by Tana Coulon
Taylor Swift was deemed to be nothing less than a “mastermind” when she crafted her tenth studio album, Midnights. In it, Swift takes us on a musical journey, bringing thirteen sleepless nights to life through song. Through vivid flashbacks, we emerge into a pool of self-reflection for all the pestering, heartfelt, raw emotions that keep Swift awake at night. Swift took a hiatus from continuing her re-recording agenda when she announced her brand new album at the MTV VMA’s while receiving the Best Video award for “All Too Well (10 minute version) (Taylor’s Version)” on August 28th.
Swift has a prolonged history of keeping her fans on their toes. Before the album was released, she revealed the tracklist one title at a time via TikTok videos called, “Midnights Mayhem With Me.” At random, Swift drew ping pong balls in a bingo cage with numbers corresponding to tracks on the album. She then picked up the phone which told the track name. Collaborating with her on previous work, Jack Antonoff accompanied Swift in the production of Midnights and worked together to create foreign electronic sounds present throughout the album. On the fourth track, “Snow on the Beach,” singer-songwriter Lana Del Rey makes an appearance by adding in background vocals and harmonies which complimented Swift’s vocals. The track “Anti-Hero” took the number one place on the Billboard Global 200 and Billboard Global Excl. U.S. charts. According to Swift, the music video which accompanies the song was intended to portray her “nightmare scenarios and intrusive thoughts.” During one scene where Swift stands on a scale, it portrayed the word “fat,” which led to controversial backlash from some viewers, causing the scene to be removed on certain platforms, including Youtube.
Within days of initial release, Midnights managed to shatter numerous records. Swift became the first artist to own all ten spots on the Billboard Top 100 in a single frame. The album received more than 3 million sales worldwide, making it the best album debut for Swift’s career overall. Midnights also had the largest streaming week of the year after just four days, with 357 million streams, which was also the biggest streaming week in history by a female musician. When it comes to vinyl sales, Swift kills the game. Continuing with the midnight theme, Swift announced different vinyl variants which reveal a clock when they are connected. After just one day of the release, these variants evidently sparked the interest of numerous fans, having already broken the record for having the single largest sales week for vinyls at 575,000 units sold.
On November 1, 2022, Swift announced a long awaited tour via Instagram titled, “The Eras Tour,” which Swift states is “a journey through the musical eras of my career (past and present!).” Throughout the tour, Swift is to be accompanied by many other talented musiciansm including Phoebe Bridgers, HAIM, Paramore, Gracie Abrams, Beabadoobee, Girl in red, MUNA, OWENN, and GAYLE. From its initial announcement, dedicated fans had no idea what they were in for. With Ticketmaster's Verified Fan program being in charge of holding the ticket sale, a total of 3.5 million people registered with only 1.5 million receiving codes. When the presale opened on November 15th, the site was bombarded with fans on the website, causing it to crash repeatedly, making fans extremely upset. People wanting tickets waited for hours to buy them, while also having to attend work, school, and carrying on with their lives. The sale had to be rescheduled to a later time resulting in floods of complaints. November 17th was the date originally scheduled for the general sale, but seeing how the previous sale unfolded, Ticketmaster tweeted, “Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow's public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been canceled." Resale websites are selling tickets for absurdly high prices, some posting for as high as $20,000. Ticketmaster received backlash from fans and Swift and her team and is now receiving their consequences as they are under investigation by the Department of Justice for “violating federal antitrust laws, which protect consumers.”