"Reputation" (stylized as "reputation") is Taylor's sixth studio album. The album was executive produced by Taylor and released on November 10th, 2017. On its first day alone, it sold 700'000 physical copies, and it debuted at #1 on the Billboard 200 Albums chart, having sold more copies that week than the other 199 listed albums combined. Within a month, the record was certified triple platinum, becoming RIAA’s top-certified album of the year.

The album has topped the charts in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Scotland, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States. According to Buzz Angle, "reputation" sold 1.28 million copies in the US during its first week, becoming 2017's best-selling album in the country, and 2 million copies worldwide.

As of May 2019, "reputation" has sold over 4 million copies in the US and over 8,5 million worldwide. It received a nomination for "Best Pop Vocal Album" at the 2019 Grammy Awards, becoming her second nomination in the category (her fifth album "1989" won in 2016).

ANNOUNCEMENT

The title, release date, and cover art were revealed after Taylor removed all previous social media presence and uploaded three videos of a snake’s tail, body, and head in August 2017; most considered this a reference to the “snake” nickname she was given after it was revealed she wrote Calvin Harris' “This Is What You Came For” after their breakup, which worsened during public fallouts with Kanye West and Katy Perry.

TITLE SIGNIFICANCE

Taylor explained her reasonings for naming the album "reputation" to Rolling Stone Magazine.

"Creating 'reputation' felt different to any other album I’ve ever made because it felt a lot less fragmented in its storytelling. It was about a journey, from one emotional place to another. Other albums I’ve made have felt like a scrapbook of different memories, but there was something overarching about the theme of this album for me. I wanted it to sound like losing something you thought you wanted, and in the end, gaining something you really needed." - Taylor Swift

She has also stated that she knew very early on she wanted to name the album "reputation", which is why she was able to construct the album based on that concept.

WRITING & PRODUCTION

Taylor started recording "reputation" in Nashville in September, 2016. If it wasn’t already clear with the now infamous, “the old Taylor can’t come to the phone right now,” line, Taylor reiterated that her goal was to make something that was very different from her previous works.

"There would be no way for me to make something even similar to '1989' and have it be effective. It had to be completely different, because that album was its own thing." -- Taylor Swift

She mainly worked with two production teams: Jack Antonoff (whom she worked with for much of  "1989"), and the music industry legends and long-time collaborators Max Martin & Shellback. Taylor explained that she decided to work with a much smaller group on "reputation" than on "1989", and picked these two to work with because she "felt like they would be versatile enough to kill "1989", and make something new."

Taylor called "reputation" her most cathartic album, something she'd wanted to make for "years and years". "After I finished it, I was like" - she exhaled heavily - "now I can go back to writing regular songs again.

BACKGROUND & RELEASE

The album's lead single, "Look What You Made Me Do", was released on August 25, 2017, and declared the “old Taylor dead”. It topped the Billboard Hot 100 chart for threee consecutive weeks and instantly found a place in cultural ubiquity. Its music video gained over 43.2 million views during its first day on YouTube, breaking the record for the most-viewed music video within 24 hours. Among many other things, throughout the video Taylor is seen as the not-so-benevolent leader of a huge squad of models lined up like an army, a baseball bat-wielding robber of a streaming company, and a controlling dancer leading a group of eight ex-boyfriends wearing shirts that read "I ❤️ TS". "If everything you wrote about me was true," Taylor said in a behind-the-scenes look at the music video, "this is how ridiculous it would look."

Surprisingly enough, Taylor didn't do much promotion for the album's release. She didn't give interviews to magazines, nor did she appear on television to perform her lead single. Instead, she did a lot of marketing through her social media accounts and chose to share recordings from her "reputation Secret Sessions" so fans could hear her thought process behind each song. The sessions — which Taylor also did for the release of "1989" — were several secret events held before the release of "reputation". Taylor invited fans to her homes in their dozens and played them the album before anyone else got to hear it.

"reputation" was finally released on November 10, 2017. According to Taylor's father, Scott Swift, the album was supposed to come out months before it did, but the trial in Denver pushed it back.