Fearless

Today's Taylor Swift song is the meaning of "Fearless" from her "Fearless" album.

This song is a perfect song for the beginning of a relationship, "Well you stood there with me in the doorway/My hands shake/I'm not usually this way but/You pull me in and I'm a little more brave/It's the first kiss/It's flawless/Really something/It's fearless."  You always want to remember those first moments, "You put your eyes on me/In this moment now capture it, remember it/Cause I don't know how it gets better than this."  This person makes you want to "dance in a storm in my best dress."

Click here for lyrics to the song, "Fearless".

Who is this song about?

The lyric hint in the song is, "I LOVED YOU BEFORE I MET YOU."

Okay that was a trick question, it isn't about anyone, it's a song that Taylor wrote about what it would be like to be that in love.  Taylor says, "This is a song about the fearlessness of falling in love. No matter how many break up songs you write, no matter how many times you get hurt, you will always fall in love again. When I wrote “Fearless,” I wasn’t dating anyone. I wasn’t even in the beginning stages of dating anybody. I really was all by myself out on tour and I got this idea for a song about the best first date. I think sometimes when you’re writing love songs, you don’t write them about what you’re going through at the moment, you write about what you wish you had. So, this song is about the best first date I haven't had yet."

The lyric hint "I LOVED YOU BEFORE I MET YOU" refers to the future love of her life.  Taylor has met a lot of guys and always picks herself up again.  I had to go through a lot of duds before I found my prince charming.  Kudos to her for picking herself up again and being fearless about falling in love.  Some day you will find your prince charming Taylor!

Click here for the music video to the song, "Fearless".

Read more

I Knew You Were Trouble

Today's Taylor Swift song is the meaning of "I Knew You Were Trouble" from her "Red" album.

This song is definitely a pop song.  It has a catchy chorus, a distinct beat and her voice is definitely in pop mode. I love it.

In her preview of the song on Good Morning America Taylor said, "The song we're releasing tonight ... it's a song that's one of my favorite songs on the album because it sounds just as chaotic as the feeling was when I wrote it. It's a song about kind of being frustrated with yourself because you have your heart broken and you knew when you first saw that person you saw all these red flags and you just went for it anyway, 'So, shame on me.' "

Who is this song about?  I had my suspicions when I first heard the song, but after watching the music video I definitely know who it is. It is about John Mayer!

Here are some of the clues from the lyrics. The first is, "Once upon a time, a few mistakes ago".  There are some rumblings that this is about Harry Styles, it is not, why not?  This line.  John Mayer was definitely a few mistakes ago.

She says that this guy "never loved me or her or anyone or anything."  And that as soon as she "fell hard" he "took a step back."  How many women has John Mayer tried to get just so he could dump them?  Taylor definitely knew he was "trouble when you walked in" and in the end "heard you moved on from whispers on the street" and she knew she was just "a new notch in your belt."  She sings about not really knowing the status of their relationship, just wanting to talk to him again when she saw him CMT awards in the song "The Story of Us".   John Mayer clearly never gave any closure to Taylor, boo John Mayer.

Click here for the lyrics to the song, "I Knew You Were Trouble".

The other clues come from the music video.  The guy in the music video has a lot of tattoos  as does John Mayer.  The guy in the music video plays the guitar and is a musician, John Mayer certainly is that.  The other may come from the necklace that is featured prominently in the video.  It seems to be one that is half of another necklace, and it appears that the guy in the video is wearing the other half at times.  He gives this necklace to her and is seen wearing it.  In the end she drops it on the ground to signify the end of their relationship.  Taylor and John sang "Half of My Heart" together for John's album "Continuum".  Taylor is also seen wearing a leather jacket, much like one that John Mayer wore while they were dating.

