The Press Box - ‘Jam Session’ — An Unhappy Conversation About Taylor Swift (Ep. 346)

Episode Date: August 28, 2017

The Ringer's Juliet Litman and Amanda Dobbins discuss Taylor Swift's shaky roll-out of her new single, 'Look What You Made Me Do,' and accompanying VMA video release (5:00), Swift's corporate sponsorships (12:00), Katy Perry's credibility in the pop music world (17:00), and the winners and losers from MTV's Video Music Awards (22:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to a special jam session. Taylor Swift emergency. I'm Juliet Luteman. I'm Amanda Dobbins. Last time we spoke, we were anticipating the new Taylor Swift song and video, and now we have both. So can I just do this right up top? I would like to apologize. Okay. I would like to apologize to the jam session community. I would like to apologize to you. I was so unbelievably wrong that I just... You just wanted to believe in her. She should be apologizing to you. I wanted to believe in Taylor. I wanted to believe that pop music could still be fun. I wanted to believe that I have not spent upwards of almost 10 years on a fandom that has turned out to be for not. That's not true. You sound like a Game of Thrones fan right now. I know.

Well, you know, I've spent a lot of time with them in the last 24 hours as well. It's been a very complex weekend in the pop culture space for me. Let's talk through what happened. Sure. So the song drops Thursday. Thursday night at midnight Eastern or midnight eastern. A little before midnight, yes. And the song is called, look what you made me do. And so can I just say something? Of course. In the moments before I clicked play on Spotify, I was so full of hope. Because you know what? Look what you made me do is

actually a great title for a very spiteful song. Or for like a chicklet novel on which I love. So that would be great. If I had one of those in my bag right now, I'd be very happy. So like, I was already hopeful, as last week's podcast is evidence of. And then I saw this song and I just, I really, I felt like a child again. I believed. And I was so wrong. I have never been more wrong. This song is horrible.

So I was at dinner when it came out and I was, you know, enjoying some fish tacos at True Food Kitchen. Oh, you love True Food Kitchen. Yeah, I do love True Food Kitchen. And I look at my phone and I'm like, oh, wow, my colleagues hate this. song. And then I was really excited to get in my car to figure out, like, how do I feel about it? And it's bad. It's just my main thing is it's childish. Like, it is, like, a song for kids. And I felt that way when we were never, ever getting back together came out. But that, like, ultimately was really catchy. This song I've heard to hear, I've had to hear like 25 times to be

able to sing it back to myself. Like, it's not catchy at all, which is a huge mistake for a lead single after three years. My main problem with it is, is the songwriting. And I think you and Max Martin. Yes, we are, we are, I believe in Max Martin and I do not believe in this Taylor Swift. Spoken word choruses from Taylor Swift. I do not. And I don't believe in this current school of it.

I just, the chorus is a huge problem. Yeah. And not just because it's apparently borrowed from Wright said Fred. Right. And also not sung. She's a singer. Yes. And we can go, we'll go back to kind of the I'm Too Sexy part of this, which is extremely

complicated, but the chorus is such a structural letdown and also does not fit Taylor Swift's mode of singing or performing at all. And it just, if the chorus, if they had landed the chorus, this would not be a great song, but it would be a listenable song. It would be a song that you would get used to as we all got used to shake it off, which is actually extremely catchy. Or we are never getting back, we are never ever getting back together is one of my secret favorites are never ever. It's pretty good. And it's funny because I feel like, look what you made me do,

is trying to be a similar kind of song, but just fails. Yeah. And even we are never ever getting back together has that recorded voicemail spoken word part, which I had forgotten back until recently, but it's the... Shake it off, has it too. This is exhausting, which still makes me laugh. That's funny. The first time it was funny, the third time, it is familiar and cheesy and annoying.

Yeah. And we talked a little bit about last week of 1989, which was a pretty good album, kind of used a lot of tired themes. And the first time that you hear Taylor Swift being mad about an ex-boyfriend or hurt by an ex-boyfriend, it's very powerful. And by the third or fourth album, you've just kind of, the magic isn't there anymore. You've heard this before. And a lot of the kind of songwriting tricks here are both familiar and kind of the worst

version of choices she's made before. I think she, I think in retrospect, she should have, like, gone acoustic, basically. Agree. She should have, like, gone back to her roots as, like, a songwriter. And if she had been really earnest about the, like, tough year she's had with all the criticism or whatever, that would be really different. But instead, she's going the petty route of, like, picking all these fights. And I think if it were good petty, yeah, she does, she, she knew how to do petty. She knows how to.

