How Has Taylor Swift Become So Popular? She Has Capitalized Capitalism and Conquered Social Media

I have been a Taylor Swift fan for years. It started when I was pregnant with my first and I listened to Speak Now on repeat after it was released. I knew she had talent. Not everyone knew at this time how good she was but she was definitely gaining traction. Sadly I missed both her fearless and speak now concerts. Fearless I found out about afterwards and speak now I didn’t want to pay 75 for nosebleeds. How little do I know. 

Over the next couple years I soaked up all her discography which wasn’t much at the time. I was super estatic when Red was released. More music. I feel in love with the soundtrack of fall upstate New York as I was driving through fall upstate New York listening to her album. The first glimmer of her marketing appeared to me when I saw she had a red release week crew. These fans got to attend her events and some were given a sneak peak of the album in her Nashville apartment before it was released. I wanted to be in NYC and be a Tay follower so bad. 

I signed up for her email list and Taylor connect. If you know you know. I purchased tickets for her tour and regret not buying the upgraded pit tickets. Again little did I know. Those would have been amazing seats. 

I started this blog and followed her socials in the chance that I would get an opportunity. I remember seeing pictures of radio DJ’s in her apartment holding her Grammys and was jealous. Little did I know that a few short weeks later I would be in her apartment holding her Grammy’s, playing her piano and taking pictures with her after she announced 1989. 

After that I didn’t care anymore about meeting her I had had my chance and that was good. I did see a different side to her fan base because I got to know more of the OG Swifties. Some of them are ruthless. They can be nice to your face, say nice things but there is always a silent competition to see who would get her attention. Through the years she had her favs for sure. I wasn’t sure I could invest the amount of time needed to be that fan to maybe get noticed. I was happy listening to the music nonstop.   

I noticed the first crack in her marketing at Formula 1. I don’t know if she was aware of it, but the competition was out of control. I had purchased vip tickets and it was utterly messed up. The organizers of the event hadn’t anticipated people lining up at 1:00 to attend her concert that night. The day started off fine, we sat in the heat and waited to get in. One by one people stood up in a very wide queue. This ended by people pushing and shoving til we were in there like sardines, some famous Swifties being very rude trying to be in the front, anything to be closer to Taylor and get noticed. There was no way to get out of that line at that point. When we were let in we ran to the stage almost getting trampled. My feet were bleeding, I was hungry and there was no food in sight. Luckily she gave us water, but I was super weak the end of the concert. It had not been a safe experience at all. I was lucky though. Behind us 40,000 people stood and I can only imagine what they had gone through. There were some lucky Swifties that got to stand on a platform because they knew people. I could have been one of those but chose not to meet them so I could stand in a dreadful line. I regretted every minute. I will say there were some nice Swifties I hung out with that day and am glad for them. 

This highlighted a few things, her concerts can be unsafe, she is not aware and Swifties are competitive and ruthless. No one should be in a line that unsafe and should always have access to food and water at her concert. And two people will do anything to be close to Taylor shoving themselves in a crowd until everyone is unsafe. Unfortunately this has not gone away and people have died and gone to the hospital because of this. 

After I got home life continued as usual and Taylor Nation, her marketing team continued to recognize fans, she sent people presents, invited them over to bake, and invited them to secret sessions and concert releases. This increased her popularity showing her relatability to fans. But it also created more competition. Her fans went online and shared their experiences and started the cycle to get noticed again while inspiring other fans to do the same. They think they have a relationship with Taylor but it’s parasocial most of the time. They invest so much time in her. She notices them on the internet but can’t keep up with all of them. She grew a loyal army by relating to her fans and reaching out to a few. She conquered social media with the help of her fans. This marketing tactic is amazing and one that companies and celebrities should take note and employ if they want to grow or should they? What is cost? Without this strategy she would not have the following she does. She learned this from visiting radio stations and meeting the DJ’s at all the stations. She did the same with the fans. In turn they would play her music and the fans would praise her forever and always seek the next opportunity. 

This tactic has an ugly side too. Taylor pays the cost with invasion of privacy and fans commenting on every aspect of her life.  They hang out outside her home and music studio to catch a glance of her. This is horrible. They don’t respect boundaries with each other or her. The fandom side of it is horrible too. Because she is one human there are only so many opportunities and a certain number of people that can have them. At the Reputation concert I had secured six tickets for my friends. We were enjoying the concert when 4 of them disappeared. Me being me went and found them. They knew someone that knew someone and got into pit. They were going to ditch me because they had an opportunity and telling me would make the number be too big. The whole fandom does this. Everyone is trying to be close to Taylor and not miss their shot. Once is never enough. They backstab and push themselves in not caring about the danger created or feelings hurt. That opportunity is the most important thing. They even sneak into pit so they can be close to her every time. They don’t care who they shove out of the way. 

