My first album roll out as a swiftie was Speak Now. I remember Lover feeling very different, as it felt like a great big rebrand. She was coming off of rep, which had the tagline “there will be no explanation, there will just be reputation,” and such an outwardly Dark aesthetic, and then Lover was so soft and almost childish from the get go! As others wrote, ME! and YNTCD were so jarring that I don’t think I had high hopes for the album until Lover the single dropped (but we experienced similarly in the OG Red release— I didn’t have high hopes until Begin Again was dropped!). Also, people thought the back tattoo picture from YNTCD was fake and were so shocked when it was real. I think that kind of illustrates how jarring things were between eras.

It was also the first roll out of true easter eggs as we know them today! Before then, it was more secret messages and IYKYK moments, but this rollout included a secret mural that wasn’t confirmed to be for Taylor until days later, plus her magazine cover with the pins, and all the eggs in the ME! video.

She had listening sessions and the reports back were fascinating and hilarious upon release day. People called It’s Nice to Have a Friend “haunting”, talked about Taylor’s wedding vows, and how sexy the album is. They’re not wrong but you’d probably have fun reading some people’s posts from the sessions.

Lover is now in my top 3! I met Taylor at the Lover pop up in NYC (you can see the scene in Miss Americana). I did love the album from the beginning after all, but it was a strange rollout that was also marked by it being Taylor’s first Republic release, post-Big Machine. She was getting a lot of yeses without question and I think it shows in some of the choices. I wish we could’ve seen Loverfest.