Taylor Swift performs onstage during “Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour” at Johan Cruijff Arena on July 04, 2024 in Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Carlos Alvarez/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
On today’s (Nov. 27) episode of the Greatest Pop Stars of the 21st Century podcast, we reach No. 2 on our list with an all-time-level pop star, who changed the sound and style of pop and is currently on a run that has absolutely no precedent in the history of the music industry. (Read our No. 2 Greatest Pop Star essay about Taylor Swift here.)
Host Andrew Unterberger is joined by renowned Swiftie (and GPS essay writer) Hannah Dailey and former Taylor Swift cover story author Jason Lipshutz to help remember her singular career and peerless artistry. We start by trying to define both what exactly it is that has made her the biggest pop star in the world for the past few years (if not far longer) and how she has bent music and culture towards her in the process. And yes, we discuss the (spoiler-free) reasons why despite her astounding success and impossibly resonant catalog, we made the very difficult decision to place her at No. 2 — or if you’d rather, 1B — on this list.
Then, we retrace her journey from teenage country sensation to Grammy-winning crossover artist to globe-conquering superstar, while also mentioning the handful of bumps in the road she’s encountered along the way. We also explain why her sonic and promotional left turn in 2020 — and the Taylor’s Versions project she embarked upon shortly after — ended up being two of the most brilliant moves any artist has made this century, and primed her for a commercial run the past three years that we still struggle to wrap our brains around. We end things with a fun game of “Tay or Nay?,” while sharing our favorite Taylor lyrics and deep cuts, and debating the actually hard questions (about some of the unfair demands we place on her as a society) and the fun-hard questions (about whether we really need all 10 minutes of “All Too Well”).
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Check it out above, get acquainted with our past episodes here, and be sure to subscribe to Billboard‘s Greatest Pop Stars of the 21st Century series wherever you get your podcasts! (Our No. 1 episode will be debut next Wednesday (Dec. 4), following the Tuesday publishing of our No. 1 Greatest Pop Star essay on Dec. 3.)