1989
October 27, 2014
«I wanted it to be a sonically cohesive album, and it ended up really being the first I’ve done since Fearless. I also wanted the songs to sound exactly how the emotions felt. I know that’s pretty vague, so I really didn’t know where it was going to go, but I knew that I wanted to work with the collaborators I had such crazy electricity with on RED, like Max Martin. I wanted to do some things that sounded nothing like what we had done before.»
Table of Contents
Background and Themes
Taylor described 1989 as the most “sonically cohesive” studio album she ever made. In an interview with Kiss FM (UK), she confirmed that the title was inspired by the music developed in her birth year, 1989, which she had re-discovered during the making of this album. In September 2014, Taylor told Rolling Stone that Martin, New York City, her journal, Fine Young Cannibals and a sense of experimentation were the key influences underpinning the album. In relation to experimentation, Taylor elaborated on the music of the 1980s:
«It [the 1980s] was a very experimental time in pop music...People realized songs didn't have to be this standard drums-guitar-bass-whatever. We can make a song with synths and a drum pad. We can do group vocals the entire song. We can do so many different things. And I think what you saw happening with music was also happening in our culture, where people were just wearing whatever crazy colors they wanted to, because why not? There just seemed to be this energy about endless opportunities, endless possibilities, endless ways you could live your life. And so with this record, I thought, 'There are no rules to this. I don't need to use the same musicians I've used, or the same band, or the same producers, or the same formula. I can make whatever record I want.'»
Writing and Recording
In February 2014, Taylor confirmed she was again working with Martin and Shellback, with whom she had collaborated for the writing of three songs on RED. This time, they were writing “a lot more than three songs together.” Taylor’s friend Jack Antonoff, with whom she had previously collaborated on the song “Sweeter Than Fiction“, and Ryan Tedder also worked on the album. Antonoff co-wrote and co-produced the songs “Out of the Woods”, “I Wish You Would” and “You Are in Love“, with the third track only appearing on the United States Target, Target Canada, and international deluxe version. Tedder co-wrote and co-produced two songs with Taylor — “I Know Places” and “Welcome To New York” — after she contacted Tedder through a smartphone voice memo. Tedder then began working on a demo for “I Know Places” on his tour bus while in Switzerland. The pair scheduled studio time soon after and recorded the song.
In September 2014, Taylor told Rolling Stone that one of the songs on the album was taken “straight from the pages of my journal”; although the name of the song is unknown, Taylor mentioned “Out Of The Woods” as part of her interview response. In regard to “Out Of The Woods”, Antonoff said: “Part of it reads like a diary, and parts of it read like something 100,000 people should be screaming all together. It’s got these very big lines that everybody can relate to, which are given weight by her being really honest about personal things.” “Out of the Woods” marked the first time that Taylor had written a song over an existing track — Antonoff sent an early version of the song to Taylor, who then added vocals and lyrics within a 30-minute time frame.
Influences
Title Significance
«It was the night of the Grammys this year. […] I remember going home and playing a lot of the new music I had recorded for some of my backup singers and one of my best friends. We were all sitting in the kitchen and I was playing them all this music, and they were just saying, ‘You know, this is very eighties. It’s very clear to us that this is so eighties.’ We were just talking and talking about how it’s kind of a rebirth in a new genre, how that’s a big bold step, how, kind of, starting a part of your career over. When they left that night, I just had this very clear moment of, ‘It’s gotta be called 1989.’»
Singles
1989 features 13 songs. The deluxe edition includes three bonus tracks and features an additional three voice memos of the beginning stages of the tracks “I Know Places“, “I Wish You Would” and “Blank Space“. Taylor teased her new sound in August 2014 with the release of “Shake It Off,” making the track the first of seven singles. The songs “Blank Space,” “Style,” “Bad Blood,” “Wildest Dreams,” “Out of the Woods“and “New Romantics” eventually followed. In addition, “Welcome to New York” was used in tourism ads for the city that served as the track’s inspiration.
1989 was only the second album to spawn five or more US top-10 singles in the 2010s decade, and made Taylor the second woman to have two albums each score five US top-10 hits. Its singles received heavy rotation on US radio over a year and a half following its release, which Billboard described as “a kind of cultural omnipresence that’s rare for a 2010s album”.
