Here's something I've learned about people.

We think we know someone, but the truth is that we only know the version of them they have chosen to show us. We know our friend in a certain light, but we don't know them the way their lover does. Just the way their lover will never know them the same way that you do as their friend. Their mother knows them differently than their roommate, who knows them differently than their colleague. Their secret admirer looks at them and sees an elaborate sunset of brilliant color and dimension and spirit and pricelessness. And yet, a stranger will pass that person and see a faceless member of the crowd, nothing more. We may hear rumors about a person and believe those things to be true. We may one day meet that person and feel foolish for believing baseless gossip.

This is the first generation that will be able to look back on their entire life story documented in pictures on the internet, and together we will all discover the after-effects of that. Ultimately, we post photos online to curate what strangers think of us. But then we wake up, look in the mirror at our faces and see the cracks and scars and blemishes, and cringe. We hope someday we'll meet someone who will see that same morning face and instead see their future, their partner, their forever. Someone who will still choose us even when they see all of the sides of the story, all the angles of the kaleidoscope that is you.

The point being, despite our need to simplify and generalize absolutely everyone and everything in this life, humans are intrinsically impossible to simplify. We are never just good or just bad. We are mosaics of our worst selves and our best selves, our deepest secrets and our favorite stories to tell at a dinner party, existing somewhere between our well-lit profile photo and our drivers license shot. We are all a mixture of our selfishness and generosity, loyalty and self-preservation, pragmatism and impulsiveness. I've been in the public eye since I was 15 years old. On the beautiful, lovely side of that, I've been so lucky to make music for living and look out into crowds of loving, vibrant people. On the other side of the coin, my mistakes have been used against me, my heartbreaks have been used as entertainment, and my songwriting has been trivialized as "oversharing".

When this album comes out, gossip blogs will scour the lyrics for the men they can attribute to each song, as if the inspiration for music is as simple and basic as a paternity test. There will be slideshows of photos backing up each incorrect theory, because it's 2017 and if you didn't see a picture of it, it couldn't have happened right?

Let me say it again, louder for those in the back...

We think we know someone, but the truth is that we only know the version of them that they have chosen to show us.

There will be no further explanation.

There will be just reputation.

("reputation" Prologue)

The album's opener, "...Ready for It?", is an electropop and industrial pop song, with elements of tropical house, dubstep and trap music.

Lyrically, the song is about Taylor's reputation and falling in love again, as well as referencing the infamous relationship between Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. The song also talks about sexuality.

"It introduces a metaphor you may hear more of throughout the rest of the album, which is this Crime and Punishment metaphor, where it talks about robbers, and thieves, and heists, and all that. And I found that to be a really interesting metaphor, but twisted it in different ways throughout the album. The way that it's presented in “…Ready For It?” is basically, finding your partner in crime, and it’s like ‘Oh my god we’re the same, we’re the same, oh my god! Let’s rob banks together, this is great!’" - Taylor Swift

"...Ready For It?" was the first promotional single from "reputation". It debuted in an ad shown during a college football game between Florida State and Alabama and was released on September 3, 2017. After its TV premiere, the song was also featured in an ABC ad. The song eventually became the second single from the album. It received generally positive reviews by critics, who cited it as an improvement on Taylor's previous single, "Look What You Made Me Do".

The music video was filmed on the day of the solar eclipse in the US - August 21, 2017. It was directed by Joseph Kahn and was filmed at the Hawthorne Plaza Shopping Center in Hawthorne, California. It features homage references to sci-fi and anime, including "Blade Runner", "Ghost in the Shell", "Ex Machina", "Tron", "Sailor Moon" and "Species". It earned 20.4 million views in its first 24 hours.

A remix for the song featuring American musician BloodPop was released on December 10, 2017. The remix received positive reviews from critics.

"End Game" is a star-studded track and is the sole collaboration on "reputation". It features Ed Sheeran and Future.

“End Game” revolves around the idea of Taylor wanting to be her lover’s soulmate. While she never mentions who this person is, it is assumed to be about Joe Alwyn, her boyfriend as of the song’s release. Through the lyrics, Taylor hopes that the “drama” revolving around her doesn’t keep him from being with her because they’ve already gotten so close.

