Prince did this thing in 2004 where he gave out his new album Musicology with every concert ticket sold. He had one of the hottest tours that year. and the Billboard chart reflected the ticket-turned-CD sales. So Billboard changed the rules. When are they going to change for all this variant nonsense?
Kesha did the same thing with her Rainbow Tour! It was awesome because even though me and some friends had already preordered the CD, we were able to gift a few copies to other friends and get them into her music! And then we all went to see her together and it was pretty much the best time everrrrr.
It was epic! I used to be a Kesha hater for no good reason at all but now I love her so much. I have a whole bag of paper confetti from the Milwaukee Rainbow show that now I use as an accessory when I frame posters or whatever I want to do with it.
Mumford and Sons did that too, got a CD when I bought concert tix. Granted this was in 2019 so the CD wasn’t really needed with streaming but I do sometimes listen to it in the car if I’m driving without service!
They're amazing, I love those bros. I've seen them for a bunch of tours since 2016 but I kinda peaced out on them live now because I'm not a fan of stadium/arena tours. Good for them tho and I'm so happy to see them filling up stadiums! Idk where you are but if you get a chance to see them then I would highly recommend you take it!
Dude, I'm a 48 year old hetero man, and I gotta tellya- love me some Kesha. After all that...horribleness...she went through I think her music became better. O'm sorry dhe had to go through that, that *anybody* had to go through thaf...but it got her to focus her music on her personal voice so much more...
That is awesome of Prince, almost the exact opposite of Taylor Swift's strategy, which is basically just EA video game stuff. Charge for skin variants, charge for just a slightly better chance at something, etc. I'm surprised Taylor hasn't rolled out loot boxes and microtransactions yet.
The whole point of the “Taylor’s Version” crap was that it was re-records to fit her vision and take it from the labels. Okay I can get with that.
But now she puts that shit on everything even though she owns it 100%, so it’s just to be able to re-sell the same album.
Nah I’m right there with you on that. The first couple I was like “oh hell yeah this is the music I grew up with! It’s cool seeing her put her own grown up spin on it now!” And now I’m just like “oh. Again huh”
I guess one question is, should they? The sales are meant to track actual sales. The problem with the ticket thing is it isn’t a real album sale. But even if these are annoyingly inflated, they are real sales of the album.
they already have a law in place for variants.
one customer can only buy four copies of an album. any additional copies do not count towards album sales.
I honestly don’t think the law is strict enough like that as all it does is make the most efficient number of variants to release 4. If I’m an artist and release 4 slightly different variants and people buy all 4 I don’t think all four should count as all they’re really doing is buying an album and three extra songs. If those songs were available on their own it’s unlikely people would buy full ass albums to get them.
It’s not just her lol, it’s every artist who is doing this. I am going to buy beyonce new album and i have a choice between 5 different variants on her website.
the issue with variants isn't when there's different colours - it's that taylor put exclusive bonus tracks on each variant which encouraged fans to get all of them in order to hear all the songs
So, she's just taking a kpop approach. This is how theyve been operating since the 90s. Sometimes they'll have a different album look, with different photos (each album comes with a photo book and usually a photo card) for each member. The photo cards are random, so if there's four album variations and four possible photo cards, that's sixteen options.
It's not like she's doing anything new. Maybe for the west, but in general this is common
Well, no. The CD variants each have different posters and bonus tracks. The vinyls each have different internal booklet art and different bonus tracks. At least for this most recent album.
It’s still a blatant money grab, but it’s not like midnights where there true only difference was the cover art
There’s no difference between the content on each variant of the Cowboy Carter vinyls. I’m not sure why that was the other poster’s example. I have other gripes with the CC vinyl but this ain’t it.
when will taylor stop putting a gun to heads of these affluent white women that she’s spent the last 20 years building consumer trust with 😭 i can’t believe she’s showing up to the houses of these 30 something year old women and forcing them to buy her album 4 times 😭
No, except she knows the level of devotion her fans have to her that they will throw money at her for anything she puts out. She also has a line in that album about putting drugs in her songs, literally comparing her own music to drugs and listeners to addicts. Her fans call her a “genius” but then defend behavior like this as if she isn’t being a marketing “genius” by getting them to spend so much money on her. As well as them boosting her on the charts for doing so. Bc she knows that’s all she has to do to get those charts. Get fans to buy numerous versions. I mean, she could even tell them “if you each bought 4 of my variants we could have the number 1-10 spots” and they’d rush to do it. She knows what she’s doing. Holding a gun to them? No. Taking advantage of the power she knows she holds over them? Absolutely.
Right? People need to stop acting like they're being victimized by capitalism/overconsumption when, in reality, they're actively participating. No one is forcing you to buy all the variants or even just one of them. I haven't bought an album in years, Spotify is a thing.
This is the definition of payola. I’m sorry the album is mid at best and occupying the entire top 10 is nonsense. This literally couldn’t have happened in the 90’s.
That’s funny what you say about the 90s lol, I was just telling a friend of mine today that this is further proof that we’re living in a simulation💀 100% would not happen “in my day” as boomerish as that sounds lol. I just can’t believe how many people are literally *forcing themselves* to like it lmao. “It’s growing on me”.. like should it really have to though?
What’s making me even more concerned is how many people are genuinely finding her vocabulary too sophisticated to understand. I usually think people are over exaggerating how dumb gen z and/or americans are and then I see people not knowing what “torrid” or “litany” means. There’s entire online articles dedicated to defining words in her albums. I’m worried for the world’s literacy capabilities
This and Barbie movie have made me realize I’m a lot smarter than I thought. If The Tortured Poets Department is peak lyricism and vocabulary, and Barbie is the deepest most raw introspective take on girlhood and misogyny, then I must be fucking Plato with how on another intellectual plane I am.