Dear John, I was the other thing, I was listening to speak now before. for the single was released just to kind of, I was having a nice moment. Yeah, so this is why I was so personally upset. But Dear John is so spiteful and petty and transcendent. And I am moved by the pettiness every time I listen to it. We needed Mean Part 2. Yes.

The next song, it was Dear John Mean on that album. It's an incredible 10 minutes of music. Yeah. We needed Taylor doing like her type of music and not like leaning on other tropes. Yeah. And, you know, she is usually kind of lyrically more clever in the way that she expresses her grudges. Yeah. This is like, you know, the tilted stage thing is just annoying.

That's a Kanye reference. It's a very specific Kanye reference. It's wrong. It's like this tilted stage was very cool. And I think it's very dumb to be making this grudge so specific at this point. I think she kind of should have gone outwards. It's like, yeah, we get it. Yeah.

Beyond that, it's like really. it's like a fifth grader's interpretation of the of dear John. Yeah. Pretty basic lyrics. It's pretty, it's pretty frustrating. And like to say she should have got an acoustic or like back to her old style of music, is not to say she can't like grow and change. Absolutely.

But this doesn't feel like authentic to the songwriting trajectory, it seemed like she was on. The one thing that Taylor Swift always had, even when she was frustrating or annoying or kind of playing too much into the victim stuff with Kanye, which she's done for a while before this, of this is just also we are still talking about this. But, you know, or when she has been kind of disappointing as a public figure or as a political figure, the one thing that you could always say about Taylor Swift is that she was

a good musician. She was a good song writer. And you cannot say that about this song. It's a total failure as a musical enterprise. And that just, if she can't even land a song, it's bad news. So then that's Thursday night. And then it gets worse because Friday morning, she does a teaser. Good Morning America.

And this kind of gets something that I was saying last week, which is I felt like she was saying a really traditional route with her rollout. Sure. And like using the VMAs as like a pivot point. And GMA is like as traditional as it gets. Like and also who does a teaser for a video? Like if you, it's just like you don't need to do a trailer for a music video. You have a lyric video for a reason.

And she did. And like it's fine. Like let that stand on its own. They actually the two, the lyric video and the actual video I think actually makes more sense together than most usually do. but so there was kind of like no reason to do the teaser and then she got picked apart for it. So they released like five frames basically. One of them so glaringly looked like a rip off of lemonade from Beyonce.

And the internet had a feel day. There were some pretty good memes. It was a total mistake. And I will say this. Let's go to distribution for a second. The one thing that I think she's, I don't even know whether she's doing it right, but this song has already broken the streaming, Spotify streaming record. and the YouTube as well.

The video has already broken the YouTube record. I think it is sold an astonishing number. And that can only happen when you reach as many people as possible. It is difficult to achieve that level of kind of internet ubiquity or not beyond internet ubiquity. So in that sense, I understand why GMA and the VMAs is what she did because you just kind of, you need that platform. The stills were terrible. terrible. And we keep asking ourselves this of just, this is all Taylor Swift's fault. It's her name on it. And it's her responsibility. But there are a lot of people who are involved in making this video and making this song, making this video and making the decisions about how it would be rolled out. And there is no one who looks at those stills and thinks, oh, this kind of looks like the formation video. Maybe we should rethink this. Right. Maybe this would not be the best way to put this forward. Maybe we should protect you from it. Maybe it's baffling that no one at any point. I can't believe this song got out, frankly, that no one said, are we sure?

We sure? I'm dying to see the rest of the liner notes. I really want to know who else she collaborated with. Because this is a Jack Antonoff, Collabo. It is. And notably, out of the woods was released really early in the 1989 album cycle. I guess it was the second or third one. It was after Shake It Off.

