Little Miss Perfect
A pencil thin control freak worth £130m, she is adored by young girls (and their dads!). So what’s the truth about...
NEW York, London, Norwich! It’s been a hectic few days for the global pop phenomenon known as Taylor Swift, named as the youngest woman ever to make it onto the prestigious Forbes World’s 100 Most Powerful Women list. The American business magazine praised the 25-year- old’s ‘impressive’ business acumen, record-breaking sales and ‘fantastically honest lyrics’.
With five platinum albums and seven Grammy awards to her name from a nine-year-career, the impish Swift is one of pop music’s highestearning — and hard-headed — stars.
Impressively, Swift writes her own songs and appears to make her own business decisions, dramatically pulling her songs off the music-streaming website Spotify in a protest over how the internet rips off musicians.
But where sweet Miss Swift really excels is in making friends wherever she goes. Especially in Norwich, where she performed at Radio 1’s Big Weekend pop festival eight days ago and heaped so much praise on the city that even the local tourist board must have blushed.
It was ‘great’ to be there, she trilled in a radio interview, listing its ‘greenest grass’, ‘ stone fences’ (whatever they are) and ‘old little church graveyards’ as her personal highlights.
And just look at all the stars — supermodels Cindy Crawford, Karlie Kloss and Cara Delevingne — who lined up to appear in her latest music video, an action-packed number called Bad Blood, which has been watched 90 million times on YouTube.
Almost everyone, it seems, finds something to like about this slim and smiley, 5ft 10in blonde. The ‘ Taylor Nation’ — as her fan base is known — encompasses all ages.
Teenage girls hear the lyrics about her romantic break-ups and see her chatting with fans on social media, sometimes even inviting them to parties or sending them presents. They believe Swift is a girl just like them.
Meanwhile, young boys can dance along to the horribly catchy tunes and secretly admire a singer whose Disney princess looks say ‘ sweet big sister’ rather than ‘scary sex vamp’.
As for grown men, well, you rarely see a photo of Swift that crops her endless legs out of the shot.
However, there’s an attention to detail in her masterful PR and determination to conquer hearts that can be unnerving. Despite recently claiming in an interview that being a superstar and touring the world is ‘not hard at all’, you shouldn’t believe a word.
Sweet, but — say insiders — painfully neurotic in person, Swift is a workaholic control freak who leaves nothing to chance if it might get in the way of world pop domination.
She certainly has fans in high places — two years ago, Prince William took part in a karaoke singalong with her (pictured below) and rocker Jon Bon Jovi during a charity gala at Kensington Palace.
So, what’s next for Little Miss Perfect? She may have shocked some fans after it emerged she got the raunchy pink Latex dress she wore in the Bad Blood video from a sex shop. As her fans mature with her, is Swift looking to spice up her image?
She seems far too clever to become sleazy — as old friend Miley Cyrus has done — but a backlash to her success is surely around the corner. And when it comes, she’s sure to pour her heart out in a song or two about it.
FAIRY-TALE CHILDHOOD
Taylor Swift clawed her way to the top with immense focus and drive — plus a little help from her wealthy, devoted parents. They worked in finance and gave her an androgynous name they thought would help her climb the corporate ladder.
She grew up in rural Pennsylvania, where the family lived with seven horses on a Christmas tree farm.
Swift went to Bible- study camp every summer and during a time when she was home-schooled, she finished two years’ worth of course work in just 12 months.
SONGS OF REVENGE AND HEARTBREAK
CREDITED as the writer or co-writer of her big hits, there’s no denying her talent, though her singing voice is nothing special.
She shook off her country and western roots — along with her old trademark sundress and cowboy boots — with her most recent album, 1989 (the year of her birth), released in october.
It sold more copies in its opening week than any album for 12 years, making her the first performer in pop history to have three albums sell more than a million copies in a week.
Swift is famous for writing songs about her experiences. That used to mean failed romances — hence hits such as We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together and I Knew You Were Trouble. Bad Blood, her new single, is a dig at pop rival, Katy Perry, whom Swift has not forgiven for poach
ing her dancers.
INTERNET QUEEN
SHE’S the ultimate mus i c industry expert at harnessing the power of the web, creating light-hearted, self- deprecating music videos that become huge hits on YouTube. This then powers the songs up the charts.
Swift’s mastery of Instagram and Twitter (where she has 58 million followers) is crucial to her success.
She responds randomly to fans, treating them like friends, speaking their language and sharing the most
inane details of life with her famous friends. When a fan messaged her that he was being bullied at school, she wrote back with advice.
A typical Swift tweet? ‘Walked into my dressing room and there was this little bowl of candy in there. Literally shrieked with excitement. Need to tone it down.’ Cynics will wonder if a performer who earns £65 million a year is ever excited by a bowl of sweets.
There’s one internet site, however, that Swift has no time for — Spotify, the music-streaming service which allows millions of users to listen to music for free. Last year, Swift took all her tracks off the site, insisting artists should be paid for their work.
IS SHE TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE?
Asked at the age of 19 if she had ever had a cigarette or an alcoholic drink, she said: ‘I have no interest in drinking. I want to be responsible for the things I say and do.’
She says she considers it her ‘responsibility’ to be aware of her influence on young people.
Inevitably, some have wondered
if Swift is too good to be true. The answer, insiders insist, is no. However, there some discrepancies in her squeakyclean image.
Last year, for instance, she writhed around in a wet T-shirt for a photo shoot for Rolling Stone magazine.
At the same time, she complained to the publication that paparazzi might try to snap pictures of her naked in her bedroom.
As for her preference for skimpy outfits in her videos and on the red carpet, she’s not averse to trading on her sex appeal.
DIGGING DEEP FOR CHARITIES
Could Taylor Swift be any more perfect? Yes, just talk to the myriad charities she supports.
She has donated money to child literacy campaigns, victims of natural disasters, services to sick children and art education.
In 2012, American First Lady Michelle obama presented her with The Big Help Award for her ‘dedication to helping others’.
The Robert F. kennedy Centre for Justice and Human Rights also honoure honoured her, describing Swift as ‘just the kind of woman we want our daug daughters to be’.
TINY ON JUST 500 CALORIES A DAY
Since b becoming a superstar, she has become progressively skinnier, with fans and nutritionists expressing alarm on social media about her tiny frame. experts estimate she weighs little over 8st. A gluten-free diet increasingly popular among celebrities may be at least partly responsible. Recently, Swift and boyfriend Calvin Harris were spotted in a gluten-free pizzeria in New York. She has started visiting the New York gym set up by celebrity trainer Tracy Anderson, who encourages an extreme diet that involves consuming as few as 500 calories a day and exercising for an hour every day.
BE HER BEST FRIEND
You won’t see pictures of the clean-living Swift staggering unsteadily out of a nightclub at 4am. She has so far avoided any drink, drugs or sex video scandal that have tainted so many of her pop princess peers.
But it’s not that she’s a goody-two- shoes, say her friends, she’s just incredibly mature for her age.
Swift’s many famous BBFs (bestest best friends) are always talking about how she gives them the best advice.
‘She is perfect and nice and never says anything mean,’ gushes her model friend karlie kloss.
Tales are legion — and, of course, eternally circulated on the web — of her kindness and generosity to fans, inviting those in the cheapest seats at her sell-out concerts to her aftershow parties or even having a fortunate few teenagers round to her house for an afternoon of baking cupcakes.