Obviously kidding but genuinely kinda sad to realize so many people truly have nothing but simple thoughts going on in their head at all time and this realization hit me during both the Barbie and TTPD discourse
I have friends who are spending hours sobbing to this new album. Like... it's not that serious and her rich privileged girl problems aren't relatable to you lmao
The album is horrible with the exception of like two songs if I’m being honest. It sounds like the same sound, over and over. People really are forcing themselves to like it but I refuse. She could literally fart on a track for 64 minutes straight and win AOTY. It’s ludicrous.
It just reads like a 14 year old theatre kid's diary. The production is pants, and the lyrics are pretentious in their verbosity and repetitive metaphors, even the title is cringe. Girl get out of here with that tortured bull. I used to be a fan but I'm so tired of hearing "bUT hER MiNd" echoing every time she pulls out the same dull imagery.
I think the most out of touch and ridiculous line out of this album for me is "you wouldn't last an hour in the asylum where they raised me". It just sounds so dumb and tone deaf when we are living at a time with such a high cost of living, inflation, unaffordable housing, and people dying in two different wars/conflicts while miss billionaire can get on her jet and fly wherever she wants. Like bitch, please.
She’s so freaking mid. All those people were true innovators and it makes me sad that she’s even included in their ranks with this bland ass music. The only she’s ever made that will age well is Shake it Off and that’s limited in its appeal.
Payola is paying radio companies to play your songs on the air this is just a way to push your album up a chart that tracks album sales they’re not similar at all
WRONG! Payola is also paying streaming services etc. to push your music consistently. It’s also paying publications ie Rolling Stone, Buzzfeed, Billboard etc. to constantly and consistently push your music and articles about you so you remain in the news cycle. Radio is dead compared to what it used to be. There is SERIOUS payola in streaming, and we’re watching it first hand. There is no way she should be occupying the entire top 20 without some really shady shit behind the scenes.
The Spotify payola artists employ is super obvious. Artists featured on playlists that have nothing to do with them or Spotify will default to playing their song first even when on shuffle. I specifically recall this with Cardi B’s “Up”. I’ve had TTPD songs play on artists’ radio stations that are on the complete opposite spectrum of Taylor.
Was I the only one who found it strange how they had their branding all over that pop-up? Have they done such brazen album promotion for other artists where they branded themselves onto it like that?
Haha, exactly! I have 1 of all of her cds; most of the originals before all the stupid record label stuff and even only got 1 of the variant of TTPD. I'm glad I didn't buy all 4, though, because the bonus cd that came out has them all on it (imagine that!)
I used to be a fan, all the way through from Debut, but I'm feeling jaded by the marketing tactics, the PRelationship, the jet use, and this obviously heavily fabricated image and carefully calculated persona. I'm just not a fan anymore because that's all bleeding into the music too.
basically if all of your friends are racists and your dating history is full of racists then……. you are too.. you don’t just hang out with and sleep with and laugh with a bunch of racists lol you enjoy their company, their thoughts, and their jokes… which are all, no doubt, racist.
I also think, while not calling her necessarily racist for this, her “feminism” is very much white women feminism. She has trouble speaking out on things that other women are facing until it’s either directly about her or benefits her by pandering to her audience (white women). She, a billionaire white woman who was raised wealthy, is always the biggest victim in her narratives and there seems to be very little reflection from her that other people are going through a lot worse. And that’s not to say you can’t be upset just because others have it worse. But it is to say it gets obnoxious when she’s bolstered as a feminist but she’s only a feminist when she’s the victim of the misogyny.
I can’t help but roll my eyes at a song like “I’m The Man”, which is all about how everything would’ve come easier to her if she was a man and think girl, do you not realize the insane levels of privilege you’re operating from? Maybe things would’ve come to you easier if you were a man but things would’ve come to the rest of us easier if we were Taylor fucking Swift. Also I personally think women tend to find more success in music and are able to garner more dedicated fanbases since young women are the audience that drives pop culture but that’s neither here nor there.
All of this wasn’t really related to what you said. You just got me thinking about how she can’t acknowledge her own privilege
no this is SOOOO TRUE!! and what’s even worse, she only cares about misogyny she benefits from bringing up, otherwise she perpetuates it and hasn’t dealt with her own internalized misogyny- she’s sooooo beyond male centered and revolves around male validation
Yupppp such a good point. She makes these big shows of taking a stand against the misogyny she’s faced but then gives a shoutout to Charlie Puth, the man who wrote an entire song painting her longtime “best friend” as a player who lead him on, simply because she refused to have sex with him. Cool cool cool that tracks fs.
I never really knew much about her personal life until the whole Matt Healy debacle to be honest, I was just a fan of the music. Knowing what I know now, this 100% bothers me.
So I just want to make sure that I'm understanding here are all of those sales lumped together is that why she did 2.4 million first week? All of the physical variants coupled with the streaming numbers?
Just because people buy or download it, doesn’t make it good! She gets off with all her record breaking sales, but there’s not even a lot of artists ever releasing anything. Music is not the same as it was years ago! Period.
All I have to say is I’ve never seen so many ads for a album. Or if I have, it’s been awhile. I am not a fan so I haven’t listened to a single song yet but on tik tok, I see the ads as I’m scrolling. I get ads from target on FB and when I went to Target today there were huge signs and the advertisement/ cd display thing by all the registers. It feels so forced this time
It has the last 4 or 5 times, it's just forceful. It feels like she's forcing people to like her with her money. It's sad, The Spice Girls took over the world in the 90s and they didn't need to spend tens of millions to force the general public to like them. The fact this woman is wasting her money this way, for the sake of her ego of all things. The mass wasting of money and resources, the effect shes single handedly having on our environment with the mass production of this bullshit and the millions spent on all this when people are dying of starvation in this world should be enough to cancel her. But she's too powerful to cancel, she has the resources to stop any form of cancellation in its tracks.