Taylor began working on "End Game" alone, when she invited Ed over for pasta on July 13, 2017. She had written the lyric "I wanna be your A-team" and wanted to play it for Ed because of his song "The A Team". She then told him she wanted him to sing a verse, so they began writing it then. They had previously worked together on her 2012 track “Everything Has Changed,” on which Ed sang the second verse.

Interesting to note, in Ed's verse he sings, "I've made mistakes and made some choices, that's hard to deny. After the storm, something was born on the 4th of July." Ed has previously said that he and fiancé Cherry Seaborn got together over July 4th and the couple celebrated their first anniversary at Taylor's house in Rhode Island over the holiday in 2016. 

The idea to collaborate with Future came about when Taylor and Ed got drunk and just began talking about how cool it would be. "End Game" is Taylor's overall third collaboration with a rapper, following the remix of her track “Bad Blood,” which featured Kendrick Lamar and “Both of Us” by B.o.B., featuring Taylor.

The track was released as the 3rd single off the album and sent to contemporary hit radio on December 3, 2017 in the United States. The music video was directed by Joseph Kahn and was released on January 11th, 2018. "End Game" became Taylor's 55th top forty hit. It became the third single from "reputation" to reach the top 40.

“I Did Something Bad” explores Taylor’s new darker trap sound in the "reputation" era as it drifts away from previous record "1989". It was planned to be a single but is now scrapped.

The song was initially teased with the lyric “they’re burning all the witches” in the music video for “…Ready For It?”. Like 2014’s “Blank Space,” “I Did Something Bad” plays on the media and public’s perception of Taylor, with her singing as the character they portray her as.

"I wrote this song on piano...it's not going to sound like it, though. It's not that kind of song. So, I brought it to them [Max Martin & Shellback], and I was trying to explain the production. I had had a weird dream, and I had woken up with this sound in my head. It was a sound that was so hooky and so catchy, that I knew it had to be in a song, because it was that annoying, it wouldn't stop going around in my head. Like, after the chorus, that's what I wanna hear, but I don't want it to be my voice, I want it to be an instrument. What instrument is that? So I was playing the voice memo to Max, and he's like 'Oh, no, there's not an instrument that can do that. But what we can do is, we can take your voice doing it, and pitch it down, so that it sounds like an enchantress/a dude.' So, that's what you're hearing after the chorus." -- Taylor Swift

She has said that this song was the first one she and Max Martin wrote where they felt they made something different enough from "1989".

"I Did Something Bad" is also the first song in Taylor's career which includes profane language (the word "shit"). Although it has explicit lyrics, the song is not marked as explicit on Apple Music.

In the remix performed on the "reputation Stadium Tour", Taylor added new lyrics to the bridge of the song. In this version she says and insists that people are trying to destroy famous personalities only because they like to see someone fall from grace.

They're burning all the witches even if you aren't one

They got their pitchforks and proof, their receipts and reasons

They're burning all the witches even if you aren't one

And it's just for fun

They're burning all the witches even if you aren't one

They got pitchforks and proof, they don't need their reasons

They only want to have fun, laughing at the problems of other persons and trying to bury them. It can also be seen as a social critique.

Taylor performed "I Did Something Bad" at the 2018 American Music Awards.

On this midtempo synthpop track, Taylor compares being in love to drug addiction. It is rumoured that the song was originally written for the "Fifty Shades Darker" soundtrack.

The comparison of love to a drug has appeared in many popular songs over the years. While talking about "Don't Blame Me" at the secret sessions, Taylor explained her concept behind the song.

"Three things can really change someone -- love, drugs and religion." -- Taylor Swift

Based on this idea, she was inspired to put these aspects together in a song. Taylor has said that she loves the passion of religious music, so she wanted to include gospel influences near the end of the song.

