Taylor Swift Reputation: What the critics are saying about her sixth studio album

Reviews published so far have been overwhelmingly positive

Taylor Swift's new album reputation is officially out, and reviews so far appear largely positive.

Produced by Swift, Jack Antonoff, Max Martin, Shellback and Ali Payami, reputation is a dead cert to break industry records and currently looks set to be one of Swift's most acclaimed albums to date.

Here's what the critics have said so far:

"One of Swift’s greatest talents as a songwriter is to encapsulate those small moments, often in a new relationship, that you as a listener cannot. Her skittishness on “Delicate”, about the danger of rushing into something, of sharing too much of yourself too soon with someone you're still getting to know, is all too palpable as the beat switches up like a nervous heart. She can be fragile (“Dancing With Our Hands Tied”, or she can be bold (“only bought this dress/so you could take it off”). There are very few faults in her songwriting, the most noticeable is the clumsy delivery in “They’re burning all the witches/Even if you aren’t one” on “I Did Something Bad”.

"And Swift can be vengeful, heard most clearly - not on “LWYMMD”, but on “This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things”. If the anger on “LWYMMD” sounds brittle then “This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things” is rage undiluted. Another Antonoff collaboration; those theatrical, creeping piano notes recall a stage version of Oliver! That cackle before she exclaims “I can’t even say it with a straight face” is utterly brutal. As for the line: “Friends don’t try to trick you/Get you on the phone/And mind-twist you,” she sings, venom dripping from every word. Kanye West and Kim Kardashian are the obvious targets. Perhaps the bravest move on the whole record is to close on the intimate piano ballad “New Year's Day”; Swift's low murmur over a gentle rhythm you'd more often hear on an album by Rufus Wainwright, or on “Avril 14th” by Aphex Twin.

"Each of the 15 songs on reputation tackles how she is perceived by the people who know her and the people who don’t. She acknowledges that even those closest to her will have differing ideas. A lover, a friend, a parent who has to see another Taylor Swift takedown online. When she explored those different “versions” of herself in the “Look What You Made Me Do” video it was less about “eras” of Swift than how, over the years, she has been portrayed by the outside world: as the girl next door, the geek, the romantic, the marketing genius, the victim, the snake. Add them together and you might just get a complete person. Swift isn’t denying any of those facets of herself. She’s not excusing them. She’s just saying there’s more than one."

Read the full Independent review here.

Rolling Stone - Rob Sheffield (★★★★)

"The world was expecting Reputation to be a celebrity self-pity party, after her September single “Look What You Made Me Do,” airing her grievances about getting mistreated by other famous people. Even if you think her complaints were totally justified, they felt like a dreary waste of her creative time, and many fans were dreading the idea of a whole album's worth. But sorry, world – that was just one of her Swiftian fake-out moves, because there's nothing else like that song on Reputation. (Whew.) Instead, she's playing for bigger emotional stakes – this is an album full of one-on-one adult love songs. That's a daring swerve from a songwriter who's scored so many brilliant hits about pursuing the next romantic high. Taylor might love the players, but nowhere near as much as she loves the game."

Full Rolling Stone review here

The Guardian - Alexis Petridis (★★★★)

"At the heart of Reputation lies a sequence of songs that chart the rise, fall and fallout of a fleeting relationship and offer a masterclass in pop songwriting along the way. "Gorgeous", "Getaway Car" and "King of My Heart" are filled with fantastic melodies – the tune of Gorgeous has a lovely, melancholy Abba-like quality – and lyrics that sound, well, lyrical: “You should think about the consequence of your magnetic field being a little too strong.” Meanwhile, Dancing With Our Hands Tied fruitfully returns to the AOR-inspired sound of 1989, while the closing New Year’s Day proves an exception to the general rule that the piano ballad is the low point of any pop album, and exposes musical roots that Reputation conceals elsewhere: you don’t get anywhere on Music Row unless you know how to knock out a romantic weepie that hits them where it hurts."

Full Guardian review here

The Telegraph - Neil McCormick (★★★★)

"Created with Swedish super-producers Max Martin and Shellback (hitmakers for everyone from Britney Spears to One Direction) and the increasingly ubiquitous Jack Antonoff (Lorde and St Vincent), Reputation’s hi-tech digital sound pushes Swift further into the realm of plastic pop. It is an ear-bending assault of warping bass synths, head-smacking drum patterns and deliriously treated vocals.

It is busy to the point of overload, especially on tracks that confront Swift’s detractors in the media (new and old). "This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things" has the extravagance of a Broadway musical show-stopper crossed with a club banger, in which Swift delivers tart put-downs with pantomime relish."

Full Telegraph review here

New York Times - Jon Caramanica

"She still has adversaries in her sight; there are jabs at Kanye West, and also at an ex-boyfriend or two. But here, too, she turns the magnifying glass around. Some of the most caustic and aware songwriting on this album is about herself. “Getaway Car” is about what happens when you leap blithely from one relationship to another. Ms. Swift is at her imagistic best here: “The ties were black, the lies were white/in shades of gray in candlelight/I wanted to leave him, I needed a reason.”

This is familiar Swift stuff — or at least, what was once familiar Swift stuff. On this album, it’s no longer the priority. The album closer, “New Year’s Day,” is the only acoustic song, and also one of the best written (though it feels as indebted to Mr. Sheeran as to Ms. Swift).

It is also probably the only song here that, upon first listen, doesn’t prompt the existential question of what, exactly, constitutes a Taylor Swift song in 2017. In making her most modern album — one in which she steadily visits hostile territory and comes out largely unscathed — Ms. Swift has actually delivered a brainteaser: If you’re using other people’s parts, can you ever really recreate your self?"

Full NYT review here

Slant Magazine - Sal Cinquemani (★★★★)

"Max Martin and Shellback's production, which comprises the bulk of the album, results in some tired, repetitive EDM tricks, but tracks like the aptly titled “Delicate” and “Gorgeous,” which tempers scathing self-critique with effervescent pop, are as understated as the other songs are bombastic. With its percolating beat and shimmering synths, the Jack Antonoff-helmed “Dress” reprises the nostalgic reverie of 1989, a reminder that Swift is capable of making pop perfection seem effortless: “Only bought this dress so you could take it off,” she swoons, followed by syncopated nervous laughter.

By album's end, Swift assesses her crumbling empire and tattered reputation, discovering redemption in love on “Call It What You Want.” The closing track, the acoustic “New Year's Day,” finds her nimbly switching time signatures and layering harmonies in ways she largely eschewed throughout the rest of the album. “You squeeze my hand three times in the back of the taxi/I can tell that's it's gonna be a long road,” she laments. For a moment, she takes off her armor and reveals the big, bleeding heart underneath."

Full Slant review here

reputation is out now on Big Machine Records

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