Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

Lore & Background

Folklore was created during the COVID-19 pandemic after the cancellation of Swift's Lover Fest tour. Swift quarantined at home, watching films and reading books that inspired her to venture beyond her usual autobiographical style. She developed imagery including an exiled man, an embittered tormentor at a funeral, and a misfit widow seeking revenge. Swift recorded vocals in her Los Angeles home studio and worked virtually with producers Aaron Dessner and Jack Antonoff, who operated from studios in the Hudson Valley and New York City. The album's title was inspired by the lasting legacy of folktales, and its visual aesthetic adopts cottagecore.

The album was announced via a black-and-white Instagram image of Swift standing alone in a forest, followed by a social media post confirming the surprise release. Swift stated that most of her planned summer events did not happen, but the album did. The Wall Street Journal noted the announcement caught fans and the music business off-guard, while Billboard said it blindsided the pop music world. Swift later revealed that the album's lyrics contained Easter eggs, including a set of three songs she called the Teenage Love Triangle, exploring a love triangle from three perspectives. Folklore was accompanied by the concert documentary Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions.

Reader's Guide

Folklore marked a significant reinvention of Taylor Swift's artistry, departing from her autobiographical songwriting to embrace fictional narratives and a mellow, indie-folk sound. The album received widespread critical acclaim for its emotional weight and intricate lyricism, with many journalists noting its introspective tone was timely for the pandemic. It topped charts in Australasia and various European countries, spent eight weeks atop the Billboard 200, and was the best-selling album of 2020 in the United States, where it was certified six-times platinum. Three songs reached the top 10 on international singles charts, with "Cardigan" peaking at number one on the Billboard Hot 100.

Folklore won Album of the Year at the 63rd Annual Grammy Awards, making Swift the first woman to win the award three times. Rolling Stone included it in their 2023 revision of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time" list. The album informed the concept of Swift's next record, Evermore (2020), and has inspired other artists' works. Its surprise release during the pandemic, created through remote collaboration, demonstrated a new model for album production and distribution, and its critical and commercial success solidified Swift's status as a versatile and influential songwriter.

Did You Know?

• Folklore was surprise-released on July 24, 2020, eleven months after Swift's previous album Lover—the fastest turnaround for a Swift studio album at the time.
• The album was created remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic, with Swift recording vocals in her Los Angeles home studio while producers worked from the Hudson Valley and New York City.
• The album includes a set of three songs Swift referred to as the Teenage Love Triangle, exploring a love triangle from all three people's perspectives at different times in their lives.