Six Albums to Listen to After The Tortured Poets Department

Other Artists Exist!

Owning my truth: I’m tired of the Taylor Swift monoculture.

Every single year, girlies everywhere (including me) have Taylor Swift as their top artist on Spotify. She puts out The Tortured Poets Department, a mid overlong album that’s only interested in a navel-gazing exploration of the lore of a billionaire, and still gets over 300 million Spotify streams in one day. Paste published a (admittedly cringe) negative review of TTPD and had to remove the byline to protect the author from abuse (it still didn’t work - Taylor stans joked about firebombing Paste’s headquarters). Y’all … it’s too much.

To combat the Taylor Swift hegemony, I’m recommending seven other albums that might appeal to people who like Taylor Swift but need something different.

Time Ain’t Accidental by Jess Williamson

Jess Williamson is an indie country artist from Texas, and one-half of the country duo Plains, along with Katie Crutchfield of Waxahatchee. I’m obsessed with Jess Williamson’s most recent album, Time Ain’t Accidental (2023). Williamson grew up in Texas but now lives in Los Angeles, and the album is pure, classic country, sung in a Texas twang. Her songs are about yearning for your hometown, falling in love, and lost loves. On standout “Hunter,” she sings, “I’ve been known to move a little fast/I’m a hunter for the real thing.” Her songs are also sexy, in a way mainstream country rarely is. On the title track, she sings, “Forget what they said to me, it doesn’t connect/To the angel in bed with me, his face ‘tween my legs.” On “God in Everything,” she talks about seeing God in a man’s “bedroom by the candlelight, when I’m down on my knees.” Hot in a fun, sacrilegious way.

Tigers Blood by Waxahatchee

The other half of Plains, Katie Crutchfield, performs as Waxahatchee, and released her newest album Tigers Blood a little over a month ago. Tigers Blood continues the country-folk sound of 2020’s Saint Cloud. Both albums are incredible, and I’d recommend either of them. Her lyrics are pure poetry, relying on imagery and the emotion of Crutchfield’s voice to convey their meaning. On “365,” Crutchfield sings about codependency and addiction: “I catch your poison arrow/I catch your same disease.” “Bored” is more direct, with Crutchfield singing, “I get bored” over and over, but she threads in the same poetry with “I can get along/‘Cause my spine’s a rotted two-by-four/Barely hanging on/My benevolence just hits the floor.” She likes a big word as much as Taylor Swift, but knows when a simple one suffices.

I saw Waxahatchee this weekend at The Salt Shed and I spent a pretty penny on merch. If you see a girl in a blue Waxahatchee trucker hat reading Interview with the Vampire at Lake Michigan, it’s me.

Pre Pleasure by Julia Jacklin

No one sings about Catholic guilt better than my Australian queen Julia Jacklin.

On “Lydia Wears a Cross,” the first track of her latest album Pre Pleasure, Jacklin sings about feeling disconnected from her classmates and their faith at her Catholic school. On “Ignore Tenderness,” she explores recovering from the sexual shame that comes from growing up Catholic, “Been watching porn; lights off, headphones on/Right when the pleasure begins my education creeps in.” Recovering Catholics deserve representation!

My favorite song off Pre Pleasure is “I Was Neon,” in which Jacklin agonizes over the ways in which the self changes. She asks, “am I gonna lose myself again?” while fretting that she “quite like[s] the person” that she is. I’ve never heard a song that better captures the fear of slipping into depression.

Rolling Up the Welcome Mat (For Good) by Kelsea Ballerini

Rolling Up The Welcome Mat is the country divorce album. People with bad taste will tell you it’s star-crossed by Kacey Musgraves, but the tortured over-the-topness of that album can’t hold a candle to Kelsea Ballerini’s 20-minute, heartbreakingly direct exploration of the end of her marriage to fellow country music artist, Morgan Evans.

Unlike TTPD and star-crossed, there’s no villain on this album. On the opener “Mountain With A View,” Ballerini sings, “I realize you loved me much more at twenty-three.” Later, on “Interlude (Full Length),” Ballerini acknowledges her own role in the divorce: “I’m blowing up my life, but I’m standing by the crater/That’s all that’s left to say.” Ballerini sings beautifully about the trajectory of a relationship that doesn’t work out. On the highlight “Penthouse,” a piano ballad, Ballerini muses, “We got along real nice, but when I left town, did you hate me?” She answers her own question by the end of the song: “We got along real nice until I wanted out, now I know you hate me.” The album closes with songs about Ballerini learning to care for herself and fall in love again.

It’s cathartic and honest, and one of the best albums about coming out of a long-term relationship where there’s no real bad guy. Maturity! Imagine!

The Baby by Samia

Samia is a nepo baby (her parents are actors Kathy Najimy and Dan Finnerty), and I choose to believe The Baby is a play on that (The Baby was released in 2020, long before the term “nepo baby” was coined). The Baby is indie rock but Samia has an ear for hooks—“Big Wheel” and “Fit N Full” were stuck in my head for weeks after I first heard them. On “Big Wheel,” Samia sings about loving and understanding someone even while they piss you off: “I understand the thing you did/And every reason you did it/But I’m so mad dude/And I wanna cry.” If you’re in the mood to cry, the closing track “Is There Something In The Movies?” will destroy you, with the chorus asking, “Is there something in the movies that’s better than my love?”

This album has the perfect mix of songs to sing in the car and songs to cry to in the bath.

A Brief Inquiry Into Online Relationships by The 1975

I picked this partially to be a troll, but also because I love this album and think it’s still The 1975’s best work. “Love It If We Made It,” one of my favorite songs of all time, is the only song that accurately captures the sensation of scrolling online. Matty Healy yells the entire song, with the verses a waterfall of Very Online Discourse including “Liberal kitsch/Kneeling on a pitch” and “Oh, fuck your feelings/Truth is only hearsay.” The chorus is a scream of hope in spite of the Discourse, with Healy repeating “I’d love it if we made it.” I spend so much of my time on silly little websites consuming dumb discourse and ruining my dopamine capacity. “Love It If We Made It” captures that feeling so well, but says maybe there’s still a way out.

The rest of the album is great too, with highlights like “Sincerity is Scary,” “It’s Not Living (If It’s Not With You),” and “I Always Wanna Die (Sometimes).” Say what you will about Matty Healy and fiancé of Charli XCX, George Daniel, but they make a great album!!!