mytasteisbetterthanyours-blog

[mytasteisbetterthanyours-blog]

Why Gorgeous is the greatest song of all time

Everyone, from most of her fans to music critics, considers Taylor Swift at her best when she gets emotional and writes about heartbreak, but for me the genius of her songwriting has always been whenever she chooses to show the insecure, dreamer side of hers, because it adds more layers to her personality and the relatability of it makes me love her even more. I think you have to be secure enough to admit your insecurities (73 Questions With Taylor Swift, 2016), but writing music based on them and sharing those songs with the whole world is nothing short of bravery.

The first time we got to see that side of Taylor Swift was when she released her second single ‘Teardrops on My Guitar’ off of her self-titled debut album. A song about unrequited crush. It was critically acclaimed and her first crossover hit. Are we surprised? Everyone immediately knew she had a special talent when they heard it on the radio for the first time. She sings:

I'll bet she's beautiful, that girl he talks about,

And she's got everything that I have to live without.

Here she compares herself to the main girl and feels sorry for herself. This is what insecure people do, don’t they?

Taylor probably knew people couldn’t get enough of it and was back at it again with her underrated gem ‘Hey Stephen’ on her sophomore album ‘Fearless’. She sings:

Hey, Stephen,

I could give you fifty reasons

Why I should be the one you choose.

All those other girls—

Well, they're beautiful,

But would they write a song for you?

She does it again. Comparing herself to others to see how she fares against the ‘competition’. This time she’s more playful about it and she’s got a point. Who writes a bridge like that? She’s too much, isn’t she?

On her self-written third album Taylor released the cult classic ‘Enchanted’ which was initially supposed to be the album title, but later was changed to ‘Speak Now’. It’s yet another song about one of her crushes. This time she made a 6 minute song out of a 10 minute conversation. Her mind, it amazes me sometimes. She sings:

Please don't be in love with someone else

Please don't have somebody waiting on you

Isn’t it ironic that if Taylor had gotten in touch with the guy again instead of writing those lyrics she would’ve had what she wanted? How? Because the said guy later covered the song saying he felt the same way about her, but was ignored as it was already too late. Shucks!

At this point, you’d think Taylor singing about unrequited love had become a recurring theme in her albums. However, she changes it up on her fourth Grammy-snubbed album ‘Red’. She gives us her most under appreciated song to date, ‘Stay Stay Stay’, on this masterpiece. Almost everyone considers it a happy song, because it’s the perfect mix of country twang and pop melodies, but it is, in fact, a sad song. Taylor used to give us secret messages on her album booklets, and it was ‘daydreaming about real love’ for ‘Stay Stay Stay’. No more crushes, but instead we have a perfect imaginary boyfriend who treats her well in the song, which even leads to her subtly proposing to him in the bridge. After the song ends, she wakes up from her dream and says ‘that’s so fun!’ with a little giggle. Isn’t it sad how her insecurity had taken her to a place where she felt as if she was never gonna find real love and had to daydream about it? What a genius song though!

Unfortunately, her fifth album ‘1989’ was devoid of any personality and didn’t offer us anything like the previous mentioned songs. Still became the most awarded pop album ever, so who am I to complain?

Finally, we get to the sixth album ‘reputation’. Now, we can explore the genius of its finest track ‘Gorgeous’. We can easily call it the root song of the whole album. It gave birth to all the major themes of the record. In the demo version which was released on YouTube we get to find out that it was the first official track written for the album. She sings:

I got a boyfriend, he’s older than us

I haven’t seen him in a couple of months

My reputation precedes both of us

The last two lines didn’t make it to the final product, but let’s analyze the ‘reputation’ line, which was later used in another song, ‘End Game’, because it was obviously too good of a line to throw away. In ‘Teardrops on My Guitar’ and ‘Hey Stephen’ she was comparing herself to other girls, this time she has to compete against the alter ego the media has created for her, and as Taylor herself says this monstrous creature had already preceded her. After taking continuous Ls in 2016, she had become the villain in her own story. If she ever wanted to have a normal relationship again, she had to defeat the alter ego she had never asked for. You know she finally wins in the end if you’ve given ‘reputation’ a full listen, but for someone as insecure as Taylor Swift that must’ve been the worst nightmare, right? In ‘Delicate’ she even gets surprised that someone is able to see past the ‘reputation’ and like her for who she is. Another sad song from Ms. Swift.