What is most important about this song though is Taylor communicating her feelings about how she lost herself in the whole relationship.  In the music video she has a voice narration introduction, she says "I think that the worst part of it all wasn't losing him, it was losing me".  She knew "his world moved too fast and burned too bright" but wondered how "the devil be pulling me towards someone who looks so much like and angel when he smiles at you?"  The video focuses on Taylor's confusion and loss of herself.  She wakes up in the ruins of a party, very disheveled.  The mood of the video is very melancholy and bleak, void of bright and vibrant colors. At the end of the video she says, "I don't know if you know who you are until you lose who you are".  Taylor has definitely moved on, is happy and dating again, and I am happy for her, because John Mayer definitely was trouble.

Click here for the music video for "I Knew You Were Trouble".

Read more

"I Knew You Were Trouble" Music Video

Here's Taylor Swift's "I Knew You Were Trouble" music video, with the introduction narration and the ending narration.

Click here for the meaning of the song, "I Knew You Were Trouble".

Introduction:

"I think, I think when it's all over it just comes back in flashes you know
It's like a kaleidoscope of memories, but it just all comes back.
But he never does.

I think part of me knew the second I saw him that this would happen
It's not really anything he said or anything he did
It was the feeling that came along with it
And crazy thing is I don't know if I'm ever going to feel that way again.
But I don't know if I should.

I knew his world moved too fast and burned too bright, but I just thought,
How could the devil be pulling me towards someone who looks so much like and angel when he smiles at you?
Maybe he knew that when he saw me.
I guess I just lost my balance.

I think that the worst part of it all wasn't losing him, it was losing me."

Ending:

"I don't know if you know who you are until you lose who you are."




I Knew You Were Trouble Lyrics (Red Album)

Written by Taylor Swift, Max Martin, Shellback

once upon a time, a feW mistakes ago
i was in your sigHts, you got mE aloNe
You found me, you fOund me, you foUnd me…
i gueSs you didn't cAre and i guess i liked that
and i When i fell hard, you took a step back
without Me, without mE, without me…
and he's long gone when he's next to me
and i realize the blame is on me, cause

CHORUS
i knew you were trouble when you walkeD in
so shAme on me Now
flew me to plaCes i’d never been till you put me down
oh I knew you were trouble when you walked iN
so shame on me now
flew me to places i’d never been
now i’m lyinG on the cold hard ground
oh oh trouble, trouble, trouble
oh oh trouble, trouble, trouble

no apologies, he'll never see you cry
pretends he doesn't know that he's the reason why
you're drowning, you’re drowning, you’re drowning…
and i heard you moved on from whispers on the street
a new notch in your belt is all i’ll ever be
and now i see, now i see, now i see…
he was long gone when he met me
and i realize the joke is on me
hey!

REPEAT CHORUS

and the saddest fear
comes creeping in
that you never loved me
or her...or anyone...or anything
yeah

REPEAT CHORUS

i knew you were trouble when you walked in
trouble, trouble, trouble
i knew you were trouble when you walked in
trouble, trouble, trouble

Read more

A Place In This World

Today is Taylor's 23rd birthday!  Happy Birthday Taylor!  In honor of her birthday the meaning of today's song is "A Place In This World" from her "Taylor Swift" album.

Who is this song about?

It's about Taylor and her desire to find a place in this world through her music.

"I was thirteen when I wrote the song "A Place In This World" and I was just kind of looking around at all these big buildings and all these important people and wondering how I was going to fit in."

In the beginning of the song Taylor is doubtful and unsure of what she wants, "I don't know what I want, so don't ask me/Cause I'm still trying to figure it out."  In the middle of the song she knows that "I'm just a girl, trying to find a place is/This world/And tomorrow's just a mystery, oh yeah."  By the end of the song she is more confident and expresses this thought "Maybe I'm just a girl on a mission/But I'm ready to fly" knowing she needs to find her place in this world.

Click here for lyrics to the song, "A Place In This World". 

What was her place in this world?  What did she want more than anything?

