Taylor Swift (From left: Beth Garrabrant, Larry Busacca/Getty Images; Republic Records; Mark Metcalfe/Getty Images, Beth Garrabrant) Graphic: Rebecca Fassola Let’s state the obvious first: Taylor Swift does, in fact, have numerous underrated tracks. Since her self-titled debut album in 2006, the singer-songwriter has recorded over 230 songs in her career, successfully experimenting with various genres in the process. Yet for anyone only vaguely familiar with her discography, the popular standouts are limited to “Love Story,” “Shake It Off,” “All Too Well” or, more recently, “Anti-Hero.” Her music tends to be eclipsed by snap judgments, a torrid news cycle around her love life, or other headlines. The narrative around Swift’s body of work is often distilled down to one (untrue) notion: She only seemingly croons about heartbreak. While Swift draws from her reality—find us an artist who doesn’t—her creative genius lies in her lyrical ability. She’s always been a passionate storyteller with a talent for waxing poetic about love, individualism, insecurities, friendship, and grief. Her 2020 albums, folklore and evermore, proved she could spin a poignant fictional yarn as well. This year has been massive for Swift, who embarked on The Eras Tour, turned it into a concert film, released her version of Speak Now in July, took over the NFL, ate a piece of chicken with ketchup and seemingly ranch, and more recently, released 1989 (Taylor’s Version). And all this came only a year after her 10th studio album, Midnights, took over the charts. So, The A.V. Club digs into Swift’s impressive repertoire to highlight some of her less-celebrated songwriting gems, picking two tracks from each of her albums. Who knows, with an open mind you might be introduced to a whole new side of Swift, too. [jezebel_slideshow]
