Heartbreak Is the National Anthem: How Taylor Swift Reinvented Pop Music

by Rob Sheffield

She reinvented pop in the fangirl’s image.

Like Madonna, she’s the kind of star whose flops are part of her legend.

She’s always had a zero-to-sixty heart, wired for melodramatic love and explosive flings and rude interruptions.

She always overdoes it, never having one feeling when six would do. One of my favorite Tay lines, from “This Love”: “I could go on and on, and I will.” Yes, she will.