In "A Place In This World" documentary Taylor says, "My big dream is to look out into a crowd of thousands of people and have them singing the words to my songs.  That to me would just be everything I've ever hoped for. I want to make people feel things when they hear my music. I want to give a song to someone who is going through a breakup.  I want to give a song to someone who loves someone and can't tell them, a song for someone who has just fallen in love, and a song for people who are just living their lives." ("A Place In This World" documentary)

Taylor's dream started when she was ten Taylor says, "I think I first realized I wanted to be in country music and to be an artist when I was ten and I started dragging my parents to festivals and fairs and karaoke contests and I did that for about a year before I came to Nashville for the first time." ("A Place In This World" documentary)

Taylor tells CMT Insider in 2008 "I first visited Nashville after I watched this TV program about Faith Hill. It said that she went to Nashville and that's how she made it in country music. So ever since I saw that TV program when I was about 10, I was obsessively, obnoxiously bugging my parents every day -- 'We've got to go to Nashville. Can we go to Nashville? Can we go on a trip to Nashville like now? Or maybe spring break, can we go to Nashville?' Everything led to that. It was like, 'So how was your day at school today, Taylor?" 'Great. Can we go to Nashville?' I would bug them every day about it until finally we planned a trip to Nashville."

 "I was eleven and I had this demo CD of me singing Dixie Chicks and Leann Rimes songs and walked into ever major record label and was like, 'Hey I'm Taylor, I'm eleven, I want a record deal. Call me."

"I think that was the trip that made me realize that I really needed to be different so I went back home to Pennsylvania where I grew up and I started writing songs and I picked up a 12 string guitar and started to play.  That's when I started writing every single day after school.  I would go into town after school and write until nine pm, come home do my homework and that's what I did for about 2.5 years straight." ("A Place In This World" documentary)

Taylor tells CMT Insider in 2008 "After the trip that we initially took and met with people on Music Row, I went home and decided that I needed to learn a few more things before I went back. I learned guitar and I learned songwriting, and I never put it down. I would play guitar for four hours a day, and my mom would make me stop, and we'd have to tape up my fingers. So instead of playing at karaoke bars and things like that where I needed to drag my little karaoke machine everywhere, I would go with my guitar and I would plug it in at coffee houses, and I would bring my little amplifier and plug it in at Boy Scout meetings. I would plug it in at all these different places, little random places where you could play. I now had a portable instrument, and I could go accompany myself, and I could play anywhere I wanted to. That really expanded the places where I could play and my abilities. I played so much that I came a long way in a short period of time."

She still tried to make it in Nashville, and did not give up. "When I was about 12, we started going to Nashville and taking trips every two months or so, going to Nashville for a week trying to meet songwriters, trying to get my foot in the door at different places. Eventually, we scored this meeting with RCA Records when I was 13. I went into RCA, and I pulled out my guitar and I played them a bunch of songs, maybe 20 songs. The A&R people there said, "We want to sign you to a development deal." And that was when I was 13. A development deal is not a full-on record deal. It's not 'All right, we're going to make an album. Let's go.' It's 'We're going to sponsor and pay for your demos that you do over this next year, and we're going to see how you grow as an artist. And then in a year, we're going to decide whether we want you or whether we want to develop you for more time or whether we want to drop you.' It's a non-committal commitment, but I was elated. I was just, 'Oh, my gosh! This huge record label wants to sign me to a development deal! I'm so excited!' So we started coming to Nashville more and more and more, and eventually we just decided to move." (CMT Insider)

Taylor moved to Nashville when she was fourteen and started attending Hendersonville High her freshman year. And finally when she was fifteen everything started to pay off, she got a record label and was able to start sharing her music with the world.  When she was sixteen she released her first album, a major victory in Nashville, a city that didn't see many young artists.  Everything skyrocketed after that.