What makes ‘Gorgeous’ so great is that she eventually goes for the guy as opposed to how she acts in ‘Enchanted’. It’s ironic how ‘Gorgeous’ starts with a child’s voice but is basically the mature version of the latter. Furthermore, the guy turns out to be the imaginary boyfriend she was daydreaming about in ‘Stay Stay Stay’, as she wrote a whole love album about him (yeah, it wasn’t marketed as such for obvious reasons). Isn’t it funny how it all became a full circle in the end? ‘Gorgeous’ is the result of the character development of how Taylor deals with her insecurity and it’s simply otherwordly.

The opening line

You should take it as a compliment

That I got drunk and made fun of the way you talk

alone is enough to understand we’re in for a ride. Taylor Swift, her obsession with the Brits and their accents. This time she’s taking us on the ‘crush’ ride under the influence, and it really isn’t surprising alcohol would be one of the recurring themes of the parent album at this point.

Sonically, the song is driven by Max Martin and Shellback’s hookiest sythns yet until the pre-chorus where it is accentuated by acoustic guitars and snares which pave the way for Swift to deliver the catchiest pre-chorus you’ll ever hear. It’s mind-blowing how this trio makes pop music sound so effortless.

Before we get back to the sythns, which could’ve been just fine to carry the whole song alone, in the chorus, we are hit by the single ding of a triangle. Such an exhilaratingly playful quirk you didn’t know you needed.

The song takes its most unexpected turn when the bridge comes on. We get a break from all the repetitive sounds and Max Martin and Shellback surprise us with old solina synths, which were made on Solina String Ensemble, a fully polyphonic multi-orchestral synthesizer with a 49-key keyboard, produced by Eminent BV (known for their Solina brand), distributed by ARP Instruments from 1974 to 1981. The keyboard uses 'organ style' divide-down technology to make it polyphonic. Max Martin is notorious for still using them in pop bridges and last choruses to achieve a more organic sound. Its sad undertones pair perfectly with how desperate Taylor sounds during the bridge. She sings:

There's nothing I hate more than what I can't have

Which is probably the most relatable line of any pop song ever, and it makes you wonder why no one else had thought of it before.

She also changes the emphasis from ‘gorgeous’ to ‘you’ in the ‘you’re so gorgeous’ line when she reminds us how gorgeous her crush is again in the bridge, which I believe is a very fruitful touch.

The language of the song, in general, may sound self-mockingly dramatic:

You ruin my life by not being mine.

But does she genuinely feel this way? Probably, yes.

She even gets whimsical in the chorus:

I can’t say anything to your face,

‘Cause look at your face.

It was annoying when the whole point of rhyming ‘face’ with ‘face’ went over some people’s heads and she was criticized for it.

Last but not least, I’d like to talk about vocal production of ‘Gorgeous’, because it’s what truly makes it greater than any other song in existence.

First of all, I have to mention how confident she sounds throughout the whole song, to the point you’d think she was singing about rejecting a guy.

It has amazing harmonies as does any other Max Martin produced track (https://twitter.com/siaylorswift/status/952242064942620672), the best adlib of her adlibbing career (I’m so foo ree yus), and angelic background vocals which come in randomly on the second part of the second chorus (https://twitter.com/siaylorswift/status/947115034597052416), that are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard.

To sum up, ‘Gorgeous’ is the most Swiftian song of Taylor Swift’s career. It has every single necessary detail a pop song should have and more. It’s the pinnacle, highest high of music. Every other song sounds underwhelming after listening to it, and since it has insane replay value you can go back to it any time without any hesitation.