Taylor Swift's "22"

     When I first heard Taylor Swift's new album, Red, I was slightly disappointed. I mean, I liked the songs. They were catchy and fun to sing along with, and isn't that why we all love Taylor so much? But there was something missing. What exactly was missing I hadn't quite figured out.

     Listening to some of Taylor's older songs, I finally realized what it was that Red didn't have. It was that teenage insecurity, that young, inexperienced vulnerable-ness that makes her so beloved to adolescent girls.

     I think it is safe to assume that most teenage girls can relate to Taylor Swift's "You Belong With Me." Who hasn't been the girl in the bleachers, losing the guy to the cheerleader who wears short skirts and high heels?

     But who can relate to a girl who sings about her break up with Jake Gyllenhaal? Or who sings about how hard it is being famous?

     Taylor Swift is no longer the girl in the bleachers. With a long list of celebrity ex-boyfriends and a very large bank account, not even your stereotypical cheerleader can relate to Taylor.

     Now 23 years old, Taylor Swift is beginning to grow out of her teenage angst. The songs on Red are powerful and (by Taylor Swift standards) edgier. But, if you give the lyrics a closer listen, if you read between the lines, it becomes evident that Taylor hasn't completely lost her vulnerability and naivety.

     Take, for instance, her song "22."

     When I first heard "22," I wasn't a huge fan. It sounded like a G-rated version of Katy Perry's "Last Friday Night." To be brief, the song was annoying.

     I kept listening to it anyway. (It's a fun tune to sing along with) And after hearing it for about the millionth time, I realized that maybe, just maybe, there was a little more depth to the song than I previously thought.

     Think I'm crazy? Let's have a look at the first few lines:

     It feels like a perfect night
     to dress up like hipsters
     and make fun of our exes

     It feels like a perfect night
     for breakfast at midnight
    to fall in love with strangers

     As mentioned before, Taylor Swift is 23 years old, though the song was most likely written when she was 22. But the singer of this song most certainly does not sound like 22-year-old. Rather, she sounds like a 12-year-old singing about what it must be like to be 22 years old. The idea of "dressing up" and eating "breakfast at midnight" is all very childish.

     Furthermore, the speaker's age is, in fact, somewhat ambiguous. We know Taylor Swift is literally 22 years old, but the song lyrics do not explicitly say "I am 22," but rather, "I'm feeling 22," or "keep dancing like we're 22." It is this careful selection of words that reveals the true meaning of the song.

     The fact that Taylor says she feels 22 on this particular night implies that, on a regular basis, she does not in fact feel "22." But what does it mean to "feel 22?"

     This is where the song's message becomes paradoxical.

     Being 22 is not fun. It's not easy. It's not all about dancing all night and falling in love with strangers. Let's consider these lines:

     Tonight's the night that we forget about the deadlines

     And then later,

     Tonight's the night that we forget about the heartbreaks

     Being 22 is full of "deadlines" and "heartbreaks." It's the beginning of adulthood. To steal Taylor's words, it's "miserable and magical."


     So what does Taylor do to escape the responsibility and miserableness of being 22? She creates this childish, magical concept of 22, this image of dancing all night and eating breakfast at midnight.

     We get the impression that Taylor is playing dress-up. But instead of dressing up like a hipster, as mentioned in the first line of the song, Taylor is dressing as a 22-year-old. She might as well be a 6-year-old girl wearing a princess costume saying, "Oh-oh, I don't know about you, but I'm feeling like Cinderella!"

     In this song, being "22" doesn't mean literally mean being 22 years old. Literally being 22 years old means responsibility. It means heartbreak and deadlines. To Taylor, being "22" means being carefree and childish. The song sounds like something a twelve-year-old wrote because Taylor misses the days of being young and having little responsibility.

     Taylor is not ready to grow up. She is not ready to face the heartbreaks and deadlines. That teenage insecurity that so defined many of her older songs is still apparent in "22." The most prevalent example is the voice over, "Who's Taylor Swift, anyway? Ew," which plays after the line, "this place is too crowded, too many cool kids."

     The childish insecurity of being left out among "cool kids" reflects the idea that Taylor has not yet grown up. She is still naive and inexperienced, still troubled by what others think of her.

     Now, you may be thinking that this is all far-fetched. Did Taylor really think about all of this as she was writing her song?

     There is no way for knowing for sure. Although I keep calling her by her first name, Taylor and I are not best friends. I have no idea what was running through her mind when she wrote "22." But even if this deeper meaning is completely accidental, does it make the song any less meaningful?

     If anything, it adds to the song's meaning. Here Taylor is, trying to write a grown-up song about partying and being an adult. But what does she sound like? Anything but an adult!