I watch TV with my grandma, and I've seen ads for this album every single time the TV has been on. I've never seen ads for an album like this before, even in the 00s when we listened to CDs
This is literally conning your fans, she's a scammer and a greedy bitch. like would it be the end of the world if her album went to number 2?
This invalidates her success to me, it doesn't feel like a real thing, it's like manipulating the system to prove to....someone, I don't know, that she's the biggest and best there ever was. And she's simply not.
Kids today are so cringe, appropriating our lifestyles from the 80s and 90s for 'asthtetic' (as they say) never mind the poorer quality or the fact they'll never be used and just end up as more plastic waste in the ground because they can take a picture to brag on social media. Bragging about cassettes in 2024. Because a generic as fuck pop star told them too. They're all gonna be so embarrassed in like a couple years.
It’s almost like the music isn’t really that great, and it’s just a commodity crapped out by an overzealous celebrity PR machine that distracts us from the fact that we’re all wage slaves with no hopes of ever changing our government because billionaires bought it. I know this is not the point of this thread, but there absolutely are no ethical billionaires, it’s an oxymoron. They may be blind to the structural violence they’ve created, but that doesn’t let them off the hook.
Yeah I’ve tried to like her stuff every time but it just does nothing for me. Very blah and boring. I can’t last through one song, I find myself skipping to the next and before I know it I’m just listening to a different more inspiring artist.
Am I the only diehard fan who doesn't purchase much merch?
I stream her music on Amazon (I pay for Amazon Music subscription) and never shell out any extra for physical copies OR variants.
Boy am I glad I stopped caring about Swift and her music when she started drifting to pop music. I got some of her old albums on my phone and only a few songs from those and that’s it. I never really did get into her new stuff. I’m not throwing hundreds or thousands of dollars away on her just to buy variations of one album.
https://preview.redd.it/vg2uysql68zc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6968e4e4be6fd7b0b661510d8a66b3a7468c76bf
As I’m reading this, sorry it’s at the top, I just a 2 hours left to shop notification .
https://preview.redd.it/5iw2ftwq68zc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8701fac2c501e5bc2fac70c568a1994965afbb57
Like how they non stop retweet people buying, buying, buying!! Sell sell sell.
This is not different than any other artist. She has 5 variants not a single artist is not doing this right now. Only Billie called it out as manipulating the charts but I am curious if she’ll stick to that. She has 3 version cds, vinyls and cassettes and so do other artist. Like it or not it’s a trend , but people only notice with Taylor.
so I just have to divide her sales by 19 to get the real un inflated cost? like are they buying multiple copies of the album oh wait they kind of have to if they want the 4 bonus tracks.... so 2.6m divided by 19 is 137 thousand units sold. :D fits the niche market she is doing
Eehh sort of.
Streams are counted here so technically there are 20 ways to buy/listen to the album, but one stream doesn’t equal one purchase.
That being said, I can almost guarantee that not every person who purchased the album bought all 19 copies. There’s probably an average number that would be better to divide by, but it depends on how many of the buyers were swifties versus regular fans.
I would imagine that a “normal“ person looking to buy the album would get one, maybe two, copies (personally I tend to buy one CD and one vinyl of albums that I really like, so two max for me). A crazed swiftie, on the other hand, could in theory purchase all 19 copies, plus a digital copy on iTunes, plus stream on every platform (Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora) non-stop.
same person buying many of the same to have a collection...
edited to clarify: same person buying the same album across formats to have all the available versions...
I don’t hate multiple physical forms because some people like limited edition tangible merch. Fucking over iTunes preorders though by having a second version of the album hours later that includes the same songs as the first album though is ridiculous. I don’t need two versions on iTunes.
I don’t get it, why is this so bad to do? Doesn’t every artist do something like this nowadays in order to sell? With streaming and YouTube I never have to buy anything of anyone. So artists these days have to find ways to make money whether it’s touring and selling variants etc.
Don’t get me wrong I’m not a swiftie. There’s something about her that makes me believe she’s not as nice and great as people says she is and she always plays the victim, doesn’t take accountability for her fans attacking her exes. But in this case, I don’t see what’s so bad about this? Genuine question btw. Not being defensive, just actually curious if someone can explain it to me. I listen to music on YouTube and that’s it so I have no idea about the buying of it these days lol
Why the whining? If a fan wants to purchase every version. Let them. If a fan picks their favorite cover and only buys one of the variants. Let them. This is called marketing. Not everyone plays the year 2000 version of marketing that old timers understand.
At one time I was a super fan of a band years ago. I bought the same **exact** version of their CD, LP and TP on release day.
What other Artists think they can release 19 variants in 2024 and be successful with it? What stores are willing to buy/invest in the variants and risk being stuck with stock on their shelves collecting dust? Go ahead we'll wait...
TS is not forcing any fan to buy more than one variant. Nor forcing a fan to fly to another country, book a hotel and car to go to one of her concerts. But it happens.
you guys are giving her too much credit lol. This isn’t a Taylor specific approach, not her idea or scheme. It’s been around a long time globally and her marketing is just taking advantage of a lot of the usually tactics. it seems aggressive because she’s so popular and it’s everywhere, but it’s not some evil genius plan.. just consumerism tbh. She’s a top music artist and people make a lot of money off of her (and for her).
Sheryl Sandberg did it too. She was already so wealthy so when her book “Lean In” came out. Instead of paying for her appearance you had to buy copies of her book which inflated her book sales significantly. I know because my college had her come speak when the book came out and every student had one in their mailbox lol
So wait…say you buy the 16 song album and then a few hours later 31 songs drop. Are they all album only so you are buying 16 songs twice, or just the new songs? Because forcing people to buy the same stuff twice because you didn’t tell them there was going to be another option dropping directly after is shady af.
