Taylor Swift Sings About Death, Resurrection as Darker Persona Emerges (Watch)
Taylor Swift is announcing her death and resurrection as she reemerges on the music scene with a much darker persona.
It's been three years since the 27-year-old singer released her fifth studio album 1989. On Thursday, she released "Look What You Made Me Do," the lead single off of her upcoming sixth studio project Reputation.
In her latest song, the pop star who's known for her country music influences takes on a new sound in which she combines dramatic piano chords with ominous synths made popular in the '80s to present some cryptic lyrics that include themes about death and resurrection.
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"But I got smarter, I got harder in the nick of time. Honey, I rose up from the dead, I do it all the time," Swift croons to her unnamed opposition in the song's pre-chorus. "I've got a list of names and yours is in red, underlined. I check it once, then I check it twice."
Swift also lets the world know that she can't be trusted in the song's bridge when she sings, "I don't trust nobody and nobody trusts me, I'll be the actress starring in your bad dreams."
At the end of the song, she makes it clear that the blue-eyed country star who made her debut at 16 years old is no longer around.
"I'm sorry, the old Taylor can't come to the phone right now," Swift says in the song. "Why? Oh, 'cause she's dead!"
In preparation for the new single, Swift deleted all of her previous social media posts Wednesday, replacing them with promotional videos that include a hissing snake. The visuals for Swift's lyric video also features an animated snake eating itself while the lyrics for "Look What You Made Me Do" flash on screen.
The singer who broke into the music industry with her self titled 2006 album once included God in some of her earlier songs. Even in the 2006 track "Our Song" which is about romance, Swift managed to croon, "when I got home, before I said amen, Asking God if He could play it again."
The pop star with Catholic roots attended preschool at Alvernia Montessori School which was run by nuns in West Reading, Pennsylvania. When her career began to take off in high school, Swift studied with the private Christian institution Aaron Academy, which offers homeschooling.
By the time she rose to fame with a sold-out tour in 2011, Swift invited Christian rock band Needtobreathe to join her on tour. Around that time in her career, the singer was even receiving public support from prominent people in the Catholic community like the former Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Minneapolis-St. Paul, John Clayton Nienstedt.
"It is refreshing to find a popular, musical role model who is focused on friends, friendship and family values. She is also aware of the responsibility she carries by being in the limelight," Nienstedt previously wrote of Swift in The Catholic Spirit.
Five years ago, Swift said she was mindful about the music she released as a role model for the next generation.
"I definitely think about a million people when I am getting dressed in the morning,"Swift previously told the CBS News program "60 Minutes."
"The truth of it is that every singer out there with songs on the radio is raising the next generation, so make your words count."
Swift is prepping her album Reputation for a Nov. 10 release.