Life got busy for me and I didn’t really care about the opportunities. As long as I could listen to her music, buy her signed cds (which I got all no problem) and merch, and go to her shows I was happy. I secured Lover Fest tickets because I was a loyal fan and had lots of Rep boosts (a great system by the way). Sadly it was canceled. I was so excited for the Eras tour and was told I had priority. I thought it’d be easy like in the past, but it was a nightmare. Instead of being at the front of the line and getting priority I was at the end and didn’t get six tickets like I wanted to go with friends. I luckily got two tickets the next day after trying for every city out there, and an amazing Swiftie gave her two extra to me. 

This is where and why she got insanely popular. The army of Swifties went to Twitter and TikTok like they have been trained to do and complained. Media caught word and people who never considered going to the concert all of the sudden had FOMO and needed tickets too. Ticket prices shot up and resale was crazy. People saw the opportunity and capitalized on it. 

Scammers came out of the woodworks. You can’t go on social media and mention tickets without someone mentioning their cousin has tickets and visit their Instagram, which they don’t. They want Zelle or friends and family for payment which is code for SCAMMER. 

Taylor benefited from all of this. She was in the press because her ticket prices were insane. People were camped outside the stadium. She was a force to be reckoned with with an army to match. But was the concert safe to go to? I had learned my lesson and ate large meals and found water in the stadium fast. Allegiant stadium in Las Vegas doesn’t have water fountains. I had to buy two 8 dollar plastic water bottles. Super bad for the environment. I went in May to MetLife so not super hot. They had free water thank goodness. We got food, but unfortunately the way I was standing, the chairs were packed so tight my large toes developed problems that I’m still recovering from a year later. 

Fans in other countries have not been so lucky. The temperatures have been hotter. Fans have been pushing and shoving for that once chance to see her close and one died in Brazil with some going to the hospital. People have had to relieve themselves where they stand in the pit, had nothing to eat and been super hot. They don’t want I get out of line because they want to be close.  

Meanwhile merch and signed cds had been in high demand with resellers capitalizing by buying up all the stock, like the tickets and profiting 100 fold. The demand for anything Taylor is out of control. I can’t be just a normal fan anymore without it dominating my life or my pocketbook. Should fans have to pay life savings away or sacrifice their health to see their favorite artist? 

Interestingly enough in Europe where there are laws preventing capitalism from getting out of control the ticket prices have remained affordable. Tickets are 100-200 dollars. But is this good for Taylor? There’s no press talking about the demand, maybe people won’t feel as compelled to go because it’s not in demand?

What can Taylor do to combat these problems for fans? First off is nothing. Second off is make her concerts safer and third is make sure the fans get the opportunities instead of fortune hunters. 

She has been close to doing the first one doing nothing and pretending it doesn’t exist. This is a tactic that has been close to getting her in trouble. She has gotten out of responsibility by letting others take the fall. The Ticketmaster fiasco is the fault of Ticketmaster. She did offer some fans the opportunity to purchase more tickets, but only two not the original six as promised. 

She blamed the venues for unsafe conditions, but she needs to demand they work to make a safe environment. Maybe have a team in place that is dedicated to fan safety at the venue. Research all the venues, find out the weaknesses and address them before the fans come. Have roped off sections of the GA. I love GA better than chairs but her GA is out of control. She needs more roped off areas, maybe split between VIP and GA and have 8-10 GA sections all with access to the food, bathroom and water. This excitement is endangering fans. A fan died at her concert and many more have had a horrible time. Something needs to get done. It’s only going to get worse and she shouldn’t need to be addressing it from stage. By that time it’s too late and too out of control. 

As far as tickets and merch she should set up a loyal fan program which she has done in the past. I would even pay monthly for it. She could also base it on top Apple and Spotify fans, fans that watch her videos etc. She has done this before and needs to bring it back. Those people have access to merch, tickets, signed cds etc, not resalers. 

What would be the cost to Taylor for making concerts safer and making opportunities more available for fans? The first one would be positive, without making them safer there’s more potential for injuries and death at her concerts and more bad press. 

The second one would be neutral for Taylor in the moment, but i think she would benefit emotionally in the long run. Taylor is benefitting from financially from capitalism right now. By making things more accessible to fans she could slow down the exploitation of fans and make more loyal fans. She may not benefit because she wouldn’t be perceived as as popular anymore and not be in the news for that. But she may have more freedom and who really needs to be that all powerful anyway? I think the end benefit would produce more loyal fans because they wouldn’t feel taken advantage of and have a chance to be closer to her because the opportunity came from her not her pocketbook. Without it tickets and merch will only be available to the rich and those profiting the most won’t even be fans of Taylor or Taylor fans taking advantage of other fans. And her merch would up in the hands of fans and not wasting away in the basement if someone trying to profit from it. 