Lyrically, Taylor may possibly be referring to the ‘serial dater’ reputation the media has created for her. She wrote her 2014 song “Blank Space” from the same perspective: the character that the media branded her as. She is claiming that she is mad and insane, that love is her drug, mocking the reputation she has been given by the media. The first part of this lyric can also be a reference to "Blank Space", which goes:

Got a long list of ex-lovers

They’ll tell you I’m insane

‘Cause you know I love the players

In addition, Taylor may also have intended to refer to the comic book villain, Poison Ivy, and Daisy, the central love interest of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s "The Great Gatsby". They also work together to show the two sides of Taylor’s public image, one of a calculating, evil villainess, and one of a love-struck victim. She has said that the novel also inspired her while writing "Delicate". Taylor further referenced "The Great Gatsby" on “This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things”:

Feeling so Gatsby for that whole year

Taylor's goal for "Delicate" was to use the vocoder to create an "emotional" and "vulnerable" sound for the track. Much like "Gorgeous", “Delicate” sees Taylor taking a more hesitant approach while pursuing a new man, likely Joe Alwyn, her boyfriend as of the song’s release.

While Taylor was writing "Delicate", she had an image of F. Scott Fitzgerald's Gatsby in her head, running through his mansion, trying to find Daisy.

Sonically, the record utilizes chilling voice harmonies backed by a simple instrumental. The lyrics describe the doubts Taylor had before confessing her feelings to her boyfriend, Joe Alwyn.

"The idea of your reputation is definitely something that I play on for the entire album, but when the album starts off it's much more bombastic. It's more like, 'Oh, I don't care what you say about me, I don't care what you say about my reputation, it doesn't matter.' But then it hits this point, on track five, where it's like, oh God, what happens when you meet somebody that you really want in your life and then you start worrying about what they've heard before they met you. And you start to wonder, could something fake, like your reputation, affect something real, like somebody getting to know you? And you start to wonder, how much does all that matter? And this is the first point of vulnerability in the record where you're like, oh maybe this does actually matter a little bit. And how does that factor in, kind of questioning the reality and the perception of a reputation, and how much weight it actually has." -- Taylor Swift

Coincidentally, “Delicate” follows Taylor’s pattern of the fifth song of her albums being one about vulnerable emotions, following previous fifth tracks “Cold As You,” “White Horse,” “Dear John,” “All Too Well,” and “All You Had To Do Was Stay.” Notably, this is the first of those songs to be about the beginning of a relationship. “I didn’t even do it on purpose,” she confessed. “When I finally was like, this is the final tracklist, I was like…oh, I did it again.”

A music video, centered around Taylor dancing to the song, premiered on March 11, 2018 during the iHeartRadio Music Awards. It was directed by Joseph Kahn. In addition, a vertical music video was released on the streaming plattform Spotify.

“Delicate” received acclaim from critics and topped Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone’s "Top 25 Songs of 2017" list. In the United States, it was a sleeper hit, debuting at number 84 on the Billboard Hot 100 after its release as a single. The song has since peaked at number 12, becoming Swift's 41st top 20 entry. It was the fifth song from "reputation" to do so making it the first album in three years to have five top 20 hits with the last album doing so being Swift's own album "1989" in 2015. The song entered at number 32 on the Mainstream Top 40 and number 37 on the Adult Top 40, peaking at the top position on both radio charts becoming the first single from "reputation" to do so. Billboard noted that compared to other singles from "reputation", which peaked high initially and then fell, "Delicate" was a slow growing radio smash which gained popularity the longer audiences stayed with it. It also became the biggest radio hit from the album surpassing "Look What You Made Me Do". 

The lead single from the highly anticipated follow-up to "1989" takes shots at several unnamed rivals. The song’s themes are of revenge and rebirth into a smarter, stronger person. It sees Taylor move in a new sonic direction, incorporating electropop and an interpolation of the 90s hit “I’m Too Sexy” on the chorus.

