On the 13 tracks of “Midnights,” a self-aware Taylor Swift shows off her ability to evolve again.
“All of me changed like midnight,” Taylor Swift confesses halfway through her latest album, the aptly named and moody “Midnights.” It’s a moment on the electric “Midnight Rain” that finds lyricist Swift at her best, reminding you of her unparalleled ability to make any emotion feel universal.
The song’s chorus begins: “He was sunshine, I was midnight rain.” And continues: “He wanted it comfortable, I wanted that pain. He wanted a bride, I was making my own name. Chasing that fame. He stayed the same.” Then, that lyric: “All of me changed like midnight.” The sound feels experimental for Swift, opening with her own vocals artificially pitched down to an almost-unrecognizable tone. It’s among the album’s most sonically interesting, an indie-pop beat that feels reminiscent of her producer Jack Antonoff’s work on Lorde’s “Melodrama,” but also fresh and captivating.
The song’s words, by Swift and Antonoff, are steady and detailed, but not distracting — allowing you to sink into the rhythm, flowing and feeling it with her.
On the 13 tracks of “Midnights,” a self-aware Swift shows off her ability to evolve again. For her 10th original album, the 32-year-old pop star approaches the themes she’s grown up writing about — love, loss, childhood, fame — with a maturity that comes through in sharpened vocals and lyrics focused more on her inner life than external persona.
“Midnight Rain” could be a thesis statement for the project she’s described as songs written during “13 sleepless nights,” an appropriate approach to the concept album for someone who has long had a lyrical appreciation for late nights (think “Style”: “midnight, you come and pick me up, no headlights…”).
