In 2012, Taylor Swift sang the iconic lyric ‘Some indie record that’s much cooler than mine’. Eight years later, Swift surprised the world with her own ‘indie record’ through her eighth album, Folklore – an indie-pop album that condenses love, loss and heartbreak into a one-hour record.

Folklore was a product of the COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. The album, produced entirely in her home and co-produced alongside Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dressner, entices you with beautiful melodies and acoustic instrumentation that makes for a good COVID-19 isolation playlist.

Swift is no stranger to shifting musical genres. Swift has diverged from country to pop music and shifting into the indie-folk genre is an interesting move for Swift to make. Having recently celebrated her 30th birthday, Folklore reflects not only Swift’s maturity as a person but this maturity possibly also extends to her shift in genre. The album’s softer dynamics and focus on the gentle sounds of piano and guitar contrasts to Swift’s previous albums where the Pop genre allowed for louder and more upbeat tracks.

Swift’s use of narratives was a notable element of the album. She produces three songs: ‘Cardigan’, ‘August’ and ‘Betty’. These songs describe a love triangle between Betty, Ines and James. These songs are written to narrate their perspective of events, each presenting some element of love, loss and heartbreak or a combination of all three. Swift also narrates the colourful life of socialite Rebekah Harkness in The Last Great American Dynasty. Harkness’ glamourous life reflected parallels to Swift’s. The song brilliantly references these parallels with the lyrics, “She had a marvellous time ruining everything”. In the final chorus of the song Swift changes the pronoun of that lyric to ‘I’ instead of ‘She’, in a sense describing how she sees elements of herself in Harkness’ life.

While I thoroughly enjoyed this album, it falls short of truly impressionable songs. ‘My Tears Ricochet’, ‘Invisible String’ and ‘This Is Me Trying’ were the only songs to make an impression for either their instrumentation or symbolic lyrics. Fans of her previous albums may not enjoy Folklore’s focus on soft and gentle musical elements which make it hard for the usual Pop listener to fully appreciate this album. I found myself struggling to differentiate certain songs such as Exile and Hoax as they sounded similar to each other. Songs like ‘Mirrorball’ also felt quite dry and had little impact on me though it’s instrumentation sounded strikingly similar to John Mayer’s War of My Life. While this album has room for improvement, it was still pleasant to listen to.

Folklore is a wonderful album worth listening if you love mellow sounds, beautiful lyrics and compelling narratives. While this record goes beyond Swift’s usual Pop albums, it’s a great introduction to a new Taylor, one that has come so far from her Country music career at the age of 14. Overall, this album was a beautiful surprise and was just what I needed to escape what is the chaos of 2020. Make sure to also check out Swift’s new film on Disney+, Folklore: The Long Pond Sessions for an intimate concert of the entire album which also provides insights into how these songs came into fruition.