And it really didn't take off. And so then she went to Blank Space like pretty quickly. And then there was also a welcome to New York somewhere in there, right? Yeah. That was tough. But even that was like we're just getting more songs at one time. And anyway, out of the woods never really took off, although it's like many like people, many people really like it, but it wasn't a successful single.

No. And she didn't learn from that. So then we had the GMA thing. And then after that came her UPS endorsement. And it turned out that she had a deal with UPS. I don't even really understand what it is, but some kind of like sign up. And then like UPS would deliver tickets to you. And then on top of that there was like a Taylor Swift.

fan club. She had a partnership with Ticketmaster to sell tickets. So you'd get early access to be able to buy tickets, but not even at any discount. And it was just sort of like corporate move after corporate move after corporate move, which like is one of the reasons she's so successful. Like she had a partnership with Target, which went really well. But these just seemed even more hollow. And you know, other musicians do use the Tickets Master. And other musicians do have partnerships. The, you know, the UPS one was a classic. Her face is going to be plastered on the damn trucks. Yeah.

Which is just, I mean, you can partner with anyone. She has many corporate sponsors. She's been a Diet Coke person forever and those commercials are a little cheesy, but everyone has, everyone has brand partnerships at this point. Pop stars do. I don't. Get in touch if you'd like me. But so it's, these are things that are done, but kind of the way in which she's doing

them is the tackiest or the most tone deaf version. Also, the dissonance between like, you've turned me into a villain and then I'm making tons of money in a very obvious way. It's hard to reconcile. With UPS. UPS. Yeah. I'm going to be honest.

I'm partial to FedEx, but I like UPS too. Julie, that's available for brand partnerships. Yeah. Here's the thing. Get at me, FedEx. Here's the thing. The UPS thing is laughable and the jokes were fantastic. So good.

They were great. But if the song had been good, it would have been a side show. Right. We would have made fun of her, but it wouldn't have mattered. We would have said this as a damn. The fundamental problem here is that she just, she screwed up the song. And she screwed it up far more than I ever imagined that she would.

I did not think that she was capable of producing such a boring and poorly constructed song. And it doesn't bode well for the rest of the album. It certainly doesn't bode well for all the choices that she's making alongside the album. Right. The only silver lining I can find here is that I think that this will be received so poorly that she may be forced back to country music. Or to, you know, the Taylor comeback album, the Taylor goes back to her. roots, et cetera.

I would love an acoustic album from her. I think we all would. Or a live album, unless she's not a great live singer. But still, she can make it work. Yeah. So that was Friday. Oh my God, we're only to Friday. So I'm going to lie down under the table.

Saturday, rumors about her attending the VMAs. And then Sunday, what's the VMAs? There was a page six story saying there would not be any reconciliation between Taylor and Katie. Page six, by the way, doing some great VMA's reporting. And I really suggest everyone look into the report about Miley's VMA's performance and how that came together. And then watch her performance.

It's a rich text. I love page six. We didn't know what she was going to do, but everything seemed to indicate that she would be showing up at the VMAs in support of her new record and her new video, which was going to be premiering. Yes, we did know that the video

was going to be premiering during the VMAs and we didn't know anything else. Yes. And I made some wild predictions last week about what she would do at the VMAs. Yes. And it was all under the assumption she would be there.

And then the VMAs. MAs happen and about 25 minutes into the show, there's a promo for Taylor Swift's new video, goes to commercial. In the middle of Julia Michaels performing, which I'm so angry about. It was the rudest thing I've ever seen. We love you, Julia. MTV, you should be ashamed of yourselves. They cut off Kyle as well, who I like didn't really know who that was until last night,

but whatever. Then, so then they come back from commercial. It's time for Taylor Swift. Just the video. No Taylor. Just the video. She doesn't even show up. So now this is fascinating.

again, I just, I need to stress how wrong I was. It's important. It's, accountability is important. And I was damn wrong because I thought that she would be using the Katie platform and that they would kind of come together and do a joint performance and we would put the feud behind this. But that's because I gave credit to these people as pop stars who I once loved. Right. And that moment is over. I will say, I'm happy the feud still alive. Why? It's not good for either of them. I don't know. Did you see, okay, I mean, did you watch Katie last night? She was very bad. Very bad.