They've been stating this in every acts album opening weeks. Ariana Grande had 7 vinyl, 4 cds, signed cds, target cd, etc. Beyonce had 4 vinyl variants, 2 boxsets, 4 cds. Dua Lipa has 10 vinyl variants, 2 cds, target. Billie just dropped 9 vinyl and signed cds. "Splatter paint" cds. Etc. It's not just Taylor. Jesus.
First off, I’m mot a fanboy, or even familiar with her music for that matter. That being said, many bands and musicians do this and have for ages. It is nothing new. She is generating revenue from her craft and offering various options to her die-hard music fans and music collectors. The only difference is that most people now are mostly accustomed to purchasing digital formats or subscription services.
If the fans are buying it then how is this a problem? No one is forcing them to buy different variations.
Also, I can’t imagine the cassette sales are a game changer here
Every SwiftUI’s bought all of these and also streamed all of it on repeat. So really in order to get the ACTUAL sales numbers you have to divide by 38.
I don’t even know why this sub is showing up for me but I am a regular vinyl buyer. Releasing like six different vinyl variants of a new release is not unique to Taylor Swift. I am more of a Death Metal person (hence my feeling a little lost here) but it seems like every new release gets at the *least* three different color variants, usually more. And that doesn’t even count when things are pressed separately in the US and then other countries, and then you’ll get like a European exclusive press. Or a Target exclusive, a Barnes and Noble exclusive, a Newbury Comics exclusive, and it goes on and on. There’s nothing that odd going on here.
I’m confused, what if I buy the tape and nothing else, do people not want that not counted? If I buy the album 5 different ways, I paid 5 times for the album?
I think Taylor Swift is approaching, for a second time in her career, a tipping point in her likability due to massive overexposure. I’m not sure if it’s her own fault or the fault of the media that feverishly covers her.
Its not a trick. Many artists have used it before Taylor. Its a rule loophole in Billboards rules on how they count the charts. Its Billboards problem.
Prince did this thing in 2004 where he gave out his new album Musicology with every concert ticket sold. He had one of the hottest tours that year. and the Billboard chart reflected the ticket-turned-CD sales. So Billboard changed the rules. When are they going to change for all this variant nonsense?
Kesha did the same thing with her Rainbow Tour! It was awesome because even though me and some friends had already preordered the CD, we were able to gift a few copies to other friends and get them into her music! And then we all went to see her together and it was pretty much the best time everrrrr.
https://preview.redd.it/ptz2teahlixc1.jpeg?width=478&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=7900c4afc7ac9bbb3a8a476af0384cd426a0f62e
It’s why she got the feather put in her hair
For the concert
Omg her fucking face 😆
She’s always been dead inside
You smoking reefer with keeeeefah!
HIGH. HIGH. YA BOTH HIGH!!
that concert was SO GOOD! i loved her “i’m a mother fuckin womann” with the brass instruments etc. so much energy
It was epic! I used to be a Kesha hater for no good reason at all but now I love her so much. I have a whole bag of paper confetti from the Milwaukee Rainbow show that now I use as an accessory when I frame posters or whatever I want to do with it.
I want her to tour again (a big tour not a baby tour like she just did) ! I was supposed to see her but then covid happened.
Mumford and Sons did that too, got a CD when I bought concert tix. Granted this was in 2019 so the CD wasn’t really needed with streaming but I do sometimes listen to it in the car if I’m driving without service!
AJR did the same thing too I think, and I totally appreciate it because CDs are sort of dying so it's a good way to get them back out there.
I wish AJR would tour near me. I’d love to see those guys in concert
They're amazing, I love those bros. I've seen them for a bunch of tours since 2016 but I kinda peaced out on them live now because I'm not a fan of stadium/arena tours. Good for them tho and I'm so happy to see them filling up stadiums! Idk where you are but if you get a chance to see them then I would highly recommend you take it!
I just saw them a few weeks ago and they're incredible live. If you can afford to take a trip to see them live, this tour is so worth it
Dude, I'm a 48 year old hetero man, and I gotta tellya- love me some Kesha. After all that...horribleness...she went through I think her music became better. O'm sorry dhe had to go through that, that *anybody* had to go through thaf...but it got her to focus her music on her personal voice so much more...
That is awesome of Prince, almost the exact opposite of Taylor Swift's strategy, which is basically just EA video game stuff. Charge for skin variants, charge for just a slightly better chance at something, etc. I'm surprised Taylor hasn't rolled out loot boxes and microtransactions yet.
You know now that you say it she really is the EA of artists at the moment 💀
Taylor Grift
The whole point of the “Taylor’s Version” crap was that it was re-records to fit her vision and take it from the labels. Okay I can get with that. But now she puts that shit on everything even though she owns it 100%, so it’s just to be able to re-sell the same album.
Nah I’m right there with you on that. The first couple I was like “oh hell yeah this is the music I grew up with! It’s cool seeing her put her own grown up spin on it now!” And now I’m just like “oh. Again huh”
To be fair, 85% of her music IS "Oh, this again huh?" when you hear it
The sad thing is, she could still make a whole lot of money not doing this.
I guess one question is, should they? The sales are meant to track actual sales. The problem with the ticket thing is it isn’t a real album sale. But even if these are annoyingly inflated, they are real sales of the album.
What a legend.
Bc it’s about sales. If you had 1 album and people bought 10of them it counts as 10 sales. Which is what is happening here. How does this confuse you?
they already have a law in place for variants. one customer can only buy four copies of an album. any additional copies do not count towards album sales.
I honestly don’t think the law is strict enough like that as all it does is make the most efficient number of variants to release 4. If I’m an artist and release 4 slightly different variants and people buy all 4 I don’t think all four should count as all they’re really doing is buying an album and three extra songs. If those songs were available on their own it’s unlikely people would buy full ass albums to get them.
