It was like a carefully planned breakup. First came the unabashed pop bangers on Taylor Swift’s last album, 2012’s Red, “I Knew You Were Trouble” and “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.” Then, in June, Big Machine chief Scott Borchetta spoke diplomatically of her next LP (titled 1989 and due Oct. 27): “Fans are going to love it. Will country stations play a complete pop song just because it’s her? No.” Then, word began to spread about Swift’s new single, “Shake It Off,” another pop radio-ready track helmed by hitmakers Max Martin and Shellback. Later, sources hinted there isn’t a single acoustic guitar on 1989. Finally, Swift, 24, dropped the “p” word before premiering the song during an Aug. 18 worldwide webcast: “I woke up every day not wanting, but needing to make a new style of music.”
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Newsflash: Swift and country “need some space.” But in a twist worthy of a Swiftian lyric, there may have been no need for kid gloves. According to several programmers, country radio had already moved on. “She hasn’t been a country artist in quite awhile,” says one country programmer who believes Swift’s last true Nashville track was 2010’s “Mean.” George King of Townsquare Media was surprised to hear the song mentioned in a country context. “We’re absolutely going to play it on our [adult top 40] station,” he says, “but I’m not looking at it as a country song. It’s her prerogative.” Quipped Fletcher Hayes of WWQM Madison, Wis.: “Did Linda Ronstadt fans want to hear her Nelson Riddle Orchestra jazz albums on top 40?”
Still, for Swift to apparently cast aside her core base, and the very supporters who helped make her one of today’s most successful female artists (22.8 million albums sold in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan, with endorsements by Target and CoverGirl to boot), seems somewhat harsh for America’s sweetheart – and, apart from pop flings or flails by Faith Hill and LeAnn Rimes, largely unprecedented. Even Shania Twain, in her bid for global success, kept a foot in Nashville by issuing pop, country and international (semi-Bollywood-flavored) versions of her 2002 multiplatinum smash, Up!
So far, reaction to “Shake It Off” has been mixed, with some press outlets, Billboard among them, hailing the song’s hooks and others groaning at its nod to “sick beats” and Swift’s own rapping. In a telling move, Big Machine confirms to Billboard that unlike “Together,” no “country radio mix” of “Shake It Off” will be serviced, perhaps in part because the writing has been on the wall. Looking at the Country Airplay peaks for Red singles, “Together”hit No. 13 and was Swift’s first officially promoted country song to miss the top 10, although “Begin Again” hit No. 3 and the title track No. 7. But 2006’s Taylor Swift and 2008’s Fearless each yielded five top 10s on country radio, while 2010’s Speak Now produced four; those three albums generated five No. 1s overall.
So how many more corners of the globe are left for Swift to conquer, and why would she stray from a genre currently exploding on the road? The answer, presumably, is an artistic one. (Swift and Big Machine declined to comment for this article.) “As an artist, it’s your call to stand still or to grow, and if you decide your job is to get to as many people as possible, then this is certainly a clear-cut way to go there,” says one Nashville label executive. “She’s always been a brilliant caretaker of her own career, and I’m guessing she’ll pull the audience along with her.”