The Man

Single | Lover (2019)

“The Man” is track four on Taylor’s seventh studio album, Lover (2019). Released on August 23, 2019, it was written and produced by Taylor and Joel Little. The upbeat pop song explores the gendered double standards surrounding ambition, success and relationships, imagining how differently the media might have treated Taylor if she were a man with the same career, mistakes and dating history.

Fans campaigned for “The Man” to become a single, and Taylor eventually answered their calls in January 2020, making it the fourth single from Lover. The song’s sharp message about sexism, paired with its catchy pop production, had made it a fan favorite long before it received its own music video.

Background and Release

Taylor began working on Lover during a week in New York City in July 2018, while still on the “reputation Stadium Tour,” with the album’s main recording sessions beginning after the tour concluded that November. The record marked a shift from the darker atmosphere of reputation (2017). In a 2019 interview with Vogue, Taylor described Lover as a “new beginning” and a “love letter to love, in all of its maddening, passionate, exciting, enchanting, horrific, tragic, wonderful glory,” recalling that she had written from an “open, free, romantic, whimsical place.”

“The Man” was written and produced by Taylor and New Zealand songwriter and producer Joel Little. Together, they created several of the songs that moved beyond Lover’s more traditional love-song themes. Alongside “ME!,” which celebrates individuality and self-acceptance, “Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince,” “You Need To Calm Down” and “Only The Young” explore LGBTQ+ rights and political change. “The Man” fits into this broader thread, reflecting on gender inequality. In the Spotify Storylines for the album, Taylor wrote:

«This is a song that I’ve been wanting to write for a very long time in my career, but I could never figure out exactly how to phrase it. I’ve wondered several times, 'If I had been a man instead of a woman and I had lived my life exactly the same way, what would people have said about me?' It’s about perception. It’s not 'What would I do if if I were a man?' It’s about how I would be seen if I’d done exactly the same stuff. This is when I got an idea of how to approach this song.»

Taylor Swift

Taylor first revealed the song’s title and shared a preview of its lyrics in her cover interview for the September 2019 issue of Vogue, published on August 8. In the interview, she described the song as a thought experiment, asking how her career might have been perceived if she had been a man with the same achievements and mistakes. The early reveal gave fans a glimpse of the album’s wider range before its release on August 23, 2019. “The Man” was initially an album track rather than a single, but it was later selected as the fourth single from Lover, with its music video, directed by Taylor herself, premiering on February 27, 2020.

In 2022, “The Man” was included on Portraits of Her, a 16-track limited-edition vinyl compilation released for Record Store Day on April 23. The collection benefited We Are Moving the Needle, a nonprofit supporting women and other underrepresented professionals working behind the scenes in music. The release coincided with Record Store Day’s 15th anniversary, for which Taylor had been named its first-ever Global Ambassador.

Artist	Taylor Swift
Album	Lover
Written	November 2018-February 2019
Released	August 23, 2019
Studios	Electric Lady (New York City) Golden Age West (Auckland)
Genre	Electro Pop
Length	3:10
Label	Republic Records
Songwriters	Taylor Swift Joel Little
Producers	Joel Little Taylor Swift

Single Artwork

Lyrical Theme

“The Man” is built around a thought experiment Taylor had wanted to explore for years: how differently her career might have been perceived if she were a man. During the iHeartRadio Lover Secret Session, she said:

«I often think about what my career and the headlines about it would have been like, if I had been a man instead of a woman. Not, 'What would I do differently?' but if I had the same accomplishments, the same mistakes, the same dating history, the same statements…What would have been different? So, ‘The Man’ is about what would have been, if I had been a dude and my approximations of it.»

Taylor Swift

The song applies that question to Taylor’s own experience in the music industry, where her ambition, success and personal life have often been scrutinized together. By imagining a male counterpart with an identical career, she challenges the idea that achievement and confidence are interpreted in the same way regardless of gender.

A major theme is the double standard surrounding relationships and ambition. Taylor contrasts the way a man might be praised for dating multiple people or behaving confidently with the criticism women can face for the same choices. Her reference to Leonardo DiCaprio, known for his successful acting career and publicized dating life, makes the comparison particularly pointed: the hypothetical male version of Taylor could enjoy similar freedoms while retaining his professional reputation. The song also questions why women’s mistakes or personal behavior can overshadow their accomplishments, while men are more readily allowed to separate their private lives from their work. Its catchy, assertive delivery turns these observations into a pointed pop statement rather than a solemn lecture.