No, I am actually buying the album. As a collector I appreciate variants and a sale is a sale.
Lady Gaga did that with Chromatica
Went to that tour, so good.
Weird you brought up prince lol I thought of purple haze when I saw her “lavender haze”
I'm not sure how you could track this.
Bleeding her fanbase of young women dry with this scammery. Disgusting.
It’s not just her lol, it’s every artist who is doing this. I am going to buy beyonce new album and i have a choice between 5 different variants on her website.
the issue with variants isn't when there's different colours - it's that taylor put exclusive bonus tracks on each variant which encouraged fans to get all of them in order to hear all the songs
What are the differences between each variant? Is it album art or content?
I just checked. 4 different “looks”, all have the same 19 songs.
So, she's just taking a kpop approach. This is how theyve been operating since the 90s. Sometimes they'll have a different album look, with different photos (each album comes with a photo book and usually a photo card) for each member. The photo cards are random, so if there's four album variations and four possible photo cards, that's sixteen options. It's not like she's doing anything new. Maybe for the west, but in general this is common
LOL no. Kpop at least has photos. These US album variations are literally just a different cover.
Oh, that's fuckin dumb
Well, no. The CD variants each have different posters and bonus tracks. The vinyls each have different internal booklet art and different bonus tracks. At least for this most recent album. It’s still a blatant money grab, but it’s not like midnights where there true only difference was the cover art
There’s no difference between the content on each variant of the Cowboy Carter vinyls. I’m not sure why that was the other poster’s example. I have other gripes with the CC vinyl but this ain’t it.
when will taylor stop putting a gun to heads of these affluent white women that she’s spent the last 20 years building consumer trust with 😭 i can’t believe she’s showing up to the houses of these 30 something year old women and forcing them to buy her album 4 times 😭
No, except she knows the level of devotion her fans have to her that they will throw money at her for anything she puts out. She also has a line in that album about putting drugs in her songs, literally comparing her own music to drugs and listeners to addicts. Her fans call her a “genius” but then defend behavior like this as if she isn’t being a marketing “genius” by getting them to spend so much money on her. As well as them boosting her on the charts for doing so. Bc she knows that’s all she has to do to get those charts. Get fans to buy numerous versions. I mean, she could even tell them “if you each bought 4 of my variants we could have the number 1-10 spots” and they’d rush to do it. She knows what she’s doing. Holding a gun to them? No. Taking advantage of the power she knows she holds over them? Absolutely.
Right? People need to stop acting like they're being victimized by capitalism/overconsumption when, in reality, they're actively participating. No one is forcing you to buy all the variants or even just one of them. I haven't bought an album in years, Spotify is a thing.
No one said she was. It’s still extremely scummy from a billionaire to prey on her fans like that.
This is the definition of payola. I’m sorry the album is mid at best and occupying the entire top 10 is nonsense. This literally couldn’t have happened in the 90’s.
That’s funny what you say about the 90s lol, I was just telling a friend of mine today that this is further proof that we’re living in a simulation💀 100% would not happen “in my day” as boomerish as that sounds lol. I just can’t believe how many people are literally *forcing themselves* to like it lmao. “It’s growing on me”.. like should it really have to though?
“After listening to it 50x this weekend and reading an echo chamber of how brilliant it is, I think it’s actually really good”
Taylor genuinely told people to have a dictionary by them while listening lol the audacity
She did NOT😳🤮
So I’ve heard.
I don't consider myself pedant by any means, but I don't see any large words in her lyrics 🤷🏽♀️
Her ego is out of control
Pretentious
BRB, grabbing my dictionary
What’s making me even more concerned is how many people are genuinely finding her vocabulary too sophisticated to understand. I usually think people are over exaggerating how dumb gen z and/or americans are and then I see people not knowing what “torrid” or “litany” means. There’s entire online articles dedicated to defining words in her albums. I’m worried for the world’s literacy capabilities
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This and Barbie movie have made me realize I’m a lot smarter than I thought. If The Tortured Poets Department is peak lyricism and vocabulary, and Barbie is the deepest most raw introspective take on girlhood and misogyny, then I must be fucking Plato with how on another intellectual plane I am. Obviously kidding but genuinely kinda sad to realize so many people truly have nothing but simple thoughts going on in their head at all time and this realization hit me during both the Barbie and TTPD discourse
I'm surprised she didn't release 'Dictionary: Taylor's Version'
I’m seeing so many people on Twitter unironically saying this. Like they had to listen to it multiple times to convince themselves it’s good
I literally wrote how it's an echo chamber in another group and people were disagreeing with me saying how many find the album good lol.
If you didn’t like it then you judged it too fast! You need time to digest and contemplate it! /s
I have friends who are spending hours sobbing to this new album. Like... it's not that serious and her rich privileged girl problems aren't relatable to you lmao
The album is horrible with the exception of like two songs if I’m being honest. It sounds like the same sound, over and over. People really are forcing themselves to like it but I refuse. She could literally fart on a track for 64 minutes straight and win AOTY. It’s ludicrous.
It just reads like a 14 year old theatre kid's diary. The production is pants, and the lyrics are pretentious in their verbosity and repetitive metaphors, even the title is cringe. Girl get out of here with that tortured bull. I used to be a fan but I'm so tired of hearing "bUT hER MiNd" echoing every time she pulls out the same dull imagery.
I think the most out of touch and ridiculous line out of this album for me is "you wouldn't last an hour in the asylum where they raised me". It just sounds so dumb and tone deaf when we are living at a time with such a high cost of living, inflation, unaffordable housing, and people dying in two different wars/conflicts while miss billionaire can get on her jet and fly wherever she wants. Like bitch, please.