Critical Reception
Retrospective reviews from GQ‘s Jay Willis, New York‘s Sasha Geffen, and NME‘s Hannah Mylrea praised how 1989 avoided contemporary hip hop and R&B crossover trends, which made it a timeless album representing the best of Taylor’s prowess. Mylrea praised it as her best record and described it as an influence for younger musicians to embrace “pure pop”, contributing to a growing trend of nostalgic 1980s-styled sound. Geffen also attributed the album’s success to its lyrics offering emotional engagement that is uncommon in pop.
1989 appeared on multiple publications’ year-end lists of 2014, ranking at No. 1 on the list by Billboard. It was also picked as one of the best albums of the 2010s decade, including top-10 entries in The A.V. Club and Slant Magazine and No. 1 by Variety. In 2020, 1989 placed at number 393 on Rolling Stone‘s 2020 revision of their “500 Greatest Albums of All Time” list (RED was placed at No. 99).
Commercial Performance
1989 debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Top 200, selling 1.287 million copies in the US during its first week. It was a record week for Taylor, and even more impressive considering the current slow failure of album sales. The total US sales figure from the debut week of 1989 was the highest since 2002, and made Taylor the first artist to sell one million or more copies of an album in a week-long period for three albums (she has since extended that record to four, after reputation (2017) sold 1.23 million copies in its first week). 1989 eventually became the best-selling album of 2014 in the US market.
In 2019, 1989 became eligible for a Diamond certification by the RIAA for selling over 10 million copies in the US, while selling over 22 million worldwide. Once certified, Taylor will become the first artist to have a diamond album and single (“Shake It Off”) from the same era. 1989 is Taylor’s second album to reach Diamond status by the RIAA (Fearless was certified in 2017).
Award Recognition
Taylor won a total of 158 awards for 1989, including “Favorite Pop/Rock Album” at the 2015 American Music Awards, “Artist of the Year” at the 2015 Billboard Music Awards, and “Album of the Year” at the 2016 iHeartRadio Music Awards.
1989 won the Grammy Award for “Album of the Year”, making Taylor the first female credited main artist to win the top prize at the ceremony twice with her own works, having previously won in 2010 for Fearless, and her third nomination overall after RED in 2014. The album also won “Best Pop Vocal Album”, Taylor’s first victory in the category. The first two singles “Shake It Off” (in 2015) and “Blank Space” (in 2016) were both nominated for “Record of the Year”, “Song of the Year” and “Best Pop Solo Performance”. The “Bad Blood” remix featuring Kendrick Lamar was nominated for “Best Pop Duo/Group Performance” and won the award for “Best Music Video”.
Impact and Legacy
Moreover, Taylor was also credited for reviving poptism, which asks music critics to approach pop with the same latitude they do ‘serious’ genres like rock, and audiences to mythologise its stars like they would Elliott Smith or David Bowie. The Guardian wrote that “poptimism really came of age in 2014, led by the unlikely figure of Taylor Swift. Making the transition out of Nashville, Swift’s latest album, 1989, is a poptimistic curve ball that ignores the dance-urban trend and replaces it with something more ambitious.” Taylor is simply an expert at putting her finger on the pulse and finding out what direction the collective culture is heading. For as much as she lyrically rebuffs those who think someone else’s “indie record is much cooler than [hers]”, she’s very much interested in capitalizing on the new, hip trend before it peaks. That’s why she gets credited for bringing back 80s inspired music to the mainstram. And that is why 1989 is the most awarded pop album in music history.
| Released | October 27, 2014 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Recorded | 2013–2014 | |||
| Studios | ||||
| Genre | Synth Pop | |||
| Length | 48:41 (Standard Edition) | |||
| Label | Big Machine Records | |||
| Producers | Max Martin Taylor Swift Jack Antonoff Nathan Chapman Imogen Heap Mattman & Robin Ali Payami Shellback Ryan Tedder Noel Zancanella | |||
TAYLOR SWIFT CHRONOLOGY | ||||
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1989 Era
1989 Songs
The 1989 World Tour
1989 World Tour Live
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