Midnights - Taylor Swift
A few catchy pop hits aren't enough to carry this collection of overhauled tracks that's all sparkle and no substance
On Midnights, Taylor Swift’s newest release, the global pop star attempts to capture the magic and melancholy that only arises in sleepless nights where the only company to be had is your own worst thoughts. While in concept this may seem like an intriguing new side of Swift to be seen, it falls flat and fails to capitalize by feeling non-committal and often forgettable.
One key reason for this shortcoming is the generally flawed design which Swift decided to take as her approach to this record. Specifically, this album came together as more of a compilation that has been forcefully fitted to become an album. Upon Swift’s initial announcement of the album, she dubbed it as “the stories of 13 sleepless nights scattered throughout my life”, and that definitely shows – but not in a good way. The major weakness of the album is that it is quite identifiable that many of these tracks were written during different eras of Swift’s career, likely being unfinished B-Sides that didn’t make the final cut for their respective albums. Similar to her current trend of releasing unused tracks dubbed “From The Vault” songs on her album rereleases, a large portion of Midnights feels to also fit this bill. “Snow On The Beach” centralizes on her country-style acoustics that sound like a cut right from Fearless or Red and “Question…?” has all of the downbeat-pop feel of 1989, especially in Swift’s lyrics and delivery. While there is a genuine attempt to turn these tracks into a meaningful piece of a whole cohesive concept album, it just doesn’t fit. The deep bass, electronic warbles, and sparkling twinkles simply feel forced onto these tracks as a way to Midnights-ify them to grating effect.
That being said, those precise sonic elements do work wondrously on songs like “Labyrinth”, “Bejeweled”, and “Anti-Hero”, which are the most stand-out tracks of the album. They feel much more intentionally built around the sounds that Swift decided for the album and as a result feel polished, full-bodied, and nothing less than reminders that Taylor Swift knows how to make pop bangers. Tracks like these go to show the best of what’s on display here and I think it’s too bad that there aren’t more tracks like them. Rather than finding ways to make things fit together, a sole focus on continuing to build around the diverse yet cohesive sounds that these songs utilize would have made for a stellar album.
I have said (and will continue to) that Taylor needs more emphasis on synth backings and glowing vocal effects that create the same circling reverb feeling on songs like Labyrinth, because it is a truly fantastic sound. So hopefully, this isn’t the last attempt at this more lo-fi, dreamy, bedroom pop sound for Taylor because I think there is so much to gain.
Apart from both extreme ends of the spectrum, the remainder of the tracks tend to fall somewhere in between feeling like filler to being songs that might be worth throwing in a playlist. Some particularly interesting influences come up on “You’re On Your Own, Kid” which plays a bit like a boygenius track, mixing up gentle vocal delivery with beautifully natural sounding drums at key moments or the addition of Phoebe Bridgers-esque trumpets on “Sweet Nothing”. These influences feel enriching and not derivative, which is a perfect spot. This balance isn’t always struck though, as can be seen on the cringe-inducing “Vigilante Shit”. Immediately, the similarities arise between this track and Billie Eilish’s hit “you should see me in a crown”. In the latter, Billie’s gentle and sultry vocals are left quite isolated in a soundscape, with jarring and distorted 808s as her only company. Taylor creates a similar atmosphere, but unlike Eilish, it ultimately builds to nothing and goes nowhere. There is no big crash to disrupt the emptiness or anything to create contrast and as such truly does just feel empty. Lyrically, it is also positively nauseating. There are cringe-inducing lyrics all over the album (including “Maroon”, which quite literally feels written by an AI), but this track is certainly in the race for the top spot.
Overall, it’s undeniable that Taylor Swift has successfully entered into a distinct soundscape for this album – and when it hits, it HITS. However, those moments are too few and far between to fully carry this album and the years of emotional weight it drags behind it. The reuse of older unreleased tracks dilutes the complete concept of the album and unfortunately she shoots herself right in the foot with it.
As a die-hard Swiftie I hate how accurate this is.