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UncutJan 12, 2021It is without question a wintering record, but out of this muted musical landscape songs of great and complex beauty emerge. [Mar 2021, p.34]
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Dec 31, 2020Even though we get a catchy moment of goofy, snarling country midway through, the album is a result of the emotional clarity that a year in quarantine provided. Swift has written about curdling relationships splendidly in the past, but there's a new dimension to her writing that wasn’t there before. Onward.
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Dec 22, 2020The pandemic seems to have freed her, given her the space to breathe, and has allowed her to produce her most elegant and sophisticated work to date.
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Dec 17, 2020Evermore as a whole doesn't play as a sad album. Swift enjoys playing with the new musical and emotional colors on her palette for Evermore to anything but a warm balm, a record suited for contemplation, not loneliness.
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Dec 17, 2020‘Evermore’ wholly offers more conviction, without sacrificing the vulnerability that enamoured even her biggest critics earlier this year.
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Dec 16, 2020While ‘no body, no crime’ is easily evermore’s biggest misstep, there are a handful of forgettable songs on here. ... evermore benefits throughout from a more forgiving production style, but the songs are slightly less good here: it doesn’t have a song as accomplished as ‘the last great american dynasty’, as revelatory as ‘peace’ or a crowning achievement like ‘exile.’ It is generally a joy to listen to, and it is a joy to see her so comfortable and so prolific.
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Dec 15, 2020Songs like “marjorie,” “happiness,” “closure” and “tolerate it,” all full of Swift’s hard-won wisdom, are the most representative of what evermore really is: a peacefully intimate record.
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Dec 15, 2020While not quite as replete with certified cottagecore stunners as folklore, evermore certainly has its fair share of strong tracks, all with varying levels of immersive realism.
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Dec 14, 2020While folklore seemed to materialize from nowhere as a complete, cohesive vision, evermore is structurally akin to something like 2012’s Red, where the breadth of her songwriting is as important as the depth.
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Dec 14, 2020Not everything on evermore truly works or lands satisfyingly, but it’s all part of a creative process that is producing some of her best and most surprising work to date. And considering portions of the world are still dealing with lockdown and are isolating ahead of returning home for Christmas, it still certainly feels like the best “worst time” to be making music like this.
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Dec 14, 2020Swift has said she has no idea where she’s going from here. She doesn’t need to. But it’s a Christmas treat to hear her enjoy creating a whole magical, mystical world away from the spotlight. No reinvention required.
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Dec 14, 2020While retreading folklore's ground, evermore deepens and enriches its older sister's world.
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Dec 14, 2020The stories she tells are about how her narrators’ choices impact others, often in ways that cause irreparable harm. That makes the songwriting a bit riskier than on Folklore, and not all of those risks pay off. If that means Evermore isn’t quite as strong as that album, she nonetheless managed to release two of the finest albums of her career in the span of just a few months.
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Dec 14, 2020evermore is even better than folklore, thanks to greater sonic cohesion (Antonoff only has one production credit, on the superlative “Gold Rush,” leaving the bulk of the music produced or co-produced by Aaron Dessner) and stronger songwriting.
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Dec 14, 2020Whether it matches up to its self-proclaimed sister record or not, 2020 has seen Taylor Swift deliver over two hours of the most relatable stories in contemporary pop. There are lyricists and there are storytellers, and in a year of uncertainty and inconsistency, Taylor Swift has emerged as the most assured songwriter of her generation.
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Dec 11, 2020Swift's lyric-writing abilities feel leveled-up on Evermore, its characters drawn in pointillistic detail. ... Similarly, the musical risks on Evermore are bigger, both in scope and in payoff. ... Freedom from expectations has, both with this album and its predecessor, led to Swift's leaps giving new heights to her already-pretty-skyscraping career.
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Dec 11, 2020This record further establishes her identity as a modern poet, and the allusions to writers of old are tucked throughout. ... Mid-record songs like “cowboy like me” and “long story short” might not rise to the top either, but to say that any of these songs are weaker in comparison to others is like complaining about smudges in a crystal wine glass set — everything here is still beautiful and much better than collections you might find elsewhere.
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Dec 11, 2020The sonic details of “Evermore” are radiant and meticulous; the songwriting is poised and careful. It’s an album to respect. But with all its constructions and conceits, it also keeps a certain emotional distance.
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Dec 11, 2020She ascends further into the pantheon of songwriters who consistently deliver despite unimaginable expectations. For all its mayhem, 2020 has unlocked the best work of her career.
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Dec 11, 2020Swift touches on so much more – nuanced acts of forgiveness, complex personal histories, the ability to visualize and know how a person can look in different shades of light. No doubt Swift is still the master of writing a spiteful kiss-off, but the songs of Evermore are a welcomed step in a more mature direction.
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Dec 11, 2020What “Evermore” is full of is narratives that, like the music that accompanies them, really come into focus on second or third listen, usually because of a detail or two that turns her sometimes impressionistic modes completely vivid. ... It’s an embarrassment of stunning albums-ending-in-“ore” that she’s mined out of a locked-down muse.
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Dec 11, 2020As well as sounding incredible as a whole (not all of Swift’s previous albums have hung together as well as this one) these songs also have the air of a victory lap about them, as though Taylor’s basking in the glow of this new cottagecore indie-pop hybrid she’s found(ed).
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Dec 11, 2020In all aspects has Swift built upon her work on Folklore, creating a vast soundscape of poetical stories, and it is only at the end of this album you realise that Folklore did leave you wanting. Evermore also does this, not because it doesn’t reach up to the pedestal of folklore – in contrast, it covers the more complex ground.
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Dec 10, 2020Not everything here works, but taken together Folklore and Evermore make a convincing case for Swift’s ability to shift shape and for her songs’ ability to travel between genres: as lockdown overachievements go, it’s pretty impressive.
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Dec 10, 2020As a direct follow up, Evermore may lack the impactful frisson of Folklore, but is nevertheless another treat of classy, emotional songcraft.
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Dec 10, 2020If ‘Folklore’ is an introspective, romantic older sister, ‘Evermore’ is the freewheeling younger sibling. ‘Folklore’ was Swift’s masterful songwriting spun through a very specific sonic palette; ‘Evermore’ feels looser, with more experimentation, charm and musical shades at play. The new album reaps the rewards the stylistic leap of faith that ‘Folklore’ represented, pushing the boundaries of that sonic palette further still.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 5,081 out of 5669
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Mixed: 64 out of 5669
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Negative: 524 out of 5669
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