Music Review: Taylor Swift's 'The Tortured Poets Department' is great sad pop, meditative

by MARIA SHERMAN Who knew what Taylor Swift's latest era would bring? Or even what it would sound like? Would it build off the moodiness of “Midnights” or the folk of “evermore”? The country or the '80s pop of her latest re-records? Or its two predecessors in black-and-white covers: the revenge-pop of “Reputation” and the literary Americana of “folklore”?

And there are surprises. The lead single and opener “Fortnight” is “1989” grown up — and features Post Malone. It might seem like a funny pairing, but it's a long time coming: Since at least 2018, Swift's fans have known of her love for Malone's “Better Now.” Even before Florence Welch kicks off her verse in “Florida!!!,” the chorus' explosive repetition of the song title hits hard with nostalgic 2010s indie rock, perhaps an alt-universe Swiftian take on Sufjan Stevens' “Illinois.

Elsewhere, Swift holds up a mirror to her melodrama and melancholy — she's crying at the gym, don't tell her about “sad,” is she allowed to cry? She died inside, she thinks you might want her dead; she thinks she might just die. She listens to the voices that tell her “Lights, camera, bitch, smile / Even when you want to die," as she sings on “I Can Do It with a Broken Heart,” a song about her own performances — onstage and as a public figure.

In life, Bow later attempted suicide and was sent to an asylum — the same institution that appears on “Who's Afraid of Little Old Me?” “Clara Bow” works as an allegory and a cautionary tale for Swift, the same way Stevie Nicks' “Mabel Normand" — another tragic silent film star — functioned for the Fleetwood Mac star.

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