Taylor Swift’s Return to the Past Turned ‘Midnights’ into Her Biggest Album Yet

Swift’s “Midnights”, while it may have disappointed indie-folk fans of her previous albums, broke several streaming and sales records within its first week. Swift’s tenth studio album is her greatest yet. Swift’s tenth album also set the record for the largest overall week by an equivalent number of album units within four days.

“The results speak for them.” George Howard, Berklee College of Music’s music industry professor, said that she is as popular as ever. She creates such a frenzy among a large number of fans. Swift’s “Reputation”, which Swift released five years ago, was the most successful U.S. album by traditional album sales. It sold 1.216 million copies. This record was broken by “Midnights”, in four days.

ADVERTISEMENT

Swift’s earlier albums were not unremarkable. Swift’s streams have increased over time as streaming has gained more music listener market share. “Red (Taylor’s Version),” broke Spotify’s record for the most streamed album by a female artist in a single day last fall. It reached 90.8 million streams on its release day. Swift’s “Folklore” held the previous record of 78.7M streams. Swift, however, broke her own record with “Midnights”, which reached 185M streams on its release day.

Why is “Midnights”, the pop star’s most successful album, so popular? And why did Swift need to release four more albums in order to break her own record of breaking her own?

Swift announced that her new album, “Midnights”, would be released on Oct. 21. Swift’s next album would likely be another remastering of an old album. Her past two albums were remastered with Fearless (Taylor)” in April 2021, and Red (Taylor)” in November 2021. Swift’s announcement of a new album at an awards ceremony, which she had never done before, caused a lot of buzz around “Midnights.”

Swift also set new standards in many other areas, including her embrace of the past and some best practices from her past.

 Returned to social media with “Swifties”

Swift was out of the public eye for one year after her 2016 dispute with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. Swift stopped making public appearances and also took a hiatus from social media. Fans were shocked to learn that Swift was no longer making public appearances. They had been used to Swift logging on to Tumblr every evening to interact with their fans since the release of “1989.”

Swift’s social media presence was even more diminished before the release of “Reputation”, when she deleted all of her posts and unfollowed everyone. The singer posted a video showing a snake four days later, foreshadowing her soon-to be released album. Swift started posting more frequently after the “Reputation” era ended, but her social media presence was much smaller. Swift’s social media accounts no longer received cat photos, fan conversations and funny comments. Swift’s surprise releases of “Folklore”, and “Evermore,” received very few social media posts.

Swift’s announcement that “Midnights” would be her album led to a shift in the social media stance. Swift didn’t let the VMA surprise depress her in the seven weeks that followed. She posted behind-the scenes looks at the making and release of the album, as well as TikToks showing the track titles. Swift is now posting almost every day and engaging with fans.

Howard stated that Howard is a smart marketer who can keep her fans apart but still make them feel connected by giving clues. It feels like a dialog.

Combining collectibles with vinyl

Swift launched a huge line of merchandise prior to “Midnights”, which boosted sales of an item that is often associated with niche artists than pop stars: vinyl records. There are four colors of vinyl albums available for purchase, each with a different cover and unique disc color. They range from mahogany, blood moon, jade green and mahogany, and cost $30. The back covers create a clock that strikes midnight for those who have all four albums. The “Taylor Swift Midnights Vinyl Clock” can also be assembled and acts as a clock. Swifties are valuable collector’s items.

Swift sold almost 500,000 albums on the day of its release, breaking vinyl album records. This is three times more than Harry Styles’ “Harry’s House”, which was released in the same week. Luminate, an entertainment data company that powers Billboard charts, announced that “Midnights”, the album with the highest sales week since 1991 when it started tracking music sales, is back on a steady upward trend.