The haters are going to hate Ryan Adams' "1989"

I love this record but can't admit it (there I admitted it). It's a great love record and that's very rare in this world. Taylor Swift is a great songwriter whose best songs are poetic gems, and the worst forgettably poetic, but either way they are all poems, and you can tell she's a very good poet. She works very hard at getting her words exactly right, and while there is a certain predictable quality to them, it's the kind of predictably that strikes a real chord in my heart, and obviously millions of other people, because she's the most famous pop star on the planet. I checked out "1989" from the library, the year I was 21, and got some good listens, but for me Taylor Swift is a great radio artist who gets played so much I don't really have to own the records. I end up knowing the better half of them by heart, the six or seven singles the music industry moguls space out cleverly, so that Taylor plays for a whole year.

I haven't listened to a lot of Ryan Adams in my life, but enough to respect him. I get that there is something primal about him, and very unperfect, that's good for rock n' roll. But I've never listened to Ryan Adams like I have since "1989," so I've got to say it's a great covers record that really reintrepts an artist so much that you almost want to say it's a Ryan Adams masterpiece, and it is, but he's covering Taylor Swift songs. There are times I almost feel ashamed for Ryan Adams when he breaks into Taylor Swift's ultra pop "Welcome to New York," but in the end Swift is a very good song writer and Adams has seen the real love struck beauty in her songs, that Swift sometimes hides with a LOT of production (if I have a complaint of her, it's that "1989" was too overproduced for me song by song, to make want to put it on, but four or five tracks are great radio music, and I love to hear them in the Movin' mix.) Ryan Adams really strips these songs down, so they have almost none of Swift's production, and this really changes them, along with his sensitive performances, but I'd argue Swift's songs are the reason for this, since they are very well written. But I can't listen to Taylor Swift's "1989" in its entirety but I can the Ryan Adams version, even if a few songs at the end aren't the best,

On You Tube, I saw a really interesting interview between Adams and Swift, and she talked about how she wrote her lyrics, and it reminded me very much of how I wrote poetry in college, aching over every line, and I think you hear this in her music.... not the ache but the pain that goes into every line, and the poetic beauty. At her worst, Taylor has a Hallmark Card quality, but at her best she shines as a voice of the masses, and occasionally a brilliant mind. Ryan Adams took Swift's lyrics and changed them in places, or left parts out, or added parts (?), so he really made these songs his own, and I guess the emarrassing and/or brilliant thing for him is that he has admitted to the world he's a huge Taylor Swift fan, and may even have a crush on her. I mean Ryan Adams is Indie cool and for him to admit his love for a mainstream Goddess like Swift all but validates her stature as a major cultural figure, so he's really gone out on an artistic limb. In some ways, his whole career could be summed up by this record, even though I know nothing about Ryan Adams, so maybe he's already made in his name, and this will be a quirky footnote that people either love or hate, but..... it's stiall a statement. We live inj a culture war where artists like Taylor Swift are condemned for being shallow, and yet their music seems more relevant now than one could have even imagined a few years ago. I had an amazing moment last week when I was walking by Bimbo's, the rock n' roll pick up dive of Seattle, and they were blasting "Trouble," and it sounded unironic.

I don't know if "1989" sounds like a normal Ryan Adams record or not, but probably not. I heard one once during a period I was painting on supermarket bags with Seaside Johnny, and it sounded like contemporary folk, mixing punk, traditional ballads, and rock n' roll, in a classic style, so there is something pure about Ryan Adams, like he's from the middle of the Country, and something a little stupid about him, but there's something stupid about rock n' roll, with a knowing glance, and Ryan Adams has done his best to capture it on "1989," by daring to be laughed at by his contemporaries, and considered a fool by my generation, thinking he was trying too hard to be ironic, and he was, but..... I've now listened to this record almost non-stop for a week and it's a very tender one about heart break, and I'd say the first 8 or 9 songs are classics, because the are great Taylor Swift songs. I don't think the last few are as good, but that's the dark side of Taylor.... saccharine sweetness.

The best song on Ryan Adams's "1989" may be "Style, because he taps into a Springsteen like feel on it, or something garage/punk from the '80's, like he does on much of the record, when the songs require it. Taylor Swift's version of "Style" was a big hit on the radio and one of my favorites, but it wasn't as brilliant as "Blank Space," a masterpiece, that Adams reintrepts. It was a kind of Don Henley "Boys of Summer" feel that was actually done by Mike Campbell, Tom Petty's lead guitarist, and collaborator, and I thought the mood Taylor Swift got on it was very relatable. I really felt like she was singing about me, and the future of her, and everyone in America, who somewhow defined the Country without tyring to, just amazing replicas of a national character, and Taylor Swift is that, and so was the man she imagined in the song. I'd listen to it every time it came on, looking forward to it, but Ryan Adams takes it even further. He changes the lyrics to "she's got that Daydream Nation look in her eye" and Sonic Youth did put out "Daydream Nation" in 1989, so I got what Adams was getting at, tweaking the original lyrics, by suddenly taking a catchy but haunting pop song, and turning it into something primal and deeply linked to the history of rock n' roll, something Swift may be attaining, through the back door.

I think Ryan Adams really takes the Taylor Swift song "Bad Blood" in the right direction. It's one of my least favorite radio friendly Taylor Swift songs, not because I think it's bad, but the production is so poppy and over the top I can barely listen to it, and this is Taylor's weakness, and strength. Ryan Adams takes "Bad Blood" and squeezes out every bit of meaning from it by making it a kind of Hillbilly Rock. Swift herself probably lends herself well to a C&W interpretation because she started her career as a Country star, and I'm sure will always be linked there, even though she's become so much more as a pop sensation, taking her C&W instincts but going free.

God Bless Ryan Adams for being open enough to stake his reputation on an album of Taylor Swift covers, done like he's thought about the songs, and felt them. I don't believe for a minute he made "1989" flippantly and yet I can already imagine them critiquing him for this in hipster rock n' roll circles, as an attempt to make the Ryan Adams brand cool and relevant, something everyone wants, and why I'm writing about "1989!" And he may have done it for this and Adams may tell me that none of these songs meant anything to him, and he came into the studio with a Taylor Swift songbook out, and made a record in a couple of days. Another school of thought would be Ryan Adams fell in love with the record, and though he understood the ironic implications of making it, really liked it, and doubled down artistically with a sensitive rendering of a pop stars hits. IMHO, Ryan Adams made this record sincerely, and really found beauty in the Taylor Swift songs. Why do I say this? The interpretations are too good for me to believe otherwise, and I have listened to a lot of pop music the last four or five years and have really loved it to the point where I have favorite artists, and Taylor Swift is a Goddess in the arena, the pop queen star. Miley Cyrus feels like Mars in the pantheon of the Gods.... Rhianna Venus... and Lana Del Rey Saturn. Maybe Lorde is Mercury, like quicksilver through the hands, and Bruno Mars is the Sun, shining on us all with his pop funk gold. Taylor Swift is the Moon, ruling the lunar court.