sand Snake and realised the GoT producers missed out on a stunt casting opportunity that aligns closer with the book counterpart and the persona Swift is finally embracing!
Ed Sheeran in GoT was bad enough.
Yes, thank you QueenB
It would have been funnier if it wasn’t happening a year after the fact. Not that it will make a difference, as I’m sure she will still shovel in money.
The VMAs have been losing viewership pretty steadily for years, and I’m not sure even La Diabla Blanca could make people tune into it rather than a GoT finale.
Because T Swift just couldn’t be eclipsed by an actual, event-of-the-century eclipse. She is SUCH a brat. Lol. Welcome back, Taylor.
You cannot fault her instict for generating press, she’s good.
I didn’t even hear about her stunt until late yesterday evening. Surely her stunt didn’t “eclipse” the eclipse itself.
only in the world of swifties.
@Nicole True.
i will be curious to see how she has evoled musically. Will it still be bubble gum pop? Will it be more country? Will it be darker and more rock oriented?
Edit: this was a response to above comment by Lolo
Her “feminist” brand is all about supporting Taylor swift and not dragging her for good reason. She’s vain and annoying and whines when things don’t go her way. She trashes her exes as if they are all the devil and besides one relationship I’ve owned sweaters for longer.
But the Kanye thing and her inserting herself into the very valid critique she was leveling at the MTV awards was the last straw for me.
It’s the same with Selena Gomez who tries to insert herself into fued lesbian then got dragged for being a Latina when convenient for her (i.e. when it’s easy). There’s better people to support
Honestly, I don’t mind this. Actually I’m kind of into it. I’m more baffled at MTV’s stupidity (because let’s call it what it is). Airing the VMAs on the same night as GOT’s season finale? Really?
Right? I feel like the VMAs already aren’t a big deal anymore and now they’re airing the same night as the finale? Kinda feels like they’re putting nails in the coffin..
Taylor is getting exactly what she wanted. People who love and hate her and everything in between are talking about this and trying to figure out what it means. I hope her PR team is very well compensated because they are very smart!
I personally don’t mind Taylor Swift, I enjoy her music. She’s my choice for basic pop lol
I remember the VMAs being a big deal when I was a teenager in the 90s. Maybe they weren’t, and it’s just how I remember them. However, music videos were more important then too. We had TRL and MTV actually played the videos. Now they don’t seem as important. Maybe I’m just an old, out of touch 30 something. Definitely won’t be tuning in to the VMAs over GoT. Especially since MTV repeats them 500 times.
Didn’t she donate money to Kesha when all her other contemporaries were content to just sit and watch? But yea..bad feminist. Nobody can live up to your ideals. Even you. Don’t post a reply. I won’t be back here.
Yeah…and? Kesha had plenty of people donate money to her, many of which requested to stay anonymous. She said so herself. Also, one act does’t erase all the garbage she’s done and still continues to do to people in the name of money and ego. Sorry.
God, please, please, stop calling her a PR genius. She has a whole management team behind herself. Lawyers, assistants, producers. And like someone else said it before. Radiohead did it first, just her bubble gum fans have no clue who Radiohead is. And THAT is the biggest shame of all.
This.
She is a PR wiz or at least savvy enough to hire smart people and actually listen to them. She cultivated an image of herself and has been at the top or near it for a long time. Last year was a mis-step of a sort. I’m neither a fan nor a hater. It will be interesting to me to see how this next album goes. It has to be really good, as I believe she has no public good will left.
I don’t like her PR. It is so heavy handed there is a large list of negatives associated with her image. Adults don’t readily admit they listen to her music and when someone doesn’t like her it is baked in and intractable. She is close to becoming cool not to like and that is nearly impossible to recover from. Obvious and insincere are words I would use for her.
Meanwhile Tom Hiddleston is winning the war on who is the most private of the exes.
True – but sad. Miss him.
He was spotted by RADA today! Out quietly working on a fundraiser that will benefit students for years to come.
I don’t think she’s ugly, but she has to stop using so much eye makeup. The snake eyes style doesn’t look very good on her. Kind of weird and creepy
Let her be already !!!! She remains undaunted . How many can rise from the ashes after the receipt meltdown? A world where Kim is the Queen and Taylor’s , a snake…what a world!
