If I had a dollar for every time Taylor Swift announced a new album while standing on-stage, accepting an award, I’d have $2. It’s not a lot, but it’s great that it happened twice.
When Swift took to the stage at the 2024 Grammys to accept the award for Best Pop Vocal Album, she seized the chance to announce to fans that her brand-new album, The Tortured Poets Department, will be released on April 19.
Swift is a real mastermind when it comes to planting clues in the lead-up to releasing new music. So, were there any obvious flags that we missed?
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Let’s start with everything we know about The Tortured Poets Department so far. It’ll be released April 19th this year, and is already available for pre-order. The bonus track on the album will be called The Manuscript, according to a listing on her website.
And… that’s about it.
But should we have seen it coming?
About eight hours before the Grammys, Swift changed her profile picture on Instagram to black and white. Fans assumed that this was a precursor to her announcing Reputation (Taylor’s Version), as the original has monochromatic album art.
A few hours later, it looked like Swift’s official website went down.
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People who tried to access the site were greeted with an error page that read “Error 321 Backend fetch failed.” It also contained the word ‘hneriergrd’, which Swifties quickly realised was an anagram for ‘red herring’.
This could have been a hint that the profile picture change may not have been about Reputation after all.
Furthermore, when Swifties dug into the code in the backend of her website, they found a bunch of words in different languages.
These words were:
Chairman
Bruises
Veins
Cadence
Apple Cake
Talisman
Love Bombs
Muse
Ink
Evidence
Fake
Though they didn’t have meaning, once Swift announced the album, many of these words matched up to the hand-written lyrics she shared online.
What has Taylor said about The Tortured Poets Department?
Swift shared a photo to social media featuring lyrics or a poem reading: “And so I enter into evidence / My tarnished coat of arms / My muses, acquired like bruises / My talismans and charms / The tick, / tick, / tick, / of love bombs, / my veins of pitch black ink.”
The image was signed by “The Chairman of the Tortured Poets Department”.
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Who is the The Tortured Poets Department about?
Swift says that she’s been keeping this album a secret for two years, which means that the songs could date back even before Midnights was released.
If you’re talking ex-boyfriends, that means she could include songs about Joe Alwyn, Matty Healy, and maybe even her current boyfriend Travis Kelce.
This probably is inconsequential, but interesting to note. Swift’s ex-boyfriend Alwyn was in a group chat with actor Paul Mescal called the Tortured Men’s Club, after they both played Sally Rooney characters.
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The Tortured Poets Department songs – how many will there be?
There will be 16 tracks on the standard album, plus a bonus track called The Manuscript.
The Tortured Poets Department album cover
The album’s cover and photoshoot was shot by Beth Garrabrant, whom Taylor has worked with on every album and rerelease since 2020
It’s black and white, featuring Swift lying on a bed, with most of her face out of frame.
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The Tortured Poets Department release date
The album will come out on April 19th. It will drop on streaming at midnight US time, which will be 2pm on Australia’s East Coast.
There’s no word yet on whether any singles will be dropped in the leadup to the album. For Midnights, the lead single Anti-Hero was released at the same time as the full album.
Taylor Swift albums in order
This will be Swift’s eleventh studio album. Her other albums include:
- Taylor Swift (2006)
- Fearless (2008)
- Speak Now (2010)
- Red (2012)
- 1989 (2014)
- Reputation (2017)
- Lover (2019)
- Folklore (2020)
- Evermore (2020)
- Midnights (2022)