It was really, really rough going. Not sure what her future holds, Katie. Exactly. But the swish-swish video and performance with like a weird basketball. Who designed that outfit, by the way? Well, I mean, Katie Perry got lucky because of swish-swish video is so bad, but no one's talking about it because of Taylor Swift. Exactly, which I guess now was Taylor's purpose. So I assume that Taylor needed the VMAs to release this.

and she has enough power that she was able to get them to release the video without attending. And I assume that Katie doesn't have any say at all. So there was nothing that she could do about it. Right. Which is a sad report on both their statuses at this point. One thing that I'm having a hard time with, this is very existential. Katie Perry put out a bad record. She had a bad publicity tour.

She made some weird choices. is and she clearly is like in like her career is like not great she'll be fine except she's making $25 million for American Idol and so she's she's part of this Taylor should put out a bad song bunch of faux pos and she still just like breaks all these records there's just like no there's no consequence for having bad pop art and like kind of bothers me I think there is because I think like well I mean there's there's there financially there's not because Katie Perry is making $25 million for American Idol which is an extraordinary amount of money yeah and And like Taylor Swift is going to continue having the funds to support her to private jets,

so she never has to sleep on the road. But here's the thing. If Katie, this is Katie Perry's last run. That's true. Because she's, she had a wheat prism was not a huge success. No. And then Witness was kind of a disaster. And the press tour around it was a disaster.

And she got the American Idol deal because of witness at all. She got it based on past performance. And she's cut. She's run out of cred. She's used her last cred and her ability. So if no one watches American Idol or if she's not good or if she's not liked and she can't get that deal again, that's kind of the end of the big road for her. Sure. I mean, she has makeup.

She has all sorts of Katie Perry is just fine. Katie Perry will has a ton of money and. Yeah, she's fine. We'll be fine. It's kind of like we went through this with Lady Gaga a couple years ago. She was so big and art pop was a disaster. And then she kind of pivoted to being an actress and then has become very campy. I loved her most recent record, but I don't think it was like the same kind of hit.

It was not. So are they both destined to be on the Lady Gaga path now, like a slight pivot and a record that some people like? Like, I mean, Lady Gaga is still playing the Super Bowl and closing out Laopalooza. I mean, Coachella, so she, too, is fine. But she's not the same level of, like, astronomical success that we have seen all three of these women have. Yeah, you know, some of it is just kind of how the music industry and culture at large is changing. I don't mean, you know, I mean the way we talk about music, the way we talk about music, the way you consume music and how there is never really one consensus.

Yeah. Person, besides Beyonce. The Beyonce exception works here as well. And Drake is obviously an exception to that. I think Kendrick, to an extent, is an exception to that. There are exceptions, but it is much harder to be the level of pop star that, say, Lady Gaga or Katie Perry or even seven or eight years ago. Yeah.

just because the mechanism of the radio and streaming and the internet, you can't have the stranglehold that a record label was once able to manufacture. So, yeah, I think that it will look a bit like that for each of these artists. I think the problem is just that it doesn't have to be quite so embarrassing as it is for each of them. And I was never really a Lady Gaga person, so I can't. It's all, that's all looked a little embarrassing to me, but I think people really did like this new record. She's found.

I love it. Yeah. And she has found certain avenues to express herself. Isn't she a Golden Globe winner? Was she? All I remember is Leo making a face at her at the Golden Globes, which is kind of what I carry with me. I think she won.

All three of them are theater kids at heart. Sure. And Lady Gaga has been able to channel that to find some roles. Yes. You know what's so interesting. I was thinking about this last night because so many possibilities. stars are theater kits at heart. Drake is a theater kid at heart. And I love it on him. It looks great. Sure. But the role of a producer in a team is to channel the power and

performance ability and everything that comes with being a theater kid and challenge that into ways that work for you. There's supposed to be a filter. There's supposed to be something so that not everyone is just doing God's Bell every night on stage. Right. And there's no more filters and everyone's just doing Andrew Lloyd Weber all the time. Like Lord, Lord literally has a lame miss song on her album. Liability is, it's crazy. It's crazy to me. It's true. Anyway, so I think a lot of people are being failed by their teams is another point because no one really knows what to do anymore. It's a lot of throwing spayal against the wall. I'm just so eager to hear the rest of the album now. I'm just so curious for the rest of the choices she made. Like, I'm not expecting it to be