On the "reputation Album Release Party", Taylor revealed that “Look What You Made Me Do” started out as a poem:

"It actually started with just a poem that I wrote about my feelings, and it's basically about realizing that you couldn't trust certain people, but realizing you appreciate the people you can trust. Realizing that you can't just let everyone in, but the ones you can let in, you need to cherish. And it had all the verses in it, just basically as is. When the beat hit, we were like 'Oh, look what you made me do, look what you made me do,' and we were just like, 'Oh my God, we've gotta edit out the rest of the words, and just do that. The most important part of the song is, 'I don't trust nobody, and nobody trusts me, I'll be the actress starring in your bad dreams. Oh, I'm sorry, the old Taylor can't come to the phone right now. Why? Oh, 'cause she's dead.'" -- Taylor Swift

The music video premiered during the MTV Video Music Awards on August 27th, 2017. It was directed by Joseph Kahn. The video made both VEVO and YouTube history, amassing the most views within 24 hours in history on both platforms. After the music video of “Look What You Made Me Do” was released, Taylor explained the true meaning behind the video: "If everything you wrote about me was true, this is how ridiculous it would look."

According to the song’s official credits, the chorus is a deliberate interpolation of the hook from Right Said Fred’s 1991 hit “I’m Too Sexy". That song was written as a satirical look at the fashion industry and inspired by the time the Fairbrass brothers spent running a gym where they observed “lots of narcissism and posing.” This connects with Taylor’s shots at contemporary paparazzi and gossip culture, a central theme on "reputation".

"Look What You Made Me Do" spent three weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

"So It Goes..." could be a symbolic summerization to Taylor’s "reputation" album as a whole.

The line “so it goes” originates from the novel "Slaughterhouse-Five" by Kurt Vonnegut, written in 1969. He says the line several times in the novel whenever a death occurs, as a narrative transition to another subject. Infamously, Taylor publicly declared the "Old Taylor" dead on "Look What You Made Me Do". The album symbolizes her transition into the “new” Taylor -- so it goes.

Lyrically, she switches things back to romance, reflecting on just how a new love interest might help her out of her fixations: “you make everyone disappear,” she explains in the moody, murky opening segment, which opens into a trap-lite chorus about getting caught up in the moment.

"So It Goes..." became an accidental dark horse of "reputation", thanks to Taylor's reluctance to sing it on the "reputation Stadium Tour" -- it was the only song from the album not included on the original setlist. That changed after fans continued to make noise about the song on social media. After a few shows, Taylor eventually started alternating between performing "Dancing With Our Hands Tied" and "So It Goes..." acoustically.

Fans have speculated the song is about Taylor’s boyfriend, British actor Joe Alwyn. During the Rhode Island secret session, she told fans that this song and all the other positive love songs on the album are about him. She wanted her fans to clarify this in online discussions and also liked multiple posts on Tumblr about this subject as further confirmation.

It was also revealed that the baby's voice featured on the song is from James Reynolds, daughter of actors Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds. Taylor told fans at the secret sessions that she was at the beach with Blake and Ryan, playing them "Gorgeous" on guitar. Afterward, James kept saying "gorgeous" over and over again, so Taylor recorded a voice memo of it.

The song received acclaim from music critics. Glamour stated that it was evidence that Swift was "single-handedly saving pop music in 2017", calling it "fizzy" and "delightful", owing to its "slightly left of centre style".

In the United States, the song debuted at number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100, number 16 on the Streaming Songs chart with 16.9 million U.S. streams, and atop the Digital Songs chart with first-week downloads of 68,000 copies. It also became her 14th song to top the Digital Songs chart and her 13th to open at the summit, tying her with Rihanna for the most number one entries on the chart with 14 each. In Australia, the song entered the ARIA Singles Chart at number 9. The song also peaked at number 15 in the UK.

In "Getaway Car", Taylor uses a Bonnie and Clyde-esqe image of two criminals attempting to flee cops in a getaway car to illustrate a doomed relationship. 

There’s a lot of imagery that’s consistent throughout "reputation," and one of these components is the idea of thieves and heists. “Getaway Car" is a prime example for this theme.

This song talks about a relationship that didn't work and seems to be referencing her romance with actor Tom Hiddleston, which occurred after her split with Calvin Harris. The couple received a ton of attention from the press, watching their every move.

"Getaway Car" quickly became a fan favorite, many of them hoping for this song to become a single from the album. And it did! The song was sent to Australian and New Zealand radio stations on September 7, 2018 as the album's seventh and final single. Interestingly enough, the day marked the two-year anniversary of PEOPLE Magazine announcing the Hiddleswift split.

