By: Emma Leonardi

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you heard the news announced at the 2024 Grammys that sent Swifties into a spiral—Taylor Swift is coming out with her eleventh studio album. The album is titled The Tortured Poets Department and is scheduled to be released on April 19th, 2024. Thanks to several leaks across the internet, we already know the tracklist for this album. So, in true Swiftie fashion, I’ll be attempting to compile the theories for each new song into one document. Wish me luck.

The first song on the list is titled “Fortnight” (yes you read that right, NIGHT not nite) and will feature Post Malone. The only thing truly known about this song is that fortnight means fourteen days (aka two weeks). However, there was also a leak of an alleged portion of the song. The lyrics go: 

Left me here in the cold

Never made it clear, never made it right.

I’ve been waiting here, goin’ on a fortnight.

Two weeks, to the day

Hopefully this is not another AI leak like with “Suburban Legends” because this version is lowkey SO GOOD.

The second song is the title track, “The Tortured Poets Department.” Other than it being the album title, it is also hypothesized that it is in reference to a group chat that Taylor’s most recent ex, Joe Alwyn, was a part of: The Tortured Man Club. If these names are truly related, I can’t wait to hear Taylor’s version (pun intended) of their relationship.

The third song is “My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys.” Many fans believe this is in reference to a lyric from “Cruel Summer,” a song on Taylor’s 7th album Lover, which was about the start of her and Joe’s relationship. The lyric goes:

Bad, bad boy

Shiny toy with a price

You know that I bought it

Could the title be referencing this past song? I can’t wait to find out.

The fourth song is titled “Down Bad.” For those who don’t know, the phrase “down bad” means “when you’re so desperate for something that you lose all rational thought” (via Urban Dictionary). I for one hope this is in relation to her short lived relationship with Matty Healy from The 1975. Because why else would she date him? Right?

The fifth song is titled “So Long, London.” This could connect back to another song from Lover called “London Boy,” which leads me to think it’s about her breakup with Joe Alwyn. At least I hope it is because I NEED ANSWERS.

The sixth song is titled “But Daddy I Love Him.” This one has me very confused, because there’s two paths she could take. The first goes along with a famous line from The Little Mermaid, verbatim to the song name. The film  was also released in 1989, aka Taylor’s birth year. Coincidence? If that reference is, then this next one is certainly not. Harry Styles has been pictured over and over in a shirt with the same phrase written on it. One of these is surely a reference, but we’ll have to wait until April 19th to know which one for certain. Personally, I’m rooting for both.

The seventh song is titled “Fresh Out the Slammer.” I believe this is in reference to her finally being able to be in the spotlight without worrying about its effect on who she’s with (aka Joe). Really, it could also just be about their relationship being over in general.

The eighth track “Florida!!!” might have something to do with a performance right after her breakup; her first show post-Joe was in Tampa. Whether or not this is true, as a Florida girl, I’m happy to have some representation.

Little is known about the ninth track, “Guilty as Sin?” I’m hoping she goes into her analysis of who exactly was guilty in her relationship with Joe. As aforementioned, I NEED ANSWERS. There is also not a lot known about the tenth track “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” The only reference I could find was to Virginia Woolf’s novel Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? which has themes of illusion vs reality (a hint at T Swift’s personal life?).

The next two tracks are the ones I’m looking forward to the most, the first one specifically. Track 11, or “I Can Fix Him (No Really, I Can)” is theorized to be about her thinking she can fix Matty Healy into someone she can be with, or change Joe’s opinion about publicity. Track 12, “loml,” is believed to not be the common saying “love of my life,” but instead “loss of my life,” in juxtaposition to lyrics from “I Don’t Wanna Live Forever”: 

Wonderin’ if I dodged a bullet

Or just lost the love of my life, oh

Either way, this song is almost definitely about Joe.

“I Can Do It With a Broken Heart,” track 13, might be the most straightforward but saddest title of the entire album. The reference is towards her having to continue with The Eras Tour whilst going through her breakup with Joe. This one might break me.

The reference of the next track, “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived,” has two theories related to it. One involves another Joe—Jonas. It is believed that this song represents Taylor’s opinions of this Jonas brother following his divorce, and her subsequent friendship, with Sophie Turner. The other theory involves it being a fictional story to the likes of folklore and evermore. Personally, I hope for the drama of the first option.

“The Alchemy,” or track 15, is believed to be in reference to saving her and Joe’s relationship, but not much else is known. However, a lot can be theorized about the final track “Clara Bow” because of its basis on a real person, an actress from the 1920s. A famous line of hers, which I hope to be not only the theme of this track but the album as a whole (which I also believe humanizes Swift a lot), is this: “I’m almost never satisfied with myself or my work or anything… by the time I’m ready to be a great star I’ll have been on the screen such a long time that everybody will be tired of seeing me.”

Given how personal all of these songs seem, I have never been more excited to see how we as fans interpret them once we officially hear the lyrics. I have a very good feeling about this album; let’s see if I’m right.