Taylor Swift's latest album is resonating with local 'Swifites'

It has been almost three weeks since Taylor Swift released her newest album, “The Tortured Poets Department”, on April 19. According to www.billboard.com, the album was streamed over 1.76 billion times worldwide in its first week, breaking the global streaming record. Swift is huge worldwide as everyone knows, but how is Missouri stacking up?

One research firm, USBettingReport, found Missouri ranked in the top 10 biggest Swiftie states, holding the second-place spot.

The news of being the second-place state was exciting for some local Swifties, including friends from Cape Girardeau, Grace Johnson and Gracie Willis. Johnson said “it’s iconic” for Missouri to be so high on the list.

Gracie Willis, left, and Grace Johnson capture a moment after getting the "1989" album.Submitted

Both women went to two of the highly sought-after “Eras Tour” concerts, going together to the second night in Kansas City and different nights in Nashville.

Willis said they are “100% Swifties, we are not bandwagon Swifties.”

Willis said she has been a Swift fan since early elementary school ever since the Fearless album was released in 2008. Johnson said she even remembers Fearless coming out, saying she does not remember a time in her life when she was not listening to some sort of Swift song or album.

“The first song that got me intrigued I saw on a TV channel that would play music videos every Saturday or Sunday morning. Her “Fifteen” music video was playing and I was, like ‘Oh who is this girl’ That was the first thing I remember, then after that “Picture to Burn” because I had a little iPod that already had a bunch of music on it and I would listen to it all the time. All of ‘Speak Now’ I was so obsessed over,” Johnson said

Willis had a similar time remembering when Swift’s first song piqued her interest, saying it was on a show such as “Good Morning America” or the “Today” show and Swift was singing “Love Story” and “You Belong with Me”. She remembers thinking, “Oh my gosh, I love her” and she bought her CD.

Now years later, the two still love all of Swift’s music, even her newest album after just a short time of its release. The two both say it ranks high on their album rating list from Swift.

Johnson said she couldn’t give the particular ranking just yet with the rest of the albums because she hasn’t had enough time with it, but that it is a great album and, with almost every song, she thought, “Oh my gosh, this is so good”.

Swift’s most recent album has been discussed among many because of its more mature nature within the songs. Willis and Johnson both said they enjoyed the matureness of it, as well as the differentiation of the songs.

“A lot of people say this album and other albums are not sonically cohesive, and I disagree. Okay, maybe it is a little bit different. Some songs don’t sound the same as other songs. But I love an album that has so many different types of songs to listen to that are different from each other,” Johnson said.

Within this album there were some favorites already by the two women.” The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived”, “Imgonnagetyouback” “The Bolter” and “The Prophecy” were just a few they said they both enjoyed.

“Even though some of her songs I can’t relate to because a lot of them are about a breakup or a situation with an ex. I can’t really relate to that right now, but I can still really appreciate, like, the lyricism of it and the artistry behind it, but I think a lot of the times when she says like, ‘Oh, this is for the fans’ like it’s her story originally, but then it becomes our story because we enjoy it so much and, like, there are different times in our lives and we can relate to certain songs and then certain songs we don’t relate to,” Willis said

Across the internet, there have been parents who disagree with Swift and how she has made this album “more mature” than others and how Swift is not a “good” role model for their young girls. Johnson and Willis disagree.

“I think she’s not geared toward children. Like, she doesn’t write songs for the children. She has also clean versions, too, of all the songs and I think she kind of puts thought into them, too, because they have words so she, like, fills in them with real words,” Willis said

Johnson said Swift is a 34-year-old grown woman. She isn’t writing music for children or working with kids.

“Her albums, (the) debut and ‘Fearless’, like, sure they’re more appropriate, but they were in my high school role. Yeah, they weren’t written for children and, also, if you have an issue with the content the songs are about just don’t listen or just listen to the super clean versions,” Johnson said.

Swift’s newest album can be streamed on every major platform. Give it a listen and let us know what are your favorite or least favorite songs on the album.