With “King of my Heart,” Taylor used both the lyrics and the tempo of the song to create a piece of art that mimics the stages of a relationship.

References to losing various kingdom related things are seen all throughout "reputation". Although she has lost in the past, it looks like Taylor has found a totally different kingdom in "King of My Heart". This kingdom is one that is more personal and intimate, one in which a new romantic interest begins to rule her “heart, body, and soul.”

Likewise, although she lost her crown in “Call It What You Want”, she still has a totally different crown to offer her lover, giving this song it’s namesake -- “King of My Heart”. A crown that seemingly means more to her than any crown from before. Taylor sayed the following at a "reputation Secret Session":

“I think it’s really interesting when people talk about their love stories. There seems to be these definitive phases, and it doesn’t matter how long that phase lasts, there seems to be a moment when you knew it transitioned into the next phase. People will be like, ‘Oh my God, we were friends for six years, and there was this moment, and we knew, and then it changed. Then there was a moment and it got deeper, and then there was a moment and we knew. Everybody has a different story with how they connect with someone else. And what I find interesting are the moments where it switches, because you always hope that that switch is going to move you forward and not backward. Because, it can happen both ways. It can happen either way.” -- Taylor Swift

She further elaborated on the sound of the song, which uses drums and a beat drop in the chorus.

"I’ve always wanted to structure a song where each individual section of the song sounded like a move forward in the relationship, but still be listenable. So, I wanted the verse to seem like its own phase of a relationship, the pre-chorus to sound like its own phase of a relationship, and the chorus to sound like its own phase of a relationship. And I wanted them to have their own identity, but seem like they were getting deeper and more fast-paced as the song went on. So finally, I was able to achieve that in a song." -- Taylor Swift

“Dancing With Our Hands Tied” is a song about the combination of love and fear and how these emotions coincide with each other.

When in the studio to record the song, she cried for an hour before she was able to put down her vocals, which she says had never happened to her before.

A fan on Tumblr who attended the "reputation Secret Sessions" explained the story behind the song.

"Taylor set 'Dancing With Our Hands Tied' up by saying that the inspiration for the song came when she was back in LA after spending several months out of the public eye. As we know now she spent basically all of this time in the UK with [boyfriend] Joe Alwyn, without anyone knowing she even was in a relationship. Back in LA […] she went to the gym only to be caught by paparazzi on her way out. Thy shouted all kinds of things at her, including comments about her weight – remember this was the first time she had been properly seen in months. She described being really overwhelmed by the experience but that her thought process was less about herself and more about how she could possibly have a normal relationship when this was her life. Taylor actually said that after the incident she went straight to the recording studio, cried, and wrote this song."

The song shows a different side of Taylor’s sound not present in much of her previous music. It has house music vibes and heavy beat drops. In the last chorus of the song Taylor also hits notes in vocal ranges she has not hit in the previous history of her music career; the notes F5 and G5.

“Dress” is one of Taylor’s most sexually charged songs on the album, and a sonically slow steamy ballad. The song details Taylor’s wants and lusts over another lover.

As the name implies, many of the sexual references throughout the song pertain to dresses. Taylor has a history of fascination with dresses dating back to her country music roots from when she first stepped foot in the music industry. She has also said there is a real dress she bought that inspired the hook of the song.

During her secret sessions, Taylor told her fans that all positive songs on "reputation" are about Joe Alwyn. References that fit this sentiment are seen all throughout the song. “Dress” likely chronicles around the time of the start of Taylor’s relationship with Joe when they were moving past the friendship stage to a more sexual stage after Taylor and Tom Hiddleston’s brief romance. The latter part of the lyric, “even in my worst light, you saw the truth in me”, is a reference to Alwyn being there for Taylor and not being bothered by the way the media was portraying her at the time surrounding the Kim/Kanye feud. References to this are seen in “Call It What You Want”, “Delicate”, and “King of My Heart.”