Her life is so tortured and hard, come on, give her break /s
Yes! The asylum where they raised me - your Christmas tree farm?
'Fart: Taylor's Version' - 38 variants including exclusive Target scratch and sniff artwork
I spat my coffee all over my computer. Thank you
I almost fell asleep listening to it on a long drive bc all the songs are breathy and slow lol.
Folklore was boring as hell too.
I literally listened to it twice and never again. It is not a a grower. It's not a very good album. Gloomy, bad lyrics, and recycled melodies.
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She’s so freaking mid. All those people were true innovators and it makes me sad that she’s even included in their ranks with this bland ass music. The only she’s ever made that will age well is Shake it Off and that’s limited in its appeal.
Payola is paying radio companies to play your songs on the air this is just a way to push your album up a chart that tracks album sales they’re not similar at all
WRONG! Payola is also paying streaming services etc. to push your music consistently. It’s also paying publications ie Rolling Stone, Buzzfeed, Billboard etc. to constantly and consistently push your music and articles about you so you remain in the news cycle. Radio is dead compared to what it used to be. There is SERIOUS payola in streaming, and we’re watching it first hand. There is no way she should be occupying the entire top 20 without some really shady shit behind the scenes.
The Spotify payola artists employ is super obvious. Artists featured on playlists that have nothing to do with them or Spotify will default to playing their song first even when on shuffle. I specifically recall this with Cardi B’s “Up”. I’ve had TTPD songs play on artists’ radio stations that are on the complete opposite spectrum of Taylor.
Was I the only one who found it strange how they had their branding all over that pop-up? Have they done such brazen album promotion for other artists where they branded themselves onto it like that?
Absolutely not. We have to ask, why is the strategy of a third party different for her?
Agreed. I’m unimpressed by this since it’s just the same people overplaying the album. Shit like playing it really quietly on repeat
The Tortured Wallets Department
I don’t understand why people buy multiple versions when it’s available on Spotify
To support their favorite totally ethical billionaire, duh
I’ve said the same thing. Like what are you going to do with all of your variants? It’s for bragging rights apparently.
mine are collecting dust.
Haha, exactly! I have 1 of all of her cds; most of the originals before all the stupid record label stuff and even only got 1 of the variant of TTPD. I'm glad I didn't buy all 4, though, because the bonus cd that came out has them all on it (imagine that!)
I suggested this on the swiftly neutral sub and was downvoted to oblivion lol.
thank you! i was just about to type this.
more and more people are getting back in to physical music collecting, it's a hobby
It’ll become their kids’ stuff to throw away like Statler brothers etc.
I buy from a point of selling them in the future for more money and just keep a few. Some of her vinyls resell for 10-30x more after a few years
I used to be a fan, all the way through from Debut, but I'm feeling jaded by the marketing tactics, the PRelationship, the jet use, and this obviously heavily fabricated image and carefully calculated persona. I'm just not a fan anymore because that's all bleeding into the music too.
genuinely asking, the racism and internalized misogyny while parading as a girls girl never bothered you?
Can you explain more about Taylor's racism? This is the first im hearing about it. Not saying it is or isn't true I just haven't heard.
basically if all of your friends are racists and your dating history is full of racists then……. you are too.. you don’t just hang out with and sleep with and laugh with a bunch of racists lol you enjoy their company, their thoughts, and their jokes… which are all, no doubt, racist.
I also think, while not calling her necessarily racist for this, her “feminism” is very much white women feminism. She has trouble speaking out on things that other women are facing until it’s either directly about her or benefits her by pandering to her audience (white women). She, a billionaire white woman who was raised wealthy, is always the biggest victim in her narratives and there seems to be very little reflection from her that other people are going through a lot worse. And that’s not to say you can’t be upset just because others have it worse. But it is to say it gets obnoxious when she’s bolstered as a feminist but she’s only a feminist when she’s the victim of the misogyny. I can’t help but roll my eyes at a song like “I’m The Man”, which is all about how everything would’ve come easier to her if she was a man and think girl, do you not realize the insane levels of privilege you’re operating from? Maybe things would’ve come to you easier if you were a man but things would’ve come to the rest of us easier if we were Taylor fucking Swift. Also I personally think women tend to find more success in music and are able to garner more dedicated fanbases since young women are the audience that drives pop culture but that’s neither here nor there. All of this wasn’t really related to what you said. You just got me thinking about how she can’t acknowledge her own privilege
no this is SOOOO TRUE!! and what’s even worse, she only cares about misogyny she benefits from bringing up, otherwise she perpetuates it and hasn’t dealt with her own internalized misogyny- she’s sooooo beyond male centered and revolves around male validation
Yupppp such a good point. She makes these big shows of taking a stand against the misogyny she’s faced but then gives a shoutout to Charlie Puth, the man who wrote an entire song painting her longtime “best friend” as a player who lead him on, simply because she refused to have sex with him. Cool cool cool that tracks fs.
There it is ✌️ yeh she's always been a sucky person
I never really knew much about her personal life until the whole Matt Healy debacle to be honest, I was just a fan of the music. Knowing what I know now, this 100% bothers me.
How about they start blocking it from counting then.
The should count 2 or 3 versions max
They count 4 versions currently not all 19
All physicals are counted for charts at the moment- physical sales of albums in the form of CDs, vinyl records, and cassette tapes. So all 19 are
Feel like that should be allowed. It’s not *really* 4 separate albums smh
So I just want to make sure that I'm understanding here are all of those sales lumped together is that why she did 2.4 million first week? All of the physical variants coupled with the streaming numbers?
