Taylor Swift Is a Fall Out Boy Fangirl
Credit to Author: Bettina Makalintal| Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2019 14:42:00 +0000
This morning, Rolling Stone dropped its newest cover story, an in-depth interview with Taylor Swift. For some of us, it was the swift kick in the pants we needed to finally put Lover on pause and put on something a little more old-school, like Fall Out Boy's From Under the Cork Tree—because, as it turns out, Swift herself is a huge fan.
After writer Brian Hiatt pointed out the seeming FOB inspiration in the song title "Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince," Swift gushed about the Chicago pop punk band. "I love Fall Out Boy so much. Their songwriting really influenced me, lyrically, maybe more than anyone else," Swift said. "They take a phrase and they twist it. 'Loaded God complex/Cock it and pull it'? When I heard that, I was like, 'I’m dreaming.'" (The image of Tay scrawling those lyrics onto a pair of Converse with a Sharpie might have grown-up emo kids everywhere dreaming, too.)
There's a lot to pull out of Rolling Stone's hulking, 10,000+ word interview, so until you've got time to read the whole thing, here are the most surprising excerpts.
On Kanye West and Drake
I was like, “OK, good. We’re back on good terms.” And then when I heard the song ["Famous" by Kanye West], I was like, “I’m done with this. If you want to be on bad terms, let’s be on bad terms, but just be real about it.” And then he literally did the same thing to Drake. He gravely affected the trajectory of Drake’s family and their lives. It’s the same thing. Getting close to you, earning your trust, detonating you. I really don’t want to talk about it anymore because I get worked up, and I don’t want to just talk about negative shit all day, but it’s the same thing.
On Game of Thrones
Look at the Game of Thrones finale. I specifically really related to Daenerys’ storyline because for me it portrayed that it is a lot easier for a woman to attain power than to maintain it.
[…]
Like, obviously I didn’t want Daenerys to become that kind of character, but in taking away what I chose to take away from it, I thought maybe they’re trying to portray her climbing the ladder to the top was a lot easier than maintaining it, because for me, the times when I felt like I was going insane was when I was trying to maintain my career in the same way that I ascended. It’s easier to get power than to keep it. It’s easier to get acclaim than to keep it. It’s easier to get attention than to keep it.
On Katy Perry and Astrology
Katy [Perry] and I were talking about our signs. . . . [Laughs] Of course we were. […] We were talking about our signs because we had this really, really long talk when we were reconnecting and stuff. And I remember in the long talk, she was like, “If we had one glass of white wine right now, we’d both be crying.” Because we were drinking tea. We’ve had some really good conversations. […] She's like, “I’m a Scorpio. Scorpios just strike when they feel threatened.” And I was like, “Well, I’m an archer. We literally stand back, assess the situation, process how we feel about it, raise a bow, pull it back, and fire.” So it’s completely different ways of processing pain, confusion, misconception. And oftentimes I’ve had this delay in feeling something that hurts me and then saying that it hurts me.
On Getting Personal
I used to be like a golden retriever, just walking up to everybody, like, wagging my tail. “Sure, yeah, of course! What do you want to know? What do you need?” Now, I guess, I have to be a little bit more like a fox.
On Haters
Some of my best friendships came from people publicly criticizing me and then it opening up a conversation. Haley Kiyoko was doing an interview and she made an example about how I get away with singing about straight relationships and people don’t give me shit the way they give her shit for singing about girls — and it’s totally valid.
On Politics
There’s literally nothing worse than white supremacy. It’s repulsive. There should be no place for it. Really, I keep trying to learn as much as I can about politics, and it’s become something I’m now obsessed with, whereas before, I was living in this sort of political ambivalence, because the person I voted for had always won.
[…]
I think a lot of people are like me, where they just didn’t really know that this could happen. But I’m just focused on the 2020 election. I’m really focused on it. I’m really focused on how I can help and not hinder.
[…]
We need to stop dissecting why someone’s on our side or if they’re on our side in the right way or if they phrased it correctly. We need to not have the right kind of Democrat and the wrong kind of Democrat. We need to just be like, “You’re a Democrat? Sick. Get in the car. We’re going to the mall.”
This article originally appeared on VICE US.