"In this last year everything I've ever worked for has started to pay off. This last year has been absolutely amazing.  It's like everything I've ever wanted, everything I've ever worked for all this time is just happening because getting a record deal means being able to do what I want to do.  This is my chance, this is my chance to bring my music out of my bedroom where I'm writing it. I think it's definitely very surreal right now because there are so many firsts." ("A Place In This World" documentary)

In her lyric hints, capital letters in the lyric booklet Taylor says "FOUND IT".  I'm SO glad you found your place in this world Taylor!  Thanks for your music and Happy Birthday!

Read more

Our Song

Today's Taylor Swift song is the meaning of "Our Song" from her album "Taylor Swift".

This song is a really fun song about a couple who doesn't have a song.  In the song Taylor describes all the fun things they do together and in essence it becomes their song.  This song would be a fun upbeat wedding song.

Who is this song about?

"Our Song" music video

It is about her boyfriend her freshman year of high school named Drew.

In November 2012 Taylor Swift during her VH1 storytellers concert Taylor said "This is a song that was off of my first album, and my first album came out when I was sixteen so the songs that I wrote on that album were songs I wrote when I was fourteen and fifteen. This was a song that I wrote actually to sing at the high school talent show. I was a freshman and I was, they had this talent show and I'd just moved there and I really wanted to like play for my friends the first time and I'd never told them really that I did this and I loved this and I write songs.  I had been dating this guy who was so nice.  So I wanted to write this song about us and play it for him and his friends and for me and for like all my friends and it was the high school talent show.  So I wrote this song and I included all these details about our relationship like how when we were on the phone really late at night my mom would patrol outside my room. She for real would just be like pacing outside my room like in figure eights and I'd be under the covers saying 'I like you so much too, I can't get off, I don't want to get off the phone, I just like you so much.'  My mom would be like 'Taylor get off the phone, you have to sleep, it's four in the morning you have to sleep, this is ridiculous, you will see Drew tomorrow, this is ridiculous.'  I wrote a song about like all the details of our relationship like when we were riding in cars and shotgun and like all those things.  So I go and I play it at the talent show and my friends loved it and like his friends loved it and people clapped a lot for it.  I went to my record label and I said to the guy at the record label, 'I think we should really put this song on the record because my friends at high school love it.' He was like, 'Now you can't just make all your decisions about a very serious thing like an album based on if your high school friends like it or not.' It ended up being our first number one at country radio so I guess you can."

It is such a happy and upbeat song and is definitely a Taylor classic.

Click here for the lyrics to "Our Song". 

Click here to watch the music video for "Our Song".

Read more

Fifteen

Today's Taylor Swift song is the meaning of "Fifteen" from her "Fearless" album.

This is a very touching song, it talks about freshman year of high school, finding your first love and then they use you and don't love you back.  It makes me cry every time I listen to it.

Who is it about?

It's about Taylor and her best friend Abigail Anderson.

"I wrote this around the story line of my best friend from high school, Abigail. I started everything with the line 'Abigail gave everything she had to a boy who changed his mind' and wrote everything else from that point, almost backwards. I just decided I really wanted to tell that story about our first year of high school because I felt in my freshman year, I grew up more than any year in my life so far."

Taylor Swift and Abigail Anderson

Taylor and Abigail met when she moved to Tennessee and started attending Hendersonville High School. "You sit in class next to a redhead named Abigail/And soon enough you're best friends/Laughing at the other girls who think they're so cool/We'll be out of here as soon as we can."

During the year they both dated older guys.  Taylor realized that she had bigger dreams, "When all you wanted was to be wanted/Wish you could go back and tell yourself what you know now/Back then I swore I was gonna marry him someday/But I realized some bigger dreams of mine." "But Abigail gave everything she had to a boy/Who changed his mind/'cause when you're fifteen and somebody tells you they love you/You're gonna believe them."

Click here for the lyrics to the song, "Fifteen". 

This song touches on a very important subject. Girls want to be loved when they are that age. But if a guy is telling you he loves you, but you need prove that you love him by doing things with him, he doesn't really love you. You don't know that when you are fifteen, you only feel the pressure from him and want to be loved so badly.  I had friends who gave things away when they were young because of this reason.  They found someone to love them, felt the pressure, gave in, and regretted it like Abigail.