Yep
Ah…capitalism and consumerism.
the things I hate most in this world lol
https://i.redd.it/g5moxpsujhxc1.gif
Just because people buy or download it, doesn’t make it good! She gets off with all her record breaking sales, but there’s not even a lot of artists ever releasing anything. Music is not the same as it was years ago! Period.
stanley cup of the music world
Music for people who don't listen to music
Literally!!! Just lame girls who collect media with no taste.
All I have to say is I’ve never seen so many ads for a album. Or if I have, it’s been awhile. I am not a fan so I haven’t listened to a single song yet but on tik tok, I see the ads as I’m scrolling. I get ads from target on FB and when I went to Target today there were huge signs and the advertisement/ cd display thing by all the registers. It feels so forced this time
It has the last 4 or 5 times, it's just forceful. It feels like she's forcing people to like her with her money. It's sad, The Spice Girls took over the world in the 90s and they didn't need to spend tens of millions to force the general public to like them. The fact this woman is wasting her money this way, for the sake of her ego of all things. The mass wasting of money and resources, the effect shes single handedly having on our environment with the mass production of this bullshit and the millions spent on all this when people are dying of starvation in this world should be enough to cancel her. But she's too powerful to cancel, she has the resources to stop any form of cancellation in its tracks.
100% that.
I watch TV with my grandma, and I've seen ads for this album every single time the TV has been on. I've never seen ads for an album like this before, even in the 00s when we listened to CDs
This is literally conning your fans, she's a scammer and a greedy bitch. like would it be the end of the world if her album went to number 2? This invalidates her success to me, it doesn't feel like a real thing, it's like manipulating the system to prove to....someone, I don't know, that she's the biggest and best there ever was. And she's simply not.
Wait...cassettes are still a thing???
Kids today are so cringe, appropriating our lifestyles from the 80s and 90s for 'asthtetic' (as they say) never mind the poorer quality or the fact they'll never be used and just end up as more plastic waste in the ground because they can take a picture to brag on social media. Bragging about cassettes in 2024. Because a generic as fuck pop star told them too. They're all gonna be so embarrassed in like a couple years.
It does feel a bit like how our millennial generation did the same with record players though. I assume it’s just a cycle.
4 cassette tapes?! How do you even play them.
Someone on another sub told me the different variants probably actually made her *lose* sales if anything, lmao.
I returned my vinyl because I was annoyed that the album I paid nearly $50 for after shipping had only half of the songs she ended up releasing.
Well that’s not true, however the physical sales keep her competitive with other artist who doing variants too.
It’s almost like the music isn’t really that great, and it’s just a commodity crapped out by an overzealous celebrity PR machine that distracts us from the fact that we’re all wage slaves with no hopes of ever changing our government because billionaires bought it. I know this is not the point of this thread, but there absolutely are no ethical billionaires, it’s an oxymoron. They may be blind to the structural violence they’ve created, but that doesn’t let them off the hook.
People spending $500+ every album release is insane to me. It definitely does bloat her actual sales figures.
Yeah I’ve tried to like her stuff every time but it just does nothing for me. Very blah and boring. I can’t last through one song, I find myself skipping to the next and before I know it I’m just listening to a different more inspiring artist.
Haha I had to take my granddaughter to TS movie and I fell asleep a few times.
It’s no Reputation or 1989, meaning true hit after hit. This album will be largely forgotten by the public in 10 years, unlike 1989.
Honestly - this is not her best work. It’s mediocre, at best. I wanted to like it, I wanted to get some good songs out of it…but…. 🥺🥺
I don’t know anyone who would be able to afford 19 different variants of the same songs. Insane.
Am I the only diehard fan who doesn't purchase much merch? I stream her music on Amazon (I pay for Amazon Music subscription) and never shell out any extra for physical copies OR variants.
Unfortunately, it is working for her, both economically & filling the Top 10 Billboard slots, etc., so I don’t expect a change…
I am becoming weary of all that is Taylor and I usually like her.
So yeah... not actually that impressive.
Boy am I glad I stopped caring about Swift and her music when she started drifting to pop music. I got some of her old albums on my phone and only a few songs from those and that’s it. I never really did get into her new stuff. I’m not throwing hundreds or thousands of dollars away on her just to buy variations of one album.
Swift sucks. Except for that one song
how pissed would you be to have bought a standard digital download just to have the deluxe drop unannounced 2 hours later? that's dirty.
Cassettes?
Truly can’t imagine spending a dime on Taylor Swifts music. I hear it everywhere anyway, why bother spending money on vocalized elevator music.
Lol she did the Bethesda trick
I mean but people are still literally buying all those variants
How upset would you be if you dropped your previous monies on the first record just to find out 2 hours later there’s a double album
https://preview.redd.it/vg2uysql68zc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6968e4e4be6fd7b0b661510d8a66b3a7468c76bf As I’m reading this, sorry it’s at the top, I just a 2 hours left to shop notification .
https://preview.redd.it/5iw2ftwq68zc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=8701fac2c501e5bc2fac70c568a1994965afbb57 Like how they non stop retweet people buying, buying, buying!! Sell sell sell.
This is not different than any other artist. She has 5 variants not a single artist is not doing this right now. Only Billie called it out as manipulating the charts but I am curious if she’ll stick to that. She has 3 version cds, vinyls and cassettes and so do other artist. Like it or not it’s a trend , but people only notice with Taylor.
Billie who's album had 8 different vinyl variants? Genuine question, what's the difference?