     Taylor Swift has a great voice, but nothing special. Her guitar-playing ability is nothing extraordinary. Yet she has record sales and millions of crazy fans. Why? Because the honesty of her lyrics, the childishness, the inexperience, make her appealing to adolescents and adults alike.

     Even when Taylor is at her most serious, even when she is trying to sound confident and experienced, she can't help but to give off innocent vibes. Her fearlessness of pouring her heart out into her music as well as the whimsy of her songs is what makes her so beloved.

     "22" is only one example of Taylor's complexity. It is a nuanced complexity, an overlooked complexity. But it is complexity that should not be ignored. At heart, Taylor is still (to quote one of her older songs) "just a girl, just trying to find a place in this world."

     And while her critics may dismiss her lyrics as overly sentimental or superficial, I can say with ninety-percent certainty that those sentimental, superficial lyrics reflect the thoughts and feelings of all those girls out there who are also trying to find a place in this world. For them, Taylor Swift is a kindred spirit. Her songs are a reassurance. These relatable qualities were a bit lost in Red, but I think, if we take a closer look, it is obvious that Taylor we all know and love is still there, hiding between the lines of each song.

     Taylor is getting older, but she hasn't quite grown up yet. And I already can't wait to see what her next album brings.








    

Kacey Musgrave's "Merry Go 'Round"

     It is very rare in country music, especially what is commonly called “new country” that you find a song that criticizes Southern or small-town life.

New country singers (examples would be Kenny Chesney, Carrie Underwood, Taylor Swift, Jason Aldean, etc.)  croon about loving life in the boondocks, motor boating on the pontoon, and speeding down dirt roads in a beat-up truck. Their tunes are energetic, happy-go-lucky, and always remind me of summertime. And as for the sad songs, they are more often than not about disillusioned love. But very rarely do the songs reflect negatively upon country life.

This is why Kacey Musgraves’s single, “Merry Go ‘Round,” caught my attention the first time I heard it on the radio.

Musgraves shows us that small town life isn’t always the easygoing lifestyle that her fellow country singers portray. Take for instance the opening lines of the song:

“If you ain’t got two kids by twenty-one

you’re probably going a die alone,

at least that’ s what tradition’s told you.”

The song continues on in this tone, questioning this “tradition” that dominates the small town (or perhaps towns?) that Musgraves sings of.  This tradition perpetuates on the symbolic “broken merry go ‘round,” and its riders “just like dust…settle in this town.”

               

        “Merry Go ‘Round” is interesting and well-written. Aside from the symbols of the merry go round and dust, there is, most notably, the clever wordplay of “merry,” marry,” and “Mary,” as well as the twisted nursery rhyme allusions in the last few lines of the song.

               

        Perhaps Musgraves’s “Merry Go ‘Round” could be compared to Carrie Underwood’s hit, “Blown Away”. The latter song tells the story of a girl who makes no effort to save her alcoholic father when a tornado comes sweeping toward their Oklahoma town. Like Musgraves does in “Merry Go ‘Round,” Underwood sings of dysfunctional families and an unhappy environment that the song’s protagonist is powerless to.

              

        But even then, the songs have distinct differences. “Blown Away” has such a dark, strong tone that the power behind the song almost overshadows the emotion. Don’t get me wrong, the song is moving, but something about it just doesn’t feel genuine.

“Merry Go ‘Round” is heartbreaking because of its domesticity. Because of Musgraves’s soft-spoken voice. She manages to sound both cynical and defeated. The song is heartbreaking because it feels real. Musgraves is honest with us, and it is obvious that this song is, to some extent, personal. You can hear the emotion in Musgraves’s voice.

I could go on for quite a while about this song, but you really just need to listen to it. Just once. Let Kacey Musgraves speak for herself. I will warn you though, the song is almost maddeningly catchy. I heard about twenty seconds of it on the radio once, and I had the chorus running through my head the rest of the day.

As much as I love happy-go-lucky country hits such as Little Big Town’s “Pontoon” and Luke Bryan’s “Drunk on You,” “Merry Go ‘Round” was a refreshing change.  While the song’s melancholy message may polarize some country fans, Kacey Musgraves is not someone who should be underestimated. She is certainly someone whose music I will be keeping an eye on, and I cannot wait until she releases a full CD. It is safe to say that when that time comes, there will be a review of that CD on this blog.

Whether that review is positive or negative, whether her Musgraves’s next songs live up to the originality of “Merry Go ‘Round,” remains to be seen.

 Kacey Musgraves’s single, "Merry Go ‘Round"is a light orange. Unexpected and attention-grabbing, but understated in its lightness.