Finding Her Way Through the Dark: What Taylor Swift’s ‘evermore’ Really Means

While others spent the pandemic baking bread, Taylor Swift made surrealist folklore. She used cabin-in-the-woods mysticism to echo her life, resulting in a warm and cozy song collection connecting the “Cruel Summer” star with wintry indie giants The National and Bon Iver. 

Noah Kahan praised Swift’s albums folklore and evermore for bringing alt-folk to the mainstream. Swift’s album pair paved the way for Kahan’s blend of Paul Simon and Mumford & Sons folk-pop, resulting in his 2023 Grammy nomination for Best New Artist. 

Is It Getting Better?

Swift wrote “evermore” about her depression. The U.S. 2020 presidential election and anxiety over the pandemic left most people on edge, and the world’s biggest pop star wasn’t immune to the chaos overwhelming the country.

Gray November

I’ve been down since July

Motion capture

Put me in a bad light

Her cascading anxiety began with the 2016 row with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. West’s song “Famous” controversially suggests he and Swift might have sex. He then raps, “I made that bitch famous.” Swift condemned the song publicly, but Kardashian posted a recording of a call between Swift and West, seemingly exposing her approval of the lyrics. 

I replay my footsteps on each stepping stone

Trying to find the one where I went wrong

Writing letters

Addressed to the fire

Pressure was mounting over increased scrutiny as the media continued to pry into her personal relationships. She was suffocating and spiraling publicly. 

And I was catching my breath

Barefoot in the wildest winter

Catching my death

And I couldn’t be sure

I had a feeling so peculiar

That this pain would be forevermore

Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon wrote “evermore” with Swift and her then-boyfriend Joe Alwyn. It’s the title track to Swift’s companion album to the 2020 release Folklore. Swift’s collaboration with The National’s Aaron Dessner resulted in two collections of indie-cottage folk. Dessner worked from his Long Pond Studio in Hudson Valley, New York creating music for Swift to write to. 

Alwyn, writing under the pseudonym William Bowery, played piano on “evermore.” Dessner explained to Rolling Stone that it was important “because he also wrote the piano part of “Exile,” but on the record, it’s me playing it because we couldn’t record him easily. But this time, we could. I just think it’s an important and special part of the story.”

A Light in the Forest

Swift finds her way through the dark and ends the song positively. She sings, This pain wouldn’t be forevermore. Like most Swift albums, evermore topped the charts. The album broke the single-week vinyl sales record previously held by Jack White’s Lazaretto. White’s album sold 40,000 copies in a week in 2014; Swift sold more than 100,000 copies of evermore in its first week in 2021. 

A Beatle Makes Room

Swift moved the original release date for evermore out of respect for Paul McCartney’s new album, McCartney III. McCartney told Howard Stern he moved his album back one week so Swift could proceed as planned. On December 11, evermore dropped, followed by McCartney III on December 18. 

Eras Tour

Swift launched The Eras Tour last March 17. The tour is a journey, in 10 acts, through her musical eras—evermore is the third segment. It’s the highest-grossing tour in history and the first to gross beyond $1 billion. 

The tour ends December 8, 2024, completing 151 shows through five continents. Swift released a concert film in theaters, selling more than any concert film in history. 

Defying Digital Gravity

In an era of shrinking attention spans and fractured communities, Swift defies all of it by selling out stadiums and movie theaters and breaking album sales records. She has the superpower to turn solitary folk music into stadium anthems. 

Swift also survived Kanye West. Twice. He made headlines wearing the red ball cap, and her colossal album, Red, is famous for a song called “I Knew You Were Trouble.” The song isn’t about West but speaks to the red flags people ignore when trouble approaches. 

West infamously interrupted Swift at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards. He snatched the microphone from her hand and said, “I’m gonna let you finish, but …” But nothing. Taylor Swift has had the last word. 

When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Photo by Frazer Harrison/Getty Images