'23 WAS TAYLOR 'TIME'
Take cover! Swift scores historic Person of the Year
Is there anything Taylor Swift can’t do?
Besides headlining the topgrossing tour of 2023 and enticing millions of her fans to tune into football games just for a glimpse of her, the pop star has become the first artist in Time magazine’s 96-year history to be named Person of the Year for their success as an entertainer.
“She’s the last monoculture left in our stratified world,” Time says. “This was the year she perfected her craft — not just with her music, but in her position as the master storyteller of the modern era.”
But of course, what everyone wants to know about is Swift’s relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.
“This all started when Travis very adorably put me on blast on his podcast, which I thought was metal as hell,” Swift told the magazine. “We started hanging out right after that. So we actually had a significant amount of time that no one knew, which I’m grateful for, because we got to get to know each other.
“By the time I went to that first game, we were a couple. I think some people think that they saw our first date at that game? We would never be psychotic enough to hard launch a first date.”
She’s cheer captain
As for all the attention she’s brought to the sport among people who might not normally watch, Swift insists: “I’m just there to support Travis. I have no awareness of if I’m being shown too much and pissing off a few dads, Brads and Chads,” she says.
“Football is awesome, it turns out . . . I’ve been missing out my whole life.”
On the topic of her career, Swift talked about how she changes up her persona for almost every album for a different “era.”
“I realized every record label was actively working to try to replace me,” she says. “I thought instead, I’d replace myself first with a new me. It’s harder to hit a moving target.”
Taylor said the success of this year came after finding “harmony” after two “horrendous things that happened to me.”
The first was a feud with Kim Kardashian and Kanye West, who tried to turn public opinion against her using what Swift says was “an illegally recorded phone call, which Kim edited and then put out to say to everyone that I was a liar.”
The second was manager Scooter Braun — “someone who hates me” — buying her music catalog out from under her.
Swift responded by re-recording her own albums, which sold like gangbusters, undercut Braun’s investment and set up this year’s tour.
World tour de force
Not that Swift is taking a victory lap. “I’ve . . . learned there’s no point in actively trying to quote unquote defeat your enemies. Trash takes itself out every single time.”
Concerts on the Eras Tour included 44 songs and 16 different costume changes. Swift trained for three months to get the dancing right.
Fans “had to work really hard to get the tickets,” she says.
“I wanted to play a show that was longer than they ever thought it would be, because that makes me feel good leaving the stadium.”
The whole process requires a day of recovery.
“I do not leave my bed except to get food and take it back to my bed and eat it there,” she says.
“It’s a dream scenario. I can barely speak because I’ve been singing for three shows straight. Every time I take a step, my feet go crunch, crunch, crunch from dancing in heels.”
Time’s Person of the Year issue will hit newsstands Dec. 15, two days after Swift’s 34th birthday.