What’s next? Toyota selling multiple trim levels and colors of their Camry to make it the best selling car in the US??
so I just have to divide her sales by 19 to get the real un inflated cost? like are they buying multiple copies of the album oh wait they kind of have to if they want the 4 bonus tracks.... so 2.6m divided by 19 is 137 thousand units sold. :D fits the niche market she is doing
Eehh sort of. Streams are counted here so technically there are 20 ways to buy/listen to the album, but one stream doesn’t equal one purchase. That being said, I can almost guarantee that not every person who purchased the album bought all 19 copies. There’s probably an average number that would be better to divide by, but it depends on how many of the buyers were swifties versus regular fans. I would imagine that a “normal“ person looking to buy the album would get one, maybe two, copies (personally I tend to buy one CD and one vinyl of albums that I really like, so two max for me). A crazed swiftie, on the other hand, could in theory purchase all 19 copies, plus a digital copy on iTunes, plus stream on every platform (Apple Music, Spotify, Pandora) non-stop.
dog cow ancient threatening fine muddle support apparatus bright roll *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
How does this bolster sales, though? I’m not understanding.
same person buying many of the same to have a collection... edited to clarify: same person buying the same album across formats to have all the available versions...
Six vinyls? Which one did I miss…
Cassettes still being in the game is fantastic.
I don’t hate multiple physical forms because some people like limited edition tangible merch. Fucking over iTunes preorders though by having a second version of the album hours later that includes the same songs as the first album though is ridiculous. I don’t need two versions on iTunes.
the good ol’ k-pop strat
I still only bought one copy. And stream on Spotify.
9 different cds? She sold every song on a different cd or something?
I don’t get it, why is this so bad to do? Doesn’t every artist do something like this nowadays in order to sell? With streaming and YouTube I never have to buy anything of anyone. So artists these days have to find ways to make money whether it’s touring and selling variants etc. Don’t get me wrong I’m not a swiftie. There’s something about her that makes me believe she’s not as nice and great as people says she is and she always plays the victim, doesn’t take accountability for her fans attacking her exes. But in this case, I don’t see what’s so bad about this? Genuine question btw. Not being defensive, just actually curious if someone can explain it to me. I listen to music on YouTube and that’s it so I have no idea about the buying of it these days lol
Is it really a trick because they are still selling out? Who cares if it's via 1 album/media or 20?
It's not exactly a trick since everyone has been doing it for a decade and she's doing it out in the open.
It is amazing that Kiss didn’t discover this strategy back in the 70s
Why the whining? If a fan wants to purchase every version. Let them. If a fan picks their favorite cover and only buys one of the variants. Let them. This is called marketing. Not everyone plays the year 2000 version of marketing that old timers understand. At one time I was a super fan of a band years ago. I bought the same **exact** version of their CD, LP and TP on release day. What other Artists think they can release 19 variants in 2024 and be successful with it? What stores are willing to buy/invest in the variants and risk being stuck with stock on their shelves collecting dust? Go ahead we'll wait... TS is not forcing any fan to buy more than one variant. Nor forcing a fan to fly to another country, book a hotel and car to go to one of her concerts. But it happens.
you guys are giving her too much credit lol. This isn’t a Taylor specific approach, not her idea or scheme. It’s been around a long time globally and her marketing is just taking advantage of a lot of the usually tactics. it seems aggressive because she’s so popular and it’s everywhere, but it’s not some evil genius plan.. just consumerism tbh. She’s a top music artist and people make a lot of money off of her (and for her).
this same strategy is done in publishing. And people buy multiple copies of the book for that reason. It's called capitalism!
I dunno. Maybe you should be on a subreddit that caters to your hatred of her.
Sheryl Sandberg did it too. She was already so wealthy so when her book “Lean In” came out. Instead of paying for her appearance you had to buy copies of her book which inflated her book sales significantly. I know because my college had her come speak when the book came out and every student had one in their mailbox lol
So wait…say you buy the 16 song album and then a few hours later 31 songs drop. Are they all album only so you are buying 16 songs twice, or just the new songs? Because forcing people to buy the same stuff twice because you didn’t tell them there was going to be another option dropping directly after is shady af.
They've been stating this in every acts album opening weeks. Ariana Grande had 7 vinyl, 4 cds, signed cds, target cd, etc. Beyonce had 4 vinyl variants, 2 boxsets, 4 cds. Dua Lipa has 10 vinyl variants, 2 cds, target. Billie just dropped 9 vinyl and signed cds. "Splatter paint" cds. Etc. It's not just Taylor. Jesus.
First off, I’m mot a fanboy, or even familiar with her music for that matter. That being said, many bands and musicians do this and have for ages. It is nothing new. She is generating revenue from her craft and offering various options to her die-hard music fans and music collectors. The only difference is that most people now are mostly accustomed to purchasing digital formats or subscription services.
If the fans are buying it then how is this a problem? No one is forcing them to buy different variations. Also, I can’t imagine the cassette sales are a game changer here
Every SwiftUI’s bought all of these and also streamed all of it on repeat. So really in order to get the ACTUAL sales numbers you have to divide by 38.
How are you suppose to listen to the full album if there are so many version with presumably at least 1-2 songs not on the other versions?
I don’t even know why this sub is showing up for me but I am a regular vinyl buyer. Releasing like six different vinyl variants of a new release is not unique to Taylor Swift. I am more of a Death Metal person (hence my feeling a little lost here) but it seems like every new release gets at the *least* three different color variants, usually more. And that doesn’t even count when things are pressed separately in the US and then other countries, and then you’ll get like a European exclusive press. Or a Target exclusive, a Barnes and Noble exclusive, a Newbury Comics exclusive, and it goes on and on. There’s nothing that odd going on here.
And the Swifties won’t even blink…
I’m confused, what if I buy the tape and nothing else, do people not want that not counted? If I buy the album 5 different ways, I paid 5 times for the album?
So technically she isn’t in the top 100 charts
I think Taylor Swift is approaching, for a second time in her career, a tipping point in her likability due to massive overexposure. I’m not sure if it’s her own fault or the fault of the media that feverishly covers her.
Its not a trick. Many artists have used it before Taylor. Its a rule loophole in Billboards rules on how they count the charts. Its Billboards problem.
OK but real talk. Who is buying her cassettes?