good or bad, but I'm just sort of like, who did you think were the people you should be working with? Like, I'm afraid we already have our answer. I'm afraid that it's all Jack Antonoff. I'm afraid that it's intensely Jack Antonoff. I would love an Ed Sheeran, song. I would kill for some Max Martin songs. You and me both. Sharon might be a possibility just because they're so close. And because, as you recall, he leaked the fact that the album was coming later this year. So maybe they're still friends or maybe he was working on it. Maybe both. I don't know. I would just love it. Ed Shearin, let's do a quick five to ten on that VMAs. Ed Shearine did not enjoy himself with the VMAs. Not having fun. Cardi B. Seen

like she was having the most fun. Loved her holding her breast. That was hilarious. I liked her reaction shot to Ed Shear and bringing Uzi Verde on stage. Okay. I want to talk about this. Yes. I go very deep on Ed Shear and YouTube. It's one of my, one of the pools of content I know the best. How frequently are you kind of checking in on this?

I check in all the time, like every other week. Okay. A lot. And how much new content shows up on Ed Shear and YouTube in the span of two weeks? Right now there's quite a bit because of his record. So we're talking kind of interview, you know, radio interviews. Performance in the Netherlands, performance in France. You know, just who knows.

It's like, this is a, it's a really beautiful relationship that we have where you will, you will always surprise me. It's like a great marriage. Continue. So Ed Shearion has been performing shape of you with his buddy Stormsy. Okay. And I was like, oh, is Stormsie going to come out? This is how he does it with Stormsy.

And then Little Uzi-Virc came out. And I found that very annoying. I was like, you can't just replace one rapper for another. Like, it just was, and then, you know, then he joined. turned in on Little Uzi Burt's song. But I just found that to be very cynical, which is kind of like the word everyone's been using to describe the show. But that really bothered me.

And I just felt like Ed was just kind of like, I'm not putting in any extra work here. Like, this is what I do. You can find someone who fits in and like maybe I'll go with it. And it takes like probably 10 minutes for Ed Sharon to figure out a new song that he has to be a part of. So it's like very little work for him. And it didn't seem like they had like some kind of seamless connection.

And I was annoyed by that. So you and Cardi B are on the same page. Yeah. We both like hell now. We three are on the same page. Great. Yeah, we all are. Other VMA's opinion.

Shout out to Sean Mendez. Okay, I thought you were going to go with pink, but we'll do Sean Mendes and then Pink. May I unveil my Sean Mendez theory. Yes. He is the universe course correcting for Justin Bieber. Interesting. Explain.

Started out on Vine. Okay. And then became a really big pop star. Sure. He's Canadian. Okay. He is like close to his family. Okay.

He's just like all the things that Bieber purported to be at first, but actually is. Like I just think he's like a good normal guy who's very also a huge pop star. Yes. And it's pretty handsome. Yeah. So the two things that we're going to say is that I don't think he's as musically talented as Justin Bieber. And number two, I was not aware until last night of what Sean Mendez looks like.

And unlike almost every. I think he and upgraded slightly. Do you want to know what? The pop means a world is so devoid of tall guys that when there is one, it's like, oh, interesting. The world at large, really. but anyway. He's clearly tall.

He also, like, he's literally growing up in front of where. It's a Beamer situation. He started doing this when he was like 15, a little bit older than Bebs. And he's just coming into his own. He was big on the UK festival circuit, so I've seen him sing. Like, no holding me back a thousand times. But I think he just seems like a nice kid. And if I had a daughter, I'd be like, yes, be into Sean Mendez.

He seems lovely. I'm sure he probably is like not as lovely as I'm giving him credit for, but whatever. Okay. Tell me about pink. And lastly, pink. Thanks for asking Amanda. Sure. I watched Game of Thrones Live instead of the VMAs.

I did I. So I had like a lot of thoughts that I had no outlet for because I was like four hours behind. Okay. I've loved Pank since a long time. Like basically ever since she started out being like R&B and then switched to pop like very quickly. And ever since the Let's Get This Party Started song, I've just been in. I love her tunes. I love her voice.

