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‘Call It What You Want’ is a textbook Taylor Swift love song—with a bitter twist

One more surprise song ahead of next week’s album.

 

Christine Friar

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Posted on Nov 3, 2017   Updated on May 22, 2021, 12:18 pm CDT

The fourth single off Taylor Swift‘s soon-to-be-released album Reputation is about the power of a hot dude. Specifically a hot dude’s power to distract you from your haters.

After surprise-announcing its release Thursday afternoon, “Call It What You Want” dropped on all major streaming services at midnight Friday. The lyric video features Polaroid snapshots of Swift, with hand-drawn animations framing the words to the song:

“Call It What You Want” has all of the trappings of a traditional Swift love song, but there’s a new twist of bitterness there too, and it’s a bitterness she doesn’t quite seem in control of yet. Swift drops oblique references to her well-documented media rivalries throughout the verses, but always circles back around to how much she loves her boyfriend at the chorus.

“All the liars are calling me one,” she coos. “Nobody’s heard from me for months / I’m doing better than I ever was.”

“All the drama queens taking swings / all the jokers dressing up as kings / they fade to nothing when I look at him,” she continues later.

With just six days until the album’s release, this will most likely be Swift’s last single before fans get to hear Reputation in full Nov. 9.

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*First Published: Nov 3, 2017, 10:14 am CDT