Suburban Legends (From The Vault)

Taylor wrote “Suburban Legends” with Jack Antonoff around 2013-2014. She never spoke about the song’s meaning, so the lyrics and it’s high school metaphor can be a bit of a mystery to decode. Taylor typically uses the social dynamics of a high school in reference to Hollywood and bigger platforms (like in “I Forgot That You Existed” or “Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince“). Generally speaking, suburban legends are stories and rumors that are passed around within a community, typically spread by word-of-mouth.

Taylor’s “Suburban Legends” tells the story of a woman who thought her teen romance would be one for the ages. It is implied that the two grew up in a small town, where dating the right person in high school can boost your prestige level around town to astronomical levels. Although she and her lover have “mismatched star signs,” she still had hopes their love would beat the odds and be “more than a chapter in my old diaries/With the pages ripped out.” She even fantasizes about being with him long enough to go to their class reunion together and see the shocked reaction of their old classmates in their “1950s gymnasium.” From the start, “Suburban Legends” also drops clues that the relationship does not, in fact, become legendary. The speaker, as voiced by Taylor, admits noticing her boyfriend gets calls from “unmarked numbers.” Eventually, the passage of time is marked by images of a clock ticking and the tide coming in, and the speaker’s ex boyfriend never returns to pick up where they left off.

Considering the high school relationship likely is a metaphor for her public relationship with British singer Harry Styles, “Suburban Legends” fits into the narrative Taylor introduced on other 1989 songs like “Style“, “How You Get The Girl” or “Is It Over Now?“.