Lover (album)
Lover is the seventh studio album by the American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, released on August 23, 2019, by Republic Records. It is her first album after her departure from Big Machine Records, which caused a public dispute over the ownership of Swift's past albums.
For other albums, see Lover (disambiguation) § Albums.Lover
August 23, 2019
November 2018 – February 2019
- Conway Recording (Los Angeles)
- Electric Lady (New York City)
- Golden Age West (Auckland)
- Golden Age (Los Angeles)
- Electric Feel (Los Angeles)
- Metropolis (London)
61:48
- Taylor Swift
- Jack Antonoff
- Joel Little
- Louis Bell
- Frank Dukes
Swift recorded Lover after finishing her 2018 Reputation Stadium Tour, having recalibrated her personal life and artistic direction following the public controversies that preceded her previous studio album, Reputation (2017). She produced Lover with Jack Antonoff, Joel Little, Louis Bell, and Frank Dukes. Described by Swift as a "lover letter to love", the album explores wide-ranging emotions like infatuation, commitment, lust, and heartache; a few songs discuss political issues such as LGBT rights and feminism. The production incorporates a 1980s-inspired electropop, pop rock, and synth-pop sound characterized by atmospheric synthesizers, mid-tempo rhythms, and acoustic instruments, with eclectic elements of country, folk, and funk.
Swift extensively promoted Lover through television shows, magazine covers, and press interviews. Lover's cover art and visual aesthetic feature bright pastel colors. Four singles were released in 2019: "Me!", "You Need to Calm Down", "Lover", and "The Man"; the first three reached the top 10 of the US Billboard Hot 100. The fifth single, "Cruel Summer", was released in 2023 and topped the Billboard Hot 100. In the US, Lover was Swift's sixth consecutive Billboard 200 number-one album and the best-selling album of 2019, and the Recording Industry Association of America certified it triple platinum. The global best-selling album by a solo artist of 2019, it topped the charts and received platinum certifications in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Norway, and the UK.
When Lover was first released, music critics generally praised the emotional maturity and free-spirited sound of Swift's songwriting, but some took the issue with the wide-ranging musical styles as incohesive. Many publications included the album in their rankings of the best albums of 2019. It was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Album and won the American Music Award for Favorite Pop/Rock Album. Retrospective reviews have placed Lover as a weaker album in Swift's discography, upholding her mature songwriting but saying that the eclectic sound brought mixed results.
Themes and lyrics[edit]
As with her past albums, Lover was a reflection on Swift's personal life;[17] she focused on creating music, deprioritized social media, and took her occupation as an entertainer less seriously.[18][19] She wrote the album after having adjusted her state of mind and embraced a newfound sense of creativity.[18][20] This sentiment is reflected in the opening track, "I Forgot That You Existed", in which Swift sings about no longer seeking vengeance against those who wronged her.[21] She described the songwriting as very confessional and autobiographical, yet also playful and whimsical;[18][22] she avoided disclosing the inspirations behind her lyrics.[23] In the September 2019 issue of Vogue, Swift dubbed the album a "love letter to love, in all of its maddening, passionate, exciting, enchanting, horrific, tragic, wonderful glory".[24] The track list consists of 18 songs that depict this theme, inspired by Swift's realization of what she called "love that was very real".[17][25] In addition to purely romantic songs, Lover includes themes of sorrow and loneliness, which Swift said could be perceived "through a romantic gaze".[26]
Most tracks are straightforward, open-hearted love songs.[27][28] The title track is about commitment to a romantic partner;[29] the ways couples customize their marriage vows inspired its bridge.[30] "Me!" is about self-affirmation and self-love.[28][31] Lust is the theme of "I Think He Knows", which is about self-confidence after a reciprocated infatuation;[27][32] and "False God", about the false hopes in a long-distance relationship.[33] "Paper Rings" and "London Boy" explore playful and quirky aspects of love;[8] the former is about a committed romance without materialistic concerns,[30] and the latter is a romantic confession to an Englishman with tongue-in-cheek lyrics that name locations in London.[21] The penultimate track "It's Nice to Have a Friend" tells a love story that begins in childhood and proceeds to adulthood;[34] Swift considered the song a representation of the feelings one wishes to experience whether they are a child or an adult.[35]
