Do you hear that?
It’s the sound of Swifties screaming around the globe after Taylor Swift dropped her latest masterpiece, “The Tortured Poets Department.”
Unveiled to the world on April 19, the album packed a punch and sent fans on a rollercoaster of emotions. Some keen observers believe the album offers intimate glimpses into the hitmaker’s heart and question whether the singer turned her personal tales and fails with romance into tunes, which are now being played across the world.
While Taylor hasn't dropped names in her songs, the internet’s Sherlocks believe there are plenty of breadcrumbs about her past romances in “The Tortured Poets Department” album.
Taylor Swift dropped her new album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” which fans think has hints about her romances with Matty Healy and Joe Alwyn
Image credits: taylorswift
The speculation around her song lyrics has made some wonder whether she is hinting at details of her brief romance with Matty Healy, the frontman of The 1975, in the aftermath of her relationship with actor Joe Alwyn.
Taylor and Matty first sparked romance rumors in 2014. "I met Taylor Swift, that was really nice," he told E! News the same year. "We exchanged numbers. Let's see what happens."
"I mean bloody hell, what am I going to do? Go out with Taylor Swift? She's a sensation, I wouldn't say no," he added.
Fans think Taylor Swift has left plenty of breadcrumbs about her romance with Matty Healy in her song lyrics
Image credits: taylorswift
The very next year, Matty addressed speculation about them dating and said: “It's all bloody fake … There's no relationship or anything happening.”
It was about a decade later when Taylor and Matty appeared to have a short-lived romance in the spring of 2023 after her split from her long-time lover, Joe.
In the song “Guilty as Sin?” from the new album, Taylor sang about having lingering feelings and “fatal fantasies” about a former flame while being in a relationship with someone else.
In the album, Taylor Swift sings about "waltzing back" into rekindled romances, which fans speculate is a reference to how her brief romance with Matty panned out
Image credits: The Image Direct
Some believe the lyrics from the titular track “The Tortured Poets Department” might also be a reference to Matty, as Taylor sings: “You left your typewriter at my apartment / Straight from the Tortured Poets Department / I think some things I never say / Like, ‘Who uses typewriters anyway?’”
Matty spoke about using typewriters in a 2019 interview with GQ. “I really like typewriters as well. I don’t have one with me because that is impractical, but the thing with typewriters and writing with pen to paper, there’s an element of commitment that goes with the ceremony with it,” he told the outlet. “It therefore forces you to concentrate a bit better.”
The lyrics of the song “loml” also appear to be about someone who reappeared in her life after they met as “kids.”
“Who’s gonna stop us from waltzing back into rekindled flames if we know the steps anyway?” she sings in the song.
Taylor Swift and Matty Healy first met in 2014 but also had a brief relationship in 2023. Now, the theme of sparking a romance with an old flame seems to be a recurring one in her new album
Image credits: David M. Benett/Getty Images
Meanwhile, the song “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived” also sounds like a dig at Matty to some fans, as the lyrics speak about a beau leading her on and then disappearing without a trace to ruin her summer.
“It wasn’t sexy once it wasn’t forbidden / I would’ve died for your sins / Instead I just died inside,” she sings. “And you deserve prison but you won’t get time / You’ll slide into inboxes and slip through the bars / You crashed my party and your rental car / You said normal girls were ‘boring’ / But you were gone by the morning.”
Matty, who wears a suit onstage while touring with The 1975 and has spoken publicly about his struggles with substance abuse, may also be the subject of the song’s lyrics about a man in a “Jehovah’s Witness suit” who “tried to buy some pills from a friend of friends of mine.”
By June last year, Taylor and Matty’s romance came to an end, and a source told People that they had split after a tumultuous romance.
"She had fun with him, but it was always casual," the source said. "They are no longer romantically involved."
"They were never boyfriend-girlfriend or exclusive and were always just having fun," another insider told the outlet. "There is no drama, and who knows what could happen again. It was a good time and ran its course."
Fans weren't too happy about Taylor dedicating so many Easter eggs in her album to Matty, who has been accused of misogyny, racism, and antisemitism in the past.
Matty faced backlash after making derogatory comments about women and different ethnic groups in a podcast with hosts Friedland and Nick Mullen. The 1975 frontman spoke about rapper Ice Spice before the group seemed confused about whether she was Hawaiian, Inuit, or Chinese. They also mocked the accents of these ethnicities before Matty later went on to join the hosts in doing impressions of Japanese people working in concentration camps.
Taylor is now good friends with Ice Spice.
Following the release of her latest album, Swifties wondered why she would dedicate so much album space to Matty, with one saying, "All that for an album about Matty Healy."
"The streets are saying Taylor Swift's entire album is about that racist yuck mouth greasy looking Matt Healy.... That's sad," one commented, while another said, "Can conclude #TaylorSwift is about matty healy. Most of it sounds so situationship and short lived relationship. Cant believe this rat that spit on gvf stage can be crucial part of this album."
Fans think the song “So Long, London” may have Easter eggs about her relationship with long-time lover Joe Alwyn
Image credits: Christopher Polk/Getty Images
The album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” also contains a track called “So Long, London,” which could be Taylor’s poignant farewell to a city where she once lived with Joe.
The song’s duration—9 minutes and 28 seconds—subtly hints at the date of September 28, which is also when Taylor and Joe were rumored to have started dating in 2016.
Taylor sings in the song: “Just how low did you think I’d go/Before I’d self implode,” and adds, “Every breath feels like the rarest air/When you’re not sure if he wants to be there.”
In terms of Taylor's digs at her exes, the cherry on top may just be the very title of the new album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” which could have sparked from a revelation Joe made in 2022.
The actor had revealed in an interview that he was part of a WhatsApp chat named “The Tortured Man Club” with actors Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott.
“It hasn’t had much use recently,” Joe said during the interview with Variety, while Paul quipped, “No, I feel like we’re less tortured now.”
Taylor is now in a high-profile relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.
In the song "Fresh Out the Slammer," Taylor sings about breaking free from the constraints of a previous relationship and being ready to explore another connection.
The track talks about being “at the starting line” and “runnin’ back home” to “the one who says I'm the girl of his American dreams.”
It is noteworthy here that both Matty and Joe are British.
Netizens had plenty to say when they began noticing digs at Matty Healy sprinkled across the album
