If you are a true Swiftie, you were anxiously refreshing Taylor Swift’s TikTok page at midnight on the morning of September 21st. On September 20th, at noon on the dot, TikTok posted not only on thier tik tok account but also on Twitter, “Meet us at @taylorswifts TikTok account at midnight ET”. Naturally, this sparked a wild discussion as to what Taylor could possibly be up to now.
Taylor is known for dropping hints about music, release dates, and even what her music is about in “Easter Eggs”. Some of her most notable ones are in her music videos. In her 10 minute version of “All Too Well” music video, fans quickly picked up on her careful choice of car for the video; a 1989 Mercedes Benz. This immediately prompted speculation about what her next re-recording would be. In the opening of her music video for “Me!”, she and co-singer Brandon Urie have an interaction in French where he tells her “You need to calm down”, thus giving away the title of her upcoming single. One of her most well known easter egg videos is in her “Look What You Made Me Do” video. It is speculated that she references Kim Kardashian’s instagram shade, when Kim shared Snapchat screenshots of Kanye and Taylor discussing “Famous”, titling it “Tea Time”. In Taylor’s video, she is dressed almost exactly like Kim is in her post, sipping tea. As she lays in a tub of jewels, viewers can see a single dollar bill. This is assumed to be a reference to a sexual assault case that she won against a DJ where she sued him for $1.
Getting back to Taylor’s most recent activity, there are a large number of ideas about what this could mean for the future. Naturally, I stayed up until midnight to see exactly what was going on. I honestly had no idea what to expect, whether it was a new single, merch, or a release date. On her TikTok, the video starts with Taylor sitting in front of a brownish backdrop. She starts talking about how she is going to start telling us the titles of the tracks on her upcoming “Midnight” album, titled the series “Midnight Mayhem”. Beside her, is an old-fashioned bingo ball machine, which has balls that have the number of each of the songs. The first ball that comes out is number “13” which even she noted “of course I would get 13 first”. (for those who don’t know, 13 is her lucky number). BUT, speculation is that the balls in there were all labeled 13, and that the 13 is in fact its own easter egg. After posting, both TikTok and TaylorNation reposted the TikTok on all of their socials, captioning the video “Of course she would get 13 first”. She reveals that the title of the 13th track on the album is “Mastermind”. This of course sent fans into a frenzy wondering if all tracks will be titled with an “M”.
For the crazy Swiftie fans (aka me), you could potentially take the one step further. Earlier in the day on the 20th, Spotify posted on Instagram about a new Taylor Swift Album of songs written by her, titled “Written By Taylor Swift”. When taken to the link, you are presented with a playlist of all of the songs Taylor has personally written. What is strange about this list though, is that at the bottom is the song “Me!” – Live From Paris. Why did she choose to add that verison to the playlist rather than the original studio recording?? Moving onto Taylors Spotify profile, she has 3 playlists. The first one is “Taylor Swift Complete Collection”, which holds every song Taylor has ever sang/performed. HOWEVER, at the top of the list, her most recent release is “Carolina”, from the Where the Crawdads Sing movie. But if you scroll down to the bottom of the list, you will find THE SAME EXACT SONG. Why is it on there twice??? Anyone who knows Taylor knows that this is not an accident by any means.
So maybe all of this means nothing, and maybe it means everything. Needless to say, Taylor Swift is always up to something, and knows how to keep her fans on their toes.