“Folklore” is the a new surprise album by Taylor Swift. It is, overall, her eighth album of her career.
The album has garnered rave reviews from critics and fans. So let’s dive into some trivia and facts about this surprise release.
- Folklore is the eighth studio album by American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift
- The album title is stylized in all lowercase
- The album was released on July 24, 2020, through Republic Records
- A surprise album, announced without pre-release promotional campaigns
- Folklore was written and recorded while Swift was in isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic
- Musically, the album eschews the upbeat electropop sound of its predecessor for stripped-down, acoustic tunes driven by piano and guitar
- Folklore features producers Aaron Dessner and Jack Antonoff
- It is categorized by mainstream reviewers as an indie folk, alternative rock, electro-folk, and chamber pop record
- The album portrays what Swift called “a collection of songs and stories that flowed like a stream of consciousness” rising out of her imagination
- It manifests vivid storytelling from third-person narratives that details heartbreak and retrospection
- “Cardigan” was released as the lead single from the album on July 27, 2020
- “Exile”, featuring American indie folk band Bon Iver, and “Betty” are scheduled to be the second and third singles, respectively
- Folklore received widespread critical acclaim, with emphasis on its sonic coherence, relaxed atmosphere, and lyrics based on fictional narratives
- It broke numerous streaming records upon release
- These records include a registered Guinness World Record for the biggest opening day for an album by a female artist on Spotify
- The album sold two million copies in its first week globally
- 1.3 million albums were sold on its first day
- In the United States, it moved more than 500,000 units within its first three days
- This marks the biggest debut week of 2020 in the country
- Folklore marked the first time Swift strayed away from a traditional album rollout, instead opting to release the album suddenly
- Swift first announced the album on her social media, 16 hours prior to its release
- It was released to all digital music platforms at midnight on July 24, 2020
- Eight limited-edition deluxe CDs and vinyls were also made available during the first week only, all of which featured different cover artwork and photos
- The CDs are scheduled to be released on August 7, 2020
- In addition, Swift sent replicas of the cardigan she wore in the music video for “Cardigan” to celebrity friends and supporters
- Some of them are Jennifer Hudson, Kesha, Troye Sivan, Tan France, Martha Hunt, Jonathan Van Ness, Loren Gray, and Kobe Bryant’s daughter Natalia
- Folklore generated three singles, with “Cardigan” serving as the lead single
- Its release was accompanied by a music video directed by Swift and produced by Jil Hardin on July 24, 2020
- The music video was released on YouTube alongside the album and lyric videos for each track
- It was serviced to pop and adult pop radio stations on July 27
- The same day, limited edition versions in digital, CD, 7-inch vinyl, and 12-inch vinyl formats were released for purchase on Swift’s official website
- The voice memo that Swift originally sent to Dessner on April 27, 2020 after receiving his instrumental tracks for what would become “Cardigan” was included in the limited edition single
- In this voice memo Swift describes her songwriting process and sings alternate lyrics a cappella over the track
- Folklore received widespread critical acclaim for its sonic coherence and Americana-inspired poetic lyricism
- At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received a weighted average score of 89
- Based on 24 reviews
- Indicating “universal acclaim”
- It is the highest score for any of Swift’s albums
- On the US Spotify chart, Folklore accumulated over 44 million streams in its first day
- Thus surpassing Ariana Grande’s previous record of 31 million for Thank U, Next
- The album’s 16 tracks occupied the top 16 spots
- “The 1” placed first with 4.175 million streams
- Thus setting a record for the biggest first-day song debut by a female artist
- The album’s tracks occupied the entire top five of the US Apple Music chart and the top eight globally
- The album also set the Amazon Music indie and alternative genre streaming record both worldwide and in the US
- Meanwhile, on-demand streams for Folklore surpassed 72 million in the US on its first day
- Surpassing the 44.3 million total of its predecessor Lover (2019)
- Also, breaking the female record formerly held by Thank U, Next (55.9 million streams)
- Folklore is the first album since Swift’s own Lover to move at least 500,000 units in one week
- The eighth album extending Swift’s record as the female artist with the most albums debuting with over 500,000 sales in the US
- Each of her studio albums, except her self-titled first album, have surpassed the half-million debut threshold
- In its opening week on Spotify, Folklore was streamed more than 166.2 million times in the US
- Marking the biggest domestic streaming debut week for an album by a female artist
- This is second only to Thank U, Next’s 166.4 million streams
- Tracks from Folklore debuted on the US Spotify weekly chart occupying the entire top 10
- This made Swift the first female and second act overall (after Drake) to achieve this feat
- In the United Kingdom, Folklore debuted atop the Official Albums Chart
- Selling 37,000 copies and surpassing Eminem’s Music To Be Murdered By for the biggest digital sales week of 2020 in the country
- It became Swift’s fifth consecutive number-one album in the UK
- Making her one of only five female artists to score at least five chart-toppers in the country, following Madonna, Kylie Minogue, Barbra Streisand and Celine Dion
- On the UK Singles Chart, “Cardigan”, “Exile”, and “The 1” opened at numbers six, eight and ten, respectively
- Swift has a total of sixteen UK top-ten hits
- This made her the first woman in UK history to debut three top-ten songs simultaneously
- In Ireland, Folklore debuted at number-one
- Scoring the country’s biggest opening week of 2020
- The album outperformed the rest of the top five combined
- Swift became the first female solo artist to chart five number-one albums in Ireland in the twenty-first century
- The tracks “Exile”, “Cardigan” and “The 1” debuted at the third, fourth and seventh spots on the Irish Singles Chart, respectively
- With that Swift’s career total top-ten hits in the country is fifteen
- Folklore debuted at number one in Belgium and Norway
- It also debuted in the top five in the Netherlands, Scotland, Sweden, and Lithuania
- And in the top ten in Germany, Italy, and Japan
- In China, the album sold nearly 720,000 copies in its first week
- Immediately became the best-selling western female album of the year
- In Australia, Folklore debuted at number one on the ARIA Albums Chart
- It was Swift’s sixth album to do so
- Giving her more chart-toppers in the country than any other artist between 2010 and 2020
- Moreover, each of the album’s sixteen tracks entered the top 50 of the ARIA Singles Chart
- Breaking the all-time record for the most simultaneous debuts in one week
- “Cardigan” became Swift’s sixth Australian number-one hit
- “Exile”, “The 1”, “The Last Great American Dynasty” and “My Tears Ricochet” entered the top-ten
- This made Folklore Swift’s first album since 1989 (2014) to earn five top-ten hits in Australia
- And Swift the artist with the most top-ten hits of 2020 in Australia thus far
- In New Zealand, Folklore opened at number one
- “Cardigan”, “Exile”, and “The 1” charted in the top ten of the New Zealand singles chart
- “The Last Great American Dynasty” placