...The radio, the internet, the world, not to mention this issue of GLAMOUR. As she launches her 1989 global tour, Jo Elvin discovers pop's unstoppable force is also the nicest.

What happened to Taylor Swift? While we have known, intellectually, for some time that she is the blonde, sweet, multi-platinum-selling country star, we can't swear that in Britain, we always really got her, can we? In fact, for many years, you'd have sooner flashed your knickers on the bus than let anyone see her name flash up on your iPod.


Now? She is owning us all - a global phenomenon of an album, an obsession to her 25.5million Instagram followers. A Saturday Night Live sketch from a few months ago sums it up nicely, where a bunch of adults rush to their doctors suffering from a new sincere and unironic enjoyment of Taylor Swift tunes. The joke being, this is confusing and alarming for them. I think most of us can relate. Her album 1989 is one of the most ludicrously catchy collections of 'proper' pop songs since Gaga's The Fame. Resistance has been futile. And not only is it now politely tolerated, but actually totally frickin' cool to unashamedly adore Taylor Swift. Hell, even Kanye, who once famously stormed a stage because she won 'Beyoncé's' VMA award, is now a fan.

I don't have any need or urge to write about overt sexuality. It just never occurs to me

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"We actually, I guess, could be called friends now!" laughs Taylor, her gazelle-like legs poured into black skinnies and twisting around each other in an armchair. "I honestly think I needed to continue to prove myself in my career and I think it finally got to a place where he realised he respected what I do as a musician."

This is why Taylor Swift will endure. Pretty and sweet, yes, but this 25 year old is no cutie-pie. She is pure guts and steel. For she hasn't been chasing your, mine or Kanye's love. She's stuck to her guns, done her own thing and guess what, we've all come running to her. From her days as an 11-year-old Pennsylvanian who would ask her mum every night at bedtime, "Do you think I'll ever get a record deal?" to the Grammy award-winning pop princess who's giving me a precious hour before rushing off to be the headline performer at the 2015 Brits, she was always going to fail or succeed at this music thing, 100% her own way. And to think her biggest triumph has come with 1989, the album her record company didn't even want her to make.


"That was very surprising to me," she says. "The one thing they had a problem with was me making a pop album. They were very scared that we wouldn't be able to maintain the level of success we had with Red. But I didn't care. It would have been all on me if we hadn't sold half of what they wanted, and I knew that. But I knew that you can't let fans get comfortable with what you make. We're supposed to entertain people. Repeating one thing over and over again is not entertaining."

Damon Baker

I think that part of me not going crazy is me admitting my life is weird and not normal

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Refreshing too, is that she has called a resounding 'bullshit' on the idea that women must be pornographic to sell their music. Pop's nicest girl was the most successful artist of 2014, with the biggest album release in 12 years, yet, thus far, has had sex with exactly zero wrecking balls. (Side note: Little Miss Balls Of Steel recently shut down two porn domains using her name, by buying them.)


"You know, everybody has different priorities as an artist," she ventures diplomatically. "Every woman has different things that make them feel strong and powerful. For me, I don't have any need or urge to write about overt sexuality. It just never occurs to me. I appreciate girls who sing about whatever they want, because that's what they want to sing about."

You see? Nice. Something that Taylor Swift has, single-handedly, made cool.

"Well, I just don't place much priority on looking cool," she shrugs. "And I think at 25, I'm finally OK with feeling that. I've said this before. I think there's this priority on having this persona of being edgy or cool or bored. And those things are all sexy. All those things are chic, when you seem not to care about anything other than yourself. And I just don't buy into it. I'm really excited by lots of things. I think enthusiasm is the best protection. It can protect you from anything. And I don't feel bored by any of this, so I don't strive to look bored by any of this."

Of course, what she finds deeply boring, to the point of infuriating, is the endless speculation about her love life.

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Damon Baker

I just don't place much priority on looking cool. And I think at 25, I'm finally OK with feeling that

"Yeah, I do feel jaded about relationships, to be honest," she says. "I think the media has sent me a really unfair message over the past couple of years, which is that I'm not allowed to date for excitement, or fun, or new experiences or learning lessons. I'm only allowed to date if it's for a lasting, multiple-year relationship. Otherwise I'm a, quote, 'serial dater'. Or, quote, 'boy crazy'. The narrative has been so wrong, every time it was the same. It's 'Taylor spotted talking to this guy, she's chasing him.' They create a beginning to the story that didn't happen most of the time, so then they have to create an ending. So they always go to the same fabricated ending that every other tabloid has used in my story, which is, 'She got too clingy', or 'Taylor has too many emotions, she scared him away'. Which has honestly never been the reason for any of my break-ups. You know what has been the reason? The media. You take something very fragile, like trying to get to know someone, and it feels like walking out into the middle of a gladiator arena with someone you've just met. And all of a sudden the public and the media are allowed to say thumbs up or thumbs down. So I just don't try it any more."

Damon Baker

I really don't know what to say to this. So I jokingly suggest she tries Tinder.

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"What is that?" Ha, the so-called serial dater has never heard of Tinder, let alone swiped either way. When I explain, she rolls her eyes and laughs. "Well, there is no easy way for me to engage with romance. I'm really busy, so I can't. And it's a good thing that I feel really independent and I feel that my friends are all I need. It's kind of a sad way I got there, though, being shamed into it."

Shamed?

"Well, what else is it when you have two boyfriends in one year and everyone's calling you boy crazy, making jokes about you at awards shows? That's public humiliation. And I don't think it's fair."

It wasn't like I was shot out of a cannon - it was, like, five years before I became recognisable to everyone

And, with on-point timing, as we went to press, Taylor's love life was under the glare again. She'd been seen out with Calvin Harris a few times (she reportedly met him the day after our interview at the Brits). What's a girl to do? She's hot. So's he. And yeah, we're obsessed.

Damon Baker


I feel really lucky to have about ten friends, like Karlie and Lena and Selena

Read the full interview with Taylor Swift in the June issue of GLAMOUR, out 30 April

Taylor Swift's 1989 is out now. Taylor will be bringing The 1989 World Tour to the UK in June 2015. For ticketing and on-sale information, go to taylorswift.com