There’s absolutely no calming down the Swifties ever since Taylor Swift announced her ninth studio album, “Evermore,” in a surprise reveal.
Ringing the alarm that sent fans on a wild Easter egg hunt early Thursday morning, the “You Need To Calm Down” crooner took to Twitter trumpeting the surprise Friday release of her forthcoming 15-track LP, which she endearingly christened the “sister” record to her eighth musical project “Folklore.”
“I’m elated to tell you that my 9th studio album, and folklore’s sister record, will be out tonight at midnight eastern. It’s called ‘evermore,’” Swift tweeted Thursday, just a few days before her 31st birthday on Sunday.
As if her new music announcement wasn’t enough to cause fans to nearly choke on their morning coffee, the singer — known for lacing her projects with hidden messages — went on to share the artwork for “Evermore,” complete with the carefully selected titles of each track.
And now, everyone wants a full kettle of tea on the secret significance of each proper name featured on her tracklist.
“Plz tell me if u find Marjorie who was standing under Willow tree where Dorothea lost her,” one fan speculated Thursday on Twitter, “and now it’s time to go see Taylor brought them together and their happiness is for #evermore I’m loosing my mind.. @taylorswift13 @taylornation13.”
Another fan had an early hunch about “Dorothea,” claiming it could be the name of Gigi Hadid’s baby, a reveal similar to when Swift divulged Blake Lively’s baby name in “Betty.”
“Y’all hear me out. We just cracked something i guess. ‘August’ is track 8 on folkore and gigi has posted a picture on Instagram caption ‘August, waiting for our girl’ and the track 8 of evermore is dorothea,” the excited fan wrote. “SO WHAT IF GIGI’S BABY’S NAME IS DOROTHEA?.”
Separating fact from fiction, here’s what we know now that “Evermore” is out:
Este
The sixth song on the album marks Swift’s first musical collaboration with longtime friends Haim; she even named the tune’s protagonist after the group’s eldest sister, Este.
“I wrote ‘no body, no crime” by myself,” Swift told fans during a Q&A ahead of her “Willow” music video premiere. “It was inspired by my obsession with true crime podcasts/documentaries and I used one of my best friends’ names as the main character. The Haim sisters have been my best friends for years and we’ve played together so many times but this is the first time we’ve done a song together.”
The lyrics tell the tale of a woman who suspects her husband of infidelity — and soon goes missing. “Este wasn’t there Tuesday night at Olive Garden / At her job or anywhere,” Swift sings.
“Working with the Haim sisters on ‘no body, no crime’ was pretty hilarious because it came about after I wrote a pretty dark murder mystery song and had named the character Este, because she’s the friend I have who would be stoked to be in a song like that,” the pop star explained in an interview with Entertainment Weekly.
“I had finished the song and was nailing down some lyric details and texted her, ‘You’re not going to understand this text for a few days but…which chain restaurant do you like best?’ and I named a few,” she continued. “She chose Olive Garden and a few days later I sent her the song and asked if they would sing on it. It was an immediate ‘YES.’ Long story short, I’m the 4th Haim sister now, confirmed.”
Dorothea
In a message shared with fans upon the release of “Evermore,” Swift referred to the subject of her eighth song as “the girl who left her small town to chase down Hollywood dreams — and what happens when she comes back for the holidays and rediscovers an old flame.”
Discussing the song on YouTube, Swift said, “There’s not a direct continuation of the betty/james/august storyline, but in my mind Dorothea went to the same high school as Betty James and Inez” — referring to characters and tales she first wrote about in “Folklore.”
The track is told from the point of view of Dorothea’s old sweetheart from Tupelo, who croons, “You got shiny friends since you left town / a tiny screen’s the only place I see you now.”
Some fans are convinced the song is based on Swift’s longtime BFF Selena Gomez, pointing out that like Dorothea, the “Lose You to Love Me” singer got her start as a child star and pageant queen. Gomez has also named “The Wizard of Oz” — a film whose protagonist just so happens to be named Dorothy — as her favorite movie.
Marjorie
“Marjorie,” the 11th song listed on Swift’s latest release, is the first name of the “Cardigan” crooner’s late grandmother, Marjorie Finlay. In her message to fans, the star mentioned a track “starring my grandmother, Marjorie, who still visits me sometimes… if only in my dreams.”
Mom to Swift’s mother, Andrea, Finlay was an opera singer and has been credited for inspiring her to pursue music, one fan pointed out on Twitter. She died on June 1, 2003, in Taylor’s hometown of Reading, Pennsylvania.
A poignant tribute to the star’s grandmother and the life lessons she imparted, “Marjorie” even features backing vocals from Finlay, making lyrics like “And if I didn’t know better / I’d think you were singing to me now” all the more moving.
During her YouTube Q&A, Swift called out lyrics from this song — based on advice her grandmother once offered — as her current favorites from the album: “Never be so kind, you forget to be kind / Never be so clever, you forget to be kind.”