Lastly how can she deal with the competitiveness and sneakiness of fans? I’ve seen fans who are super nasty get opportunities over and over because they spend the time to get noticed. I don’t think this will change but she can be more careful who she gives opportunities too. She can research them and see how they treat others. Many will only show what they want her to see unfortunately. I have met several nice Swifties. Maybe she needs a list of those people who are genuinely nice and not just putting on a show. I think this one is super hard because it’s really hard to see how people treat others when they aren’t being watched.

I hope Taylor makes her concerts safer and her tickets and merch more accessible to fans. I don’t want to miss out on those opportunities too. I want to go to the Eras Tour again and take my whole family, we only got 2 tickets and 2 of my kids couldn’t go. I want to be wear the new beige TTPD hoodie, but instead it’s sitting in a resalers home where they hope to get 150-300 for it. I may not get to be able to even do these things anymore because of capitalism. I can still listen to the music nonstop but I’m not buying 20 variants of a digital album (save that discussion for another day). 

Manuscript Song Meaning

Todays Taylor Swift song is the meaning of the song “The Manuscript” from The Tortured Poets Department.

The manuscript is one of my favorite songs on The Tortured Poets Department. Why? It starts off on just a piano with Taylor and it is hauntingly beautiful with beautiful lyrics. On a side note she wrote this song herself. 

What is this song about?

I know I started this blog out saying who the songs were about, but I feel like it has evolved since. I can still figure out who they’re about and I’ll say, but I don’t think that should be the focus especially with this song. This song perfectly describes her approach to her music and her lyrics and encapsulates everything about her work.

She writes this song in 3rd person, ie no I’s or me’s. This is especially important to the meaning of the song. In the first couple verses, she talks about rereading a “manuscript” aka songs she has written in the past specially for this one “All Too Well”. She talks about the relationship she had with him. This someone she was talking about was Jake Gyllenhaal. He “made coffee every morning in a French press” and they had great “conversation”. He told her “if the sex was half as good as the conversation was soon they’d be pushing strollers.” She did lose her virginity to him and was expecting to spend the rest of her life with him. She loved him. He was her first love.

But as I’ve detailed before, he basically ghosted her and didn’t show up to her birthday party. He made all these promises to her and said he loved her and then he didn’t show up for her. She was devastated and “couldn't sleep unless it was in her mother's bed”. We also saw this in the “All Too Well” music video.

She said it was hard to write the song. She told Good Morning America in 2012, “All Too Well” [was difficult to write emotionally] because it took me a really long time to filter through everything I wanted to put in the song without it being a 10 minute song, which you can’t put on an album. I wanted a story that could work in the form of a song and I called my co-writer Liz Rose and said, ‘Come over, we’ve gotta filter this down,’ and it took me a really long time to get it.”

“All Too Well” she became her fans favorite song. It’s my favorite song from her discography. They wanted it played at every show. She even played it at the Grammy’s for them. She told fans at the Reputation tour,

“You turned this song into a collage of memories of watching you scream the words to this song, or seeing pictures that you post to me of you haven written words to this song in your diary, or you showing me your wrist, and you have a tattoo of the lyrics to this song underneath your skin, And that is how you have changed the song ‘All Too Well’ for me.”

When she rereleased the album, “Red (Taylor’s Version)” she released the 10 minute version she had mentioned years ago, a request fans had always wanted. She also made a music video for the song that was phenomenal. It won all sorts of awards for a 10 minute song.

Back to the song “The Manuscript” Taylor says she moved on from the relationship and “dated boys who were her own age.” It’s had been years since she wrote this song. She wrote the song because “the professor said to write what you know.” By “looking back” she could “move forward”. She was able to perform this song and build a fan base and share it with the world. By releasing this song so personal to her, “she knew what the agony had been for.” 

Now all she has left from this relationship is a manuscript or the song that she wrote is the “last souvenir”. “Now and then I [she] re-read[s] the manuscript.” This is talking about her reflecting on this song she refers to as a manuscript which is interesting because in the music video for “All Too Well” the character goes on to become an author and releases a book about the time she had with this lover. What’s interesting about this line is it’s the only line that is written in first person and present tense. It really emphasizes what the song is about. She is saying that she wrote this song for her but then she released it to her fans. They changed the meaning of the song for her. She gave them this song. That’s why she’s talking in third person most of the song. She’s detached herself from the reason song it was originally written for. She changes ton 1st person as she reflects on what the song has become and what it means to her now. The “story isn’t mine anymore” she says. It has changed because she has gave it to the world. The manuscript might’ve been about one song “All Too Well”, but it really encapsulates her whole work. It is interesting that she put this song at the very end of The Tortured Poets Department main album, the one released that is not a special version, but it’s still a bonus track. 