Other songs explore the pitfalls of romance.[36] "The Archer" is about her self-awareness and acknowledgement of her past mistakes,[37][38] and "Cruel Summer" is about a painful, fleeting summer romance.[30] "Cornelia Street" narrates a relationship in which Swift is afraid she will lose her partner again if she repeats her earlier mistakes.[39] She takes the blame for having hurt her partner on "Afterglow"[40] and contemplates a loved one's prolonged medical treatment on "Soon You'll Get Better".[32] "Death by a Thousand Cuts" was inspired by the romantic comedy film Someone Great[41] and is about overcoming a failed relationship's painful aftermaths.[42][43] Swift said that writing "Death by a Thousand Cuts" was "incredible news" to her because she could continue writing songs about heartbreak even if she was in a healthy relationship.[44] In the closing track, "Daylight", Swift says that she "[wants] to be defined by the things that [she loves]" and contemplates that love to her now is "golden" rather than "burning red" as she once believed, a reference to the title track of her 2012 studio album Red.[32][37][40]
A few songs reflect Swift's perception of contemporary US politics. Since her 2006 debut as a country-music artist, Swift's record company had warned her against becoming involved in politics,[note 1] but after witnessing the political events affecting the rights of certain people,[note 2] she became disillusioned and decided to involve in the public political discourse.[9] Swift wrote "Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince" after the 2018 midterm elections; its lyrics use high school as a metaphor for American politics because she thought the social events of a traditional American high school, like the political landscape, can alienate some people.[18] "The Man" was inspired by the double standards women experience the music industry and in wider society.[35] "You Need to Calm Down" advocates for LGBT rights, inspired by a conversation in which a friend asked Swift what she would do if she had a gay son;[9] other inspirations were cyberbullies, cancel culture, and the way the mass media "pits [women] against each other".[6]
Release and promotion[edit]
Title and artwork[edit]
Swift initially considered choosing "Daylight" as the album's title track but scrapped the idea because she thought it is too sentimental. She picked Lover as the title because she felt it better represents the overall theme and is "more elastic as a concept"; songs such as "You Need to Calm Down", which is about LGBT rights, could align with this concept.[18] Colombian photographer and collage artist Valheria Rocha, who worked with Swift on the album's art direction, photographed and edited the album's cover art.[71] The cover depicts Swift with sapphire hair tips and a pink, glittery heart shape on her right eye in front of colorful, pink clouds.[72][73] Some media commented the artwork evokes the atmosphere of summer and music festivals.[72][74]
Swift used the bright, pastel colors of the cover art in her social media posts and clothing during promotion of Lover, departing from the dark, black-and-white art and aesthetic of Reputation.[75][76] In an article for Entertainment Weekly, Emma Madden said Lover's cover art looks like "a fan-made aesthetic post on Tumblr", and called it part of the emerging trend of "kitschy album artwork". By using cover art that deliberately looks like a fan-made product rather than art commissioned from professional graphic designers, Lover brought "a level of iconicness and relatability" to Swift's audience because, according to Rocha, they could create their own versions of the cover art.[77]
Commercial performance[edit]
Variety, citing Republic Records, reported Lover sold nearly one million copies before its release.[144] In the U.S., the album sold around 450,000 copies in its first day[145] and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 with a first-week tally of 867,000 album-equivalent units, of which 679,000 were pure sales. It is Swift's sixth U.S. number-one album and made her the first female artist to have six albums sell more than 500,000 copies each in one week.[146] In its opening week, Lover outsold all of the other 199 albums on the chart combined, becoming the first album to do so since Swift's Reputation (2017).[147] All of Lover's 18 tracks simultaneously charted on the Billboard Hot 100, breaking the record for the most simultaneous chart entries for a female artist.[148] With Lover, Swift returned to the top of the Billboard Artist 100 chart for a thirty-seventh week, extending her all-time record as the longest-running number-one act.[149]