She's a great performer. And I just, I thought she killed it last night. I loved it. It was nice. I don't know, she's just great. I don't feel any ill will. I just, yeah, I was, I also had to switch to Game of Thrones and then immediately switched back to VMAs and it was kind of a hectic night.

I did not have a great time watching the VMAs. No. I was pretty, I was bored or bewildered. Yeah. It was uncomfortable watching Katie Perry. That was extremely uncomfortable. The first hour was just very tough because it was the Katie Perry intro's, the Taylor Swift video, Lord, who was apparently sick. but then just did a Napoleon Dynamite dance instead, which I admire the chutzpah.

But it was kind of a little strange that that is the best that the VMAs could offer was the most interesting pop star, not even singing. What's your relationship like with Alessia, Kara? Do you have one? I really like here. There was a brief moment when I thought about walking down the aisle at my wedding to hear. Oh, interesting. And then I was informed that that would be not that cool.

and also really rude, which is a great point. I like her a lot. The new song is fine. I wish her well. You know, this was the thing. It just overall, it was a low energy. I thought Rob Parvilla's piece made a great point, which is that all of the pop stars who still matter

and who are still interesting and doing compelling work were not there. And you felt the absence and you felt kind of what the state of pop music is right now, which is pretty tough. And that's what I'm so bummed about with the Taylor song is that we need a good, pop song. Totally. Even like someone like Demi Lovato had like a weird weekend. She's, she did. Sing the national anthem for Mayweather McGregor, which she did very well and she's very capable singer. But that was like a weird choice for her. And then she performs, sorry, not sorry, song I love. And she sounded good. But I don't know. There's just something

lacking with her. She couldn't fly to L.A. She didn't. I was wondering. I was wondering. So they had two performances from. Yeah. They also had DNCE and Rod Stewart. You know who's the biggest winner to me, by the way, I wanted to mention this is Joe Jonas. It's incredibly difficult to rebrand after being in a boy band, let alone one with your brothers, and to not even have him say DNCE with Joe Jonas, but just like people accept him as being in some weird, like band that actually don't cares about, is I think a huge triumph, plus he's getting Sophie Turner from Game of Thrones. Sure. So good job. Yeah. He had a true or not true, probably not true. There was a like internet BDSM like scandal surrounding him a few years ago. And now he's just in a band, just

guy in a band. So that's a huge triumph and I'm really impressed by him. Good job. Yeah. It was still, that was an entirely bizarre performance. It was the most awkward transition of the night. It was right after the tribute to Heather Hire. Heather Hire and Charlottesville. And then suddenly Rod Stewart and Joe Jonas were just dancing around in Vegas. And you're like, what on earth is going on? The whole thing was tone deaf, which is just really a way to sum up Taylor Swift as well. I think pop music is struggling with the climate of the country and it's role in it. Sure. And I think that we're kind of feeling that with Taylor, with the BMAs, with Katie. Absolutely. With all of these struggles. You know, and we talked a little bit about it last night of

kind of Katie and Taylor are an interesting comparison set in this because Katie kind of did, Katie participated in the 2016 election, which I admire. And I, that's what I would want for my pop stars. She endorsed Hillary Clinton, just to be clear, it wasn't just participating. It was endorsing Hillary Clinton. And she has since responded to kind of current event. as best she can. It was not the most elegant expression. No. And it didn't really work for her.

And I don't think it really added that much to the national discourse, which is kind of what you would hope from those attempts. So, you know, that's, Taylor Swift, on the other hand, has said nothing, done nothing, and is being the most petty version of herself. And it doesn't sit well either. And obviously... It's not even fun petty.

It's not even fun petty. I want to send her a highlight reel of Dream on Green's interviews. Yeah. And so there's a way. there's a way to do it right. And I admire the effort and trying and speaking out more than I admire saying silent always. But this idea that she should just suddenly rebrand into something that she's not also has its pitfalls. But no one is getting anything right is kind of the issue right now. No one knows how to hit their marks. Right. And it just, there are other more important things going on

and it doesn't, it doesn't add up. This has been a jam session special edition. Thank you for for listening. Thank you. And again, I'm very sorry.