Taylor and Abigail talk about the personal nature of the song and the hope that it will help other's who are fifteen and going through the same thing in the "On the Set Behind the Scenes 'Fifteen' ".

Taylor: "My song fifteen is about my freshman year in high school, things that I wish had been said to me in a song. I remember when I first played the song for Abigail I was really nervous because I didn't know if she would be okay with me telling her story like that. It's really a personal song especially from her angle."

Abigail "People always ask me, 'Does it bother you that your name is in a song that's so personal?' And it really doesn't just because of the way Taylor and I feel about it. If one girl can kind of learn from it or connect to a song like that, it's totally worth it."

Taylor: "Half of it is reminiscing what I went through, but half of it is really sort of cautionary to people going into their freshman year of high school and walking through the doors."

I hope that young girls will realize that they do not need to give everything to their boyfriends and will learn from Abigail's story.

Read more

Innocent

Today's Taylor Swift song is the meaning of "Innocent" from her "Speak Now" album.

Taylor performed this song for the first time at the 2010 VMA's, September 12th.  She chose to perform this song because of a specific event that took place at the 2009 VMA's.

Taylor performing at the 2010 VMA's, 9/12/2010

  Click here for video of the live performance to "Innocent".

What happened at the 2009 VMA's?

Taylor Swift had just won Best Female Video for "You Belong To Me".  She was delivering her acceptance speech when Kanye West came onstage, stole the microphone and said, "Yo, Taylor, I'm really happy for you and I'mma let you finish, but Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time. One of the best videos of all time!"  It was a shock to everyone there including Beyoncé who let Taylor come back up on stage when she won Video of the Year.  President Obama even weighed in on the controversy.

Kanye West and Taylor Swift, 2009 VMA's, September 13, 2009

Taylor told The View September 15, 2009, "Well, I think my overall thought process was something like, 'Wow, I can't believe I won, this is awesome, don't trip and fall, I'm gonna get to thank the fans, this is so cool. 'Oh, Kanye West is here. Cool haircut. What are you doing there?' And then, 'Ouch.' And then, 'I guess I'm not gonna get to thank the fans.' You know, I'm not gonna say that I wasn't rattled by it. But I had to perform live five minutes later, so I had to get myself back to the place where I could perform."

Kanye did feel bad for what happened that night, but I don't know if it was more over the bad press he was getting or he really felt sorry.  In a series of Twitter messages Kanye said, "She deserves the apology more than anyone... Who am I to run on stage? I would never ever again in a million years do that. Sorry to let you down. It is distasteful to cut people off as a general rule. What's the point of dressing tastefully if I'm going to act the complete opposite? Yes I was that guy. A 32 year old child. When I woke up from the crazy nightmare I looked in the mirror and said GROW UP KANYE ... I take the responsibility for my actions. Beyonce didn't need that. MTV didn't need that and Taylor and her family friends and fans definitely didn't want or need that."

So what did Taylor do? She wrote a song. In the song "Innocent" she compares making mistakes in childhood versus making mistakes when you are older. She let Kanye know that she accepted his apology and that grown ups can make mistakes too.  "It's okay, life is a tough crowd/32, and still growin' up now/Who you are is not what you did./You're still an innocent."  

Click here for lyrics to the song, "Innocent".

Taylor told Access Hollywood "The decision to perform 'Innocent' on the VMA's was very inline with what the album is about. The album is called Speak Now, it's about saying, saying what you need to say at the moment that you need to say it.  I had a bunch of different options going into the VMA's.  I could have sung a different song, I could've not gone, I could've done a bunch of different things, but I felt like going to the VMA's and singing a song about how I had felt, it seemed like the right call if I'm going to live my life in the way that I wrote that album."

I think that Kanye is a still a jerk for what he did, but kudos to Taylor for taking the higher road and forgiving him.

Read more