"This song was one of those things where almost every line is something that I came up with like a year before, and then when I was writing the song, I just cherry picked, and I was like, ‘Like that, like that, like that, like that.’ And I was really proud of the hook of this because it sounds like a pickup line, and yet it is a love song about deep and tender feelings." -- Taylor Swift

On this lighthearted, anthemic, and almost comical track Taylor throws some major shade at all of her "haters". The theme of "The Great Gatsby" once again returns in this song.

During the secret sessions held before the release of "reputation", Taylor told fans that this song drew on her experiences with fame and the media. She stated that she’d throw extravagant parties and invite her friends on stage with her during the "1989 World Tour" as a nice gesture, to share her success with those around her. However, the media eventually turned that against her, questioning and criticizing her need for a “squad” which led her to essentially move out of the public eye completely and go on a sabbatical for the next year.

"It’s [a song] about when people take nice things for granted. Like friendship, or trusting people, or being open or whatever. Letting people in on your life, trusting people, respect. Those are all really nice things." -- Taylor Swift

Many have also speculated that this song specifically references her ongoing feud with rapper, Kanye West.

The production of the song was inspired by "Hard Knock Life" from Annie. Taylor said she loved the sound of children yelling in musicals, so she decided to put it in her song.

"This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things" serves as the final song on Taylor's "reputation Stadium Tour". This makes it the first song to close one of her tours that's not been made a single.

“Call It What You Want” is the second promotional single from "reputation". It was first announced on November 2nd, 2017, which was coincidentally the 13th anniversary of Taylor meeting Scott Borchetta, who discovered and signed her to Big Machine Records.

Taylor has said that she views "reputation" as having a very linear timeline. With that said, it makes perfect sense that “Call It What You Want,” the album’s penultimate track, would be a good reflection of where Taylor was as the album was being released.

"The way I feel the album is, as far as a storyline, is I feel like it starts with just getting out any kind of rebellion, or anger, or angst, or whatever. And then, like, falling in love, and realizing that you kind of settle into what your priorities are, and your life changes, but you welcome it because it’s something that matters to you. And this last part of the album feels like settling into where I am now. So it started with where I was when I started making the album, and ends with kind of my emotional state now. And this song, I think, really reflects that probably the best on the album.” -- Taylor Swift

After the song was released, many fans were quick to point out lyric parallels between the bridge of this track and her 2008 hit “Love Story,” on which Taylor daydreams about getting saved and running away with her boyfriend. Now she declares:

You don't need to save me

But would you run away with me?

"Yes."

The album's closer, "New Year's Day", explores the flip side of the romanticism of a New Year's Eve kiss, and is about how the one that sticks around the next day is the person that matters more. It is the fourth single off the album and was released to country radio.

Contrasting the prior rest of the album where Taylor takes many shots as various others, she creates a more mature image here -- thankful for her past and ready to ‘clean up’ and move on in the future. The song uses a New Year’s party as a metaphor to discuss holding on to people and memories from both good and bad times. Taylor recognizes that when the ‘parties’ in her life are over and the ‘new year’ begins, such memories are all she will have left to hold on to and learn from.

“Two New Year’s Eve’s ago…I found myself in the midst of a very incredible 3 a.m. moment where you feel like you’re invincible and you end up like jumping in a pool in the winter. And you feel super untouchable in that moment. And then the next morning you feel very fragile. And you’re like, 'This is love! This is what love really is.' We all wanna find someone to kiss at midnight, that’s cool or whatever, but who’s gonna want to hang out with you the next day when you’re like ‘ADVIL OR NOTHING.’ So this is a song about real love and finding someone to hang out with on New Year’s Day.” -- Taylor Swift

According to Taylor, there are two lines in this song that she had been saving for a long time, for the right moment. The first one is, "Please don’t ever become a stranger whose laugh I could recognize anywhere." And the other one is, "Hold on to the memories, they will hold on to you."

Musically, the song is reminiscent of Taylor’s older tracks, with sparse production and simply guitar and piano as backing. Producer Jack Antonoff has said that "New Year's Day" was the quicketst song to record on the album -- they only recorded it once.

"New Year's Day" was officially being promoted as a single and released to country radio; it went for adds at the format on November 27, 2017.