In her Instagram on April 19, 2024 she says,

“The Tortured Poets Department. An anthology of new works that reflect events, opinions and sentiments from a fleeting and fatalistic moment in time - one that was both sensational and sorrowful in equal measure. This period of the author’s life is now over, the chapter closed and boarded up. There is nothing to avenge, no scores to settle once wounds have healed. And upon further reflection, a good number of them turned out to be self-inflicted. This writer is of the firm belief that our tears become holy in the form of ink on a page. Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it.

And then all that’s left behind is the tortured poetry.

THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT is out now.”

This is a great concept about releasing stress and being able to move on from things, write it down and not think of it about it anymore. I use this myself quite often.Taylor does it on a grand scale and makes a lot of money from it. She is also emphasizing that she’s not doing this to get it back at people, but to express how she feels. And that basically is the whole message of The Tortured Poets Department and why it is the last song on the album. Living a good life is being able to move on and Taylor does that by writing her music and we all enjoy it. Thank you Taylor for sharing very personal pieces of yourself with us all these years. Your music has been there for me so many times of my life and been able to help me in ways you’ll never know. 

“Clara Bow” Song Meaning

Today’s Taylor Swift song is the meaning of the song “Clara Bow” from the album “The Tortured Poet’s Department”. 

I know I haven’t written one of these in a while, but I felt inspired  I have a lot to write about in the past few years  Taylor has put out so much music.

Who is this song about?

The song’s title gives it away. It is about Clara Bow kind of, Clara Bow is used to describe the pains of Hollywood specifically because how they treated her. Her look in the “Fornight” music video is a homage to Clara Bow’s look. 

Who is Clara Bow? Clara Bow was a silent film star and one of the first It girls in Hollywood. She was super pretty and also super outspoken. She did not care what people thought and was scandalous for the time, even though other people put on a show and did the same things she did. She was ostracized from the other girls in Hollywood. She came from a hard and rough upbringing, but was a sensation when she stared in movies. She retired from acting when talkie movies started but not because she did not like them but because she was sick of Hollywood.

Taylor relates to her because she is the It girl right now. Look at her Eras tour. It sold out before it reached general sale with millions of people on the waitlist. Resale tickets are insane. It is impossible to get popular merch from her website. Scalpers grab it up fans can get it. She has been ostracized at times, especially by Kim Kardashian and Kanye. She has all the attention and more.

On a side note from a fans side it is hard being a Taylor fan. I have been a fan for years and it was hard getting things, but now it’s impossible. I want her to be popular but not so popular I can’t see her show or get merch. 

What is it like for Taylor? This song is reminiscent of “The Lucky One” and “Nothing New” where she laments on new younger people taking her place. “Clara Bow” takes a different form because people are always comparing her to someone else. Instead of being the old one she was the new one being compared to other artists. Taylor says in her Amazon Music track by track experience, “I used to sit in record labels trying to get a record deal when I was a little kid. And they’d say, ‘you know, you remind us of’ and then they’d name an artist, and then they’d kind of say something disparaging about her, ‘but you’re this, you’re so much better in this way or that way.’ And that’s how we teach women to see themselves, as like you could be the new replacement for this woman who’s done something great before you. I picked women who have done great things in the past and have been these archetypes of greatness in the entertainment industry. Clara Bow was the first ‘it girl.’ Stevie Nicks is an icon and an incredible example for anyone who wants to write songs and make music.”

In the song she says that people did expect her to “see the lights of Manhattan” or “meet these suits in L.A.” It was a nice dream to have, but they didn’t think she’d make it. But she did. 

And then she found out how brutal fame is. She could be the “new god we're worshipping” if she “Promise[d] to be ... dazzling..” She describes being famous with terms such as “fake”, “smoke rings”, “crown is stained”, and “war machines”. They encouraged her to “take the glory” but “give everything”, enjoy the ride but give it everything she had, sleep, privacy, time etc. This fame can be hard to maintain and sustain however, “beauty is a beast”, “demands more”, and is fickle it is “only when your girlish glow flickers just so”. It’s not easy and this caused her insecurities like not being able to leave a gym without being put together or starving herself to look just right. 

It is interesting she puts Clara Bow first, the first it girl who went through a lot of the things Taylor has gone through. She also put in Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac, who’s she is friends with. Stevie was beautiful back in the day and so famous. This also shows a counter example of competing with each other because Stevie and Taylor are friends and helping each other. Stevie even wrote a poem that is in the cd case or vinyl pages for Taylor. In the end Taylor has made her inconceivable dream come true and sees artists coming in after her like Billy Ellish and Olivia Rodrigo. They have been compared to Taylor. She sees in them “an edge she never” had. Who knows what will become of them, but what a beautiful song to end the first side of Tortured Poets Department illustrating the tortured souls developed in the music industry due to comparison, fleeting fame, and unrealistic standards. I’m glad that Taylor has realized she does not need to conform to those “ideals” anymore and can make the music she wants, look the way she wants, and be the size she wants.