Taylor later explained that the song grew beyond her own experiences to encompass stories she had heard from women throughout the music industry. In outtakes from her December 2019 Billboard interview, she described the contradictory expectations women face: “Because if we make a mistake, that’s our fault, but if we strategize so that we won’t make a mistake, we’re calculating.” She summed up the problem as “a bit of a damned-if-we-do, damned-if-we-don’t thing happening in music.” Taylor also said she deliberately wanted the message to be catchy so that listeners would remember it, adding that hearing fans share their experiences at work and school had reinforced the value of speaking openly about inequality.

Production

“The Man” pairs a sleek, upbeat synth-pop production with a punchy bassline, crisp percussion and sharp electronic accents. The polished, driving arrangement gives Taylor’s vocals an assertive edge, while the catchy chorus turns its pointed lyrics into an instantly memorable pop hook. Beneath the glossy sound, the tight rhythm and confident delivery lend the song a slightly swaggering quality, echoing the self-assured attitude Taylor imagines a male version of herself might be allowed to get away with.

Live Performances

Taylor first performed “The Man” live in an acoustic version at her City of Lover concert in Paris on September 9, 2019, later releasing the performance as “The Man (Live from Paris)” in February 2020. She also performed the song during her NPR Tiny Desk Concert on October 11, 2019, offering a stripped-back take on the track before bringing it to a much larger stage just weeks later.

On November 24, 2019, Taylor opened her career-spanning medley at the American Music Awards with “The Man,” where she was honoured with the “Artist of the Decade” award. Wearing a white button-down shirt printed with the titles of her first six albums, she danced alongside a group of young girls before transitioning into “Love Story” and the rest of the medley. The outfit carried an extra layer of meaning amid her public dispute with former label Big Machine Records over the rights to her early recordings: the performance began with a song about gendered double standards while literally displaying the albums at the centre of the dispute.

“The Man” later became part of the regular setlist for “The Eras Tour” (2023-2024). The staging transformed the song into a tongue-in-cheek corporate spectacle, with office-inspired scaffolding, desks and other workplace props surrounding Taylor as she performed in an oversized, glittering Versace blazer. The visual concept echoed the song’s music video, in which Taylor transforms into a swaggering male executive, bringing its satire of workplace sexism to life onstage. For fans, the performance also made the song’s message particularly tangible: Taylor took over the very kind of corporate environment in which women’s authority and ambition are often questioned.

Music Video

Directed by Taylor, the music video marked her official solo directorial debut and imagines a world in which a wealthy, confident and cocky man is rewarded for behavior that might be criticized in a woman. Taylor transformed into the fictional businessman through prosthetics, facial sculpting, eyebrow wigs and a muscle suit, with the makeup process taking four to six hours each day. The video also features a cameo by Taylor’s father, Scott Swift, and a brief voice appearance by Dwayne Johnson.

Accolades and Critical Reception

“The Man” received a largely positive critical response. Spencer Kornhaber of The Atlantic called it one of the most straightforwardly catchy songs on Lover, while also identifying it as Taylor’s most explicit musical statement on sexism. Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone described it as a “righteous feminist bombshell” that reputation could have used, and Raisa Bruner of Time praised it as an empowering pop anthem for anyone who has encountered sexist double standards.

The music video, released on February 27, 2020, gave the song’s argument a more elaborate satirical form. Critics highlighted Taylor’s transformation into Tyler Swift, a swaggering businessman who receives praise and the benefit of the doubt despite his obnoxious behavior, while women around him are treated as props. The video’s most prominent accolade came at the 2020 MTV Video Music Awards, where Taylor won “Best Direction,” becoming the first solo female artist to win the category. Accepting the award remotely, she said:

«This is amazing! This is the very first video that I've ever directed on my own. I'm just so grateful for this. I want to take an opportunity to say thank you to the team who believed in me as a first-time director and made this video with me. I want to say thank you to everyone in the industry who voted for this video. But I also really want to thank the fans because you are the only reason why the industry cares about anything that I do.»

Taylor Swift

It was also nominated for “Video of the Year” and “Video for Good,” and later received a nomination for “Best Video” at the 2020 MTV Europe Music Awards and a Webby Award nomination in 2021. These honors recognized the video’s visual concept and direction, while the song itself stood out among Lover’s more overtly political tracks for bringing Taylor’s personal experiences of public scrutiny into a broader conversation about gender and power.

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The Man

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