From those first pulsating electronic thumps on "Lavender Haze," the mellow opener, Midnights tells you more or less exactly what it's going to be: a Jack Antonoff-produced, slick, buzzy record. Which is (Mr.) perfectly fine. But anyone hoping that Taylor Swift would emerge from quarantine armed with a quiver full of joyous bangers is in for a letdown.
I've made no secret of my disdain for most of 2017's petulant Reputation, and initially all the digital beeps, boops, and drum loops were giving me Reputation-lite vibes. Thankfully, it's not that, and repeated listens have grown on me. It's a pleasurable way to spend 45 minutes (or 70 if you take on the "3 a.m." version*), with zero filler or clunkers, the possible exceptions being the duo of "Karma," which is sillier than the rest of the album, and "Sweet Nothing," which is just sorta...there.
As for those patented Taylor anthems that are destined to be classics played on radio loops evermore, there are only two real possibilities here: the wistful, bouncy "You're on Your Own, Kid" and the self-deprecating "Anti-Hero," with its earworm chorus of "It's me/Hi/I'm the problem/It's me." Those are surefire add-to-Taylor-mix tunes; there might be two or three others. The moody "Maroon" qualifies, as does the album's closer "Mastermind," which would've sounded right at home next to "Archer" on 2019's Lover. Ditto "Question...?," which could've been lifted from Taylor's poppiest album, 2014's 1989.
"Vigilante Shit" most clearly revives the petty spirit of Reputation, but even the snarky bravado of a line like "I don't start shit/but I can tell you how it ends" seems delivered with an arch smile rather than a snarling sneer. Taylor sounds relentlessly content on Midnights, both sonically and lyrically.
Therein, perhaps, lies the rub.
Taylor has released three original albums in the past couple years. Folklore and Evermore were well-received pandemic-era comfort food, but the biggest song off those two albums is probably "Willow," which nobody's going to use either as breakup catharsis or the first dance at their wedding. The lasting impact of Midnights remains to be seen, but I'm wagering that nothing's going to come near to cracking the monoculture as 2021's "All Too Well (10-Minute Version)," which harkened back to 2012 Taylor, who was, to be honest, kind of a hot mess. Poor Jake Gyllenhaal was out here catching strays almost a decade later, and it was completely goddamned delightful for everyone (except Jake, I'm guessing).
It's not my nature to destroy someone's hard-won maturity and stability by, let's say, implicating Taylor's current British beau Joe Alwyn in a good ol' fashioned sex and drugs scandal, so it will have to be up to one of you (perhaps we can crowd fund one)? In all seriousness, the easiest fix is parting ways with Antonoff, or at least significantly ratcheting down his involvement. The two obviously have an exceedingly high level of comfort with one another, and perhaps that's what's holding back the steady-but-unspectacular Midnights.
Taylor is at her best when confronting her pathos and pain, and despite the album's title referring to the end of a day's cycle, it sure feels like Midnights falls squarely in the middle: not angry, not forlorn, not ecstatic, just mid.
*None of the seven "3 a.m." songs are worth saying much about. The best are "Paris" and "Would've, Could've, Should've." The only legitimately bad song out of the record's score of tunes is "Glitch."
Midnights: B-
Evermore: B
Folklore: B+
Lover: A-
Reputation: C-
1989: B
Red: A
Speak Now: A-
Fearless: B+
Taylor Swift: Idk. I don't like country, never listened to it