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) certified Lover platinum, denoting one million album-equivalent units, after four weeks of release.[150] The only million-selling U.S. album of 2019, it sold 1.085 million pure copies, both physical and digital, becoming the year's best-selling album. It was the fourth time Swift had the best-selling album of a calendar year in the U.S., after Fearless (2009), 1989 (2014), and Reputation (2017). Combining singles sales and streaming, Lover sold 2.191 million units throughout the year.[151] The RIAA certified Lover triple-platinum in October 2022[152] and the album surpassed two million U.S. sales by January 2024, becoming Swift's 10th album to do so.[153] After Swift embarked on the Eras Tour in April 2023, Lover re-entered the top 10 of the Billboard 200.[154]
In the wider Anglosphere, Lover peaked atop the charts in Australia, New Zealand,[155] the U.K. (including Scotland),[156][157] Ireland,[158] and Canada.[159] It set chart records in Australia, where it made Swift the artist with the most number-one albums of the 2010s decade,[160] and both the U.K. and Ireland, where it made her the first female artist in the same decade to have four number-one albums.[161][162] The album was certified platinum or higher in Australia (six-times platinum),[163] New Zealand (five-times platinum),[164] and the U.K. (double platinum).[165] In March 2024, following the Australian dates of the Eras Tour, Lover topped the ARIA Albums Chart, more than four years after its release.[166] In Europe, Lover reached number one in Latvia,[167] Lithuania,[168] the Netherlands,[169] Norway,[170] Portugal,[171] Spain,[172] and Sweden.[173] In China, it became the first international album to sell more than one million units within its first release week and made Swift the first international artist to have three million-selling albums, after 1989 and Reputation.[174]
Lover sold more than 3.2 million copies worldwide in 2019, becoming the year's best-selling album by a solo artist and the second overall, behind Japanese group Arashi's greatest hits album 5x20 All the Best!! 1999–2019.[175][176] The album also sold a million units in its first week worldwide, tying her with Ayumi Hamasaki's 1999 release of Loveppears biggest global sales for pure units of a studio album in its opening week.[177] The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI) recognized Swift as the Global Recording Artist of 2019, making her the first female artist to twice earn that honor—her first being in 2014.[178]
Legacy[edit]
Accolades[edit]
Lover has received various awards and nominations, including Favorite Album of the Year at the People's Choice Awards,[179] Best International Artist at the ARIA Awards,[180] and two album-sales awards at the BuzzAngle Music Awards.[181] At the 2019 American Music Awards, at which Swift was honored as Artist of the Decade, Lover won Favorite Pop/Rock Album. Winning four other awards, Swift was the most-awarded artist of the night, and with 29 wins was the most-awarded in AMAs history.[182] The music videos for Lover's singles won four awards at the MTV Video Music Awards; in 2019, "You Need to Calm Down" won Video of the Year and Video for Good, and "Me!" won Best Visual Effects;[183] and in 2020, "The Man" won Best Direction.[184]
At the 62nd Annual Grammy Awards in 2020, Lover was nominated for Best Pop Vocal Album, which went to When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go? by Billie Eilish. Lover's singles "You Need to Calm Down" and "Lover" were respectively nominated for Best Pop Solo Performance (lost to "Truth Hurts" by Lizzo) and Song of the Year (lost to "Bad Guy" by Eilish).[185] Lover won Pop Album of the Year at the iHeartRadio Music Awards,[186] an award in Sales and Marketing (Packaging Campaign) by the American Advertising Federation in Nashville,[187] and was nominated for Top Billboard 200 Album at the Billboard Music Awards.[188] The album won Album of the Year (Western) at the Japan Gold Disc Awards,[189] Best Selling Album (English) at Hong Kong's RTHK International Pop Poll Awards,[190] and a Music Jacket Creative Award at Japan's CD Shop Awards.[191]