Midnights (Jade Green Edition)

 

listen some reviews may say it skips or its warped but honestly its just luck mine cam in a brown bag yes a BAG not suitable for vinyl’s yet mine works perfectly no skips and not warped what so ever honestly just a game of luck sucks but its true

 

“Midnights” is the 10th album by US country/pop sensation Taylor Swift. I have been a fan of Taylor since she released 2nd album “Fearless” way back in 2008. Her career trajectory since has been nothing short of phenomenal. Winning loads of awards and selling millions and millions of records. Even if she did have, in my opinion, is the occasional blip in her discography. Those being “Reputation” and “Lover”. But the rest of the albums feel flawless.

“Midnights” was an unexpected album as many thought Taylor would continue with her reissues but in October 2022 this album dropped without even a single to promote it. When the album was announced she didn’t even announce the track names and it actually led me to think each track was called “Track 1, track 2…track 3” etc. As that is what it said on the CD sleave artwork. But if you have Tik tok you will know she gradually unveiled the track listing in the run up to the album being released.

I decided to by the deluxe edition of the album on CD. I found it strange that it was kind of hidden away on her website while all the different colour vinyls were pushed more. The deluxe edition contained two remixes and an extra track but you didn’t know this till you got the CD. But that is not the most annoying part. Three days after release she released a 3am edition of the album with 7 extra tracks on streaming services. Which is great now you know this but at the time for me it was infuriating.

I do, however, have to give credit to Swift for Midnights. She has once again plunged herself into a new space in her music. Giving us a full blown synth pop album which has a completely different vibe to what has come before. The way she does this is like nothing no one else does in her field. And everything she does, whether I like it or not, seems to turn to gold too. Some of these songs already have over 300 million plays on Spotify and it’s only been out a few months.

It does have a very chill out feel about the album, apart from maybe “Vigilante S*&t” which shows off Taylor’s angsty side which reminds me of “Bad Blood” off “1989”. “Karma” and “Anti-Hero” are probably my favourite songs off the album. “Karma” is the most upbeat song off the album and “Anti-Hero” the biggest hit. The thing I find with this album is that if you strip out the vocals, I think would be a pretty bland album as for a lot of it, it is just the same beat running through it. Taylor’s vocals very much carry the album, and her lyrics also get a lot of attention. For that reason, I don’t think this is an album I will be going back to that much as I prefer more imagination in the instrumentation part as well as good vocals.

Overall, though this is a decent album and I have to give kudos to Taylor for going in yet another direction with her music. This album does have some great songs on it. Sometimes it does feel like it is too samey, and some songs blend into each other. But since it’s so different to what she has done before we can let her off with that. I do notice though that the tour she announced is an “Eras” tour which is basically a best of tour rather than a “Midnights” tour. Now there is the argument that she hasn’t really toured the last 4 albums (including “Midnights”). However maybe it’s also because a lot of “Midnights” and “Folklore” and “Evermore” weren’t really built for stadiums. And maybe there is not enough big hits on these albums to justify it.