Taylor Swift announces new album, ‘The Tortured Poets Department,’ and song titles

By MALLIKA SEN and BETH HARRIS
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Forget her “Reputation.” Taylor Swift has a whole new album coming out.

Accepting the Grammy for best pop vocal album on Sunday night, Taylor said she’d been keeping a secret for two years.

“My brand-new album comes out April 19. It’s called ‘The Tortured Poets Department.’ I’m going to go and post the cover right now backstage,” she announced.

And so she did.

On her Instagram, Swift posted a black-and-white image of her reclining across pillows. The top half of her face and lower half of her legs are cut off in the low-contrast image.

“All’s fair in love and poetry…” her caption read. In a little over an hour, the Instagram post alone had amassed nearly 7 million likes — a figure that swelled to an apt 13 million in under a day.

“And so I enter into evidence / My tarnished coat of arms / My muses, acquired like bruises / My talismans and charms / The tick, tick, tick of love bombs / My veins of pitch black ink,” read what appeared to be handwritten lyrics posted after the album cover.

Inside Los Angeles’ Crypto.com Arena, Swift’s album announcement elicited screams from the upper levels.

Swift had provoked mass speculation earlier in the night when her site seemed to go down. Some theorized she was gearing up to release “Reputation (Taylor’s Version),” but cryptic clues on the “crashed” site indicated that might be a misdirect.

And so it was.

The site’s back up now, focused around the upcoming album, with preordering and merchandise options. The album will feature 16 tracks, with some editions offering a bonus track, “The Manuscript,” according to product descriptions. On Monday night, Swift released a track listing on social media.

Collaborations include “Fortnight,” featuring Post Malone, and “Florida!!!” featuring Florence + the Machine. A selection of other song titles: “Down Bad,” “I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can),” “loml” and “Clara Bow.”

This will be Swift’s 11th studio album, not counting her re-recordings. Her last original album was “Midnights,” released in October 2022. Since then, she’s launched the billion-dollar Eras Tour and released “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version)” and “1989 (Taylor’s Version).”

Swift was accepting the Grammy for “Midnights” when she made the surprise announcement. She later picked up album of the year, the show’s final award, for the album.

“I would love to tell you this is the best moment of my life, but I feel this happy when I finish a song, or when I crack the code to a bridge that I love, or when I’m shortlisting a music video, or when I’m working with my dancers,” she said after accepting her album of the year award from Celine Dion. With it, she broke the record for the most wins in that category (her other albums of the year: “Fearless,” “1989” and “Folklore”).

As she walked the red carpet in custom Schiaparelli Couture, she paid homage to her album title, donning a Lorraine Schwartz choker with a small clock embedded. And yes, the time was set to the midnight — even if the viewer had to tilt their head to see the hands pointing to “12.”

While a nod to the album — and reminiscent of the “tick, tick, tick” in “The Tortured Poets Department” post — the watch seemed particularly apt, given the superstar’s seemingly packed schedule over the next week. Swift is set to head back out on her Eras Tour this week, performing for four nights in Tokyo. She still will be able to make it back to the U.S. later in the week to catch her boyfriend Travis Kelce playing in the Super Bowl.

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Sen reported from New York. Music Writer Maria Sherman contributed reporting.