When Taylor rolls out this new re-brand/album it’s going to be done within in inch of it’s life. She knows that people really got tried of her last year and made fun of her (which she hates!) which is why I don’t think she’ll do the “poor me” tour in the press. She’s too savvy and knows it will go down like a lead ballon.
Yep, haters gonna hate. Hilarious.
I don’t understand all the hate for Taylor on this site. I adore her and think she’s an awesome person compared to KK or Katy Perry. Taylor has never used a sex tape to get famous and continue to piggyback from that and now famous to be famous or she has never insulted a mentally ill person and failed to know math and science were related. She loves her fans, she is very charitable, and as we saw last week, she’s also a strong woman. So why all the hate?
oh lord. Please just look at all her past crap. So what if she does charity. It doesn’t erase all the crap she’s done to people. She’s a perpetual victim, uses racist dog whistle terms to her advantage, and pretends to be a feminist while blasting another female over backup dancers.
And that’s just from the last year.
She did take davantage of Kanye’s illness betting on the fact no one would believe him and if it wasn’t for the Day of Receipts no one would have. All the while being racist. I proudly despise her.
The only thing that pisses me off about her behavior is the fact she disses all her exes in her songs, then won’t actually name who they are about so claims innocence, but instead she gives these huge hints through the lyrics, song titles, interviews or even comments during an awards ceremony to out who the diss songs are about. I find it hard to believe that nearly EVERY ex bf did her wrong. I only have one ex out of many that treated me quite badly. The others, well, we just didn’t mesh well, but I never felt the need to talk badly of them, except for one real creep like I said. Either she chooses bf’s very unwisely, or she isn’t mature enough to realize that the other is not always to blame.
All I ever think of when I see that pic of her in the black and rainbow houndstooth two-piece is how she farted on stage. My kids had the awards show on and I walked up to the tv to get a good look at the fabric and she was introducing her Wildest Dreams video when that fart ripped!!! All i could think was “is this what I have been missing by not watching these awards shows?” LOL She can deny it all she wants but I heard what I heard.
Well we all fart lol.
She has a contract with AT&T right? Direct TV exclusive channel or the like?
Will anyone else who uses a snake in their PR be sued is my question. Another short video was released today that is more obviously a snake, the snake is getting closer, we get it Taylor. You’re closing in on us.
For someone who sings the Shake It Off anthem, girl sure knows how to hold a grudge. Shake It Off? More like Keep It In and Combust.
Life didn’t stop because there was an eclipse. I feel like it’s reaching to imagine some sinister attempt to overshadow the eclipse just because Taylor Swift did something the same day.
Isn’t the whole point of a SM purge to proclaim a clean slate and a new start, to say that what comes next is not like before? Then she goes and posts a snake on said clean slate. What a wasted statement. All it does it remind people of past events and make it abundantly clear that she just can’t let it go. No growth, no introspection, no maturity. I was looking forward to seeing Taylor openly embrace her strength, not caring what the world thought, or what others said about her, but I don’t think that’s going to happen.
If all her creative energies go into responding to what others say about her, it becomes abundantly clear that she has nothing significant of her own to say. Taylor Swift seems to exist only as a reflection of the attention she gets from others.
Your words are spot on. It’s reminiscent of Trump actually with everyone is so mean to me!” whinery. He silences his opposition with gaslighting. Tay does the same thing.
I don’t get the big deal about whatever it was she posted, and the VMAs are pointless. My money is on her appearing on something on August 31st, because 31 backwards is 13 and that’s how silly she is.
Unpopular opinion: I think she dumped Hiddleston because he’s so *on* all the time that he’s exhausting.
And Snake isn’t exhausting with her “all the ddrama all the time” and her ME ME ME selfish persona. Yeah right. She is so lovely that all her RS end rather fast. Besides this regular Joe but he is not a human but gost, so we don’t count him.
I’m genuinely curious to see what direction the Swift PR machine takes this time around. She badly needs a reinvention and the idea of “embracing her inner snake” is intriguing, but for the life of me I can’t see her making it work. It’s hard to go from “poor me, Victim” to Slytherin pride, no?
I’m nobody, but, personally, I think Taylor Swift is way too invested in being likeable to pull that transition off.
She tried with Blank Space. People liked that she owned that man eater image…then she backtracked by referring to it as “satire”.