'Red' by Taylor Swift: An Album I’ve Grown to Truly Understand with Age

I love every album Taylor Swift has released. In my eyes she has no “worst” album. However, if I’m being completely honest, when Taylor’s fourth album, Red, was released, I struggled to connect with it. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely loved it. I was at Target on release day, money in hand and ready to be spent. I listened to the album over and over again when I got home. But something was different about this album than Taylor’s previous three. It wasn’t worse, it wasn’t a letdown, it wasn’t disappointing…it was just different. I couldn’t find a personal connection with most of the songs the way I had with the songs on Taylor Swift, Fearless, and Speak Now. But why?

I recently realized why I felt this way at the time. I wasn’t at a place in my life, in 2012, where I could truly relate to a lot of the songs on Red. Even though I couldn’t relate with every song in Taylor’s discography before this album of course, this time it was different. When I first heard Red, I was 15 going on 16. I had never been in a relationship or anything close to one. My priorities were fitting in at school, minor crushes, getting ready to learn to drive, and finding my path in life. Taylor’s first three albums were a bit more in that vein than Red. Red is an album full of intense emotions. That is how the album got its title after all.

“…when we’re trying to move on, the moments we always go back to aren’t the mundane ones. There are the moments you saw sparks that weren’t really there, felt stars aligning without having any proof, saw your future before it happened, and then saw it slip away without any warning. These are moments of newfound hope, extreme joy, intense passion, wishful thinking, and in some cases, the unthinkable letdown…most of all, this record is about love that was red.” – Red album prologue

Taylor Swift was becoming an adult while she wrote Red. She was still the same person, but she was experiencing relationships and life in a new way. The relationships she was in were more intense, more complicated, and less black and white. I was in a completely different stage of life than Taylor was during Red, and I hadn’t yet experienced anything like what she had. But today, I’m approaching my senior year of college. I’ve grown up since 2012. I’ve experienced so much more in life and in relationships than I had back then. After all, I was finally just beginning to relate to “Fifteen” at that point. Red was the most complex of Taylor’s albums to date at that time, exploring many emotions and experiences her previous albums hadn’t. I’ve highlighted here a few key songs from Red that I think paint an accurate picture of the theme of the album.

“State of Grace” is the opening track of Red, and it’s the perfect illustration of what this album is all about. It talks about this fast-paced world, everyone going in their own directions and dealing with their own emotions. But then someone comes into Taylor’s world suddenly who completely changes everything for her. This love was completely unexpected and had a profound impact on her. This song explores the idea that love isn’t always straightforward—because people aren’t always straightforward. Taylor sings, “so you were never a saint / and I’ve loved in shades of wrong / we learn to live with the pain / mosaic broken hearts.” Her new love has made mistakes. She has a history. This relationship has the potential to fade into nothing or completely unravel, or it could become something golden if each person plays by the rules of love. As the song says, “love is a ruthless game / unless you play it good and right.”

“Treacherous” has become one of my favorite tracks on Red over the years. The song tells about being in a relationship which you know will end badly. But the connection between you and the other person cannot be denied, so you decide to jump into it anyway. You know this road is “treacherous,” but you like it. You keep going.

One specific lyric from “Treacherous” has found its way onto countless Twitter and Instagram bios, tattoos, and tour posters. “Nothing safe is worth the drive.” I never understood why this lyric meant so much to so many people. Then one day, driving down a lonely road on my way back to my dorm, it hit me. Without giving too many personal details, I realized I had just gone somewhere alone I had never been before. I had tried something I’d never done before. I thought the experience might be good for me, but I had also been terrified of it. But on my way home, I realized it was completely worth it. I hadn’t thought it would be safe, but if I had let that stop me, I wouldn’t have this incredible experience that I still think about today. Maybe other people do experience relationships like this as teenager, but I see this song as one written from the perspective of someone a bit older. Either way, I finally understood this amazing track when I head a potentially “treacherous” experience of my own.

“Red” is about the intense rainbow of emotions that comes with falling in love and losing love. “I Knew You Were Trouble” is a more obviously titled track than “Treacherous,” but it also tells a story of seeing danger ahead in a relationship and pursuing it anyway. However, it focuses more on the aftermath of this and the shame felt when it's all over. “I Almost Do” is a heartbreaking song about being in love with someone and, even though you desperately want to reach out to them, not being able to see them anymore, all the while constantly wondering about them. One of the most well-known lines from this lesser-known track says, “I bet it never, ever occurred to you / that I can’t say hello to you and risk another goodbye.” Taylor is protecting herself from being hurt again by the person she cares about the most.

“All Too Well” is the fan favorite from Red, and understandably so. Besides being a beautiful song instrumentally and melodically, “All Too Well” is a lyrical masterpiece. It’s an absolutely heartbreaking song about a past relationship of Taylor’s that obviously had a major effect on her. The relationship Taylor sings about in “All Too Well” was very different from the ones in songs on her older albums. This one appears to have been emotionally intense in good ways at the beginning, and in tragic ways at the end. The song tackles some of the struggles of relationships that typically only occur when you’re older, such as, “you call me up again / just to break me like a promise / so casually cruel in the name of being honest.” This type of communication breakdown is a bit more adult than situations in songs like “Forever & Always,” where Taylor patiently waits by the phone for a call that never comes. Instead of wishing for the calls, she now gets them, only to have them break her heart. This relationship is also the kind that can truly change a person, as is evident by the lyric, “time won’t fly, it’s like I’m paralyzed by it / I’d like to be my old self again / but I’m still trying to find it.”

One of Taylor’s most unique songs, in my opinion, is “Holy Ground.” It’s definitely a standout track on Red. The song revisits a relationship that has indeed ended, but one that Taylor now looks back on and in which she can see beauty. It is a very mature thing to be able to look back on a relationship in this manner. She doesn’t see it as all sunshine and rainbows and wishing she still had it, but she also doesn't view her time with this partner as a terrible experience. She doesn’t regret it, and she even wants to dance in celebration of what they once had (“tonight I’m gonna dance / for all that we’ve been through”).

“Sad Beautiful Tragic” is one of my favorite songs of all time by Taylor Swift. The song is incredibly, well, sad. Taylor once told Billboard magazine that it’s “a breakup song in the form of a funeral march.” “Sad Beautiful Tragic” is very solemn and melancholy. It’s a look back on a relationship that didn’t work out, lamenting the fact that it’s over and done with, and now there’s nothing either of them can do about it. The lyrics of this track are very mature as well. It’s a fairly simply-written song, but that contributes to its tone. The verses particularly have intense emotion and storytelling. One lyric I specifically find beautiful and heart-wrenching is from the song’s second verse, “time is taking its sweet time erasing you / and you’ve got your demons and darling / they all look like me.”

My original title for this piece was 'Red' by Taylor Swift: An Album That Ages Like a Fine Wine. But I realized that wasn’t actually what I was trying to say. I’ve aged. I am now in a place in my life where I can truly relate to the songs on Red. The album was always poignant and real and emotionally stirring. A person just has to have had certain experiences in life and in love to fully appreciate the beauty that is Red. At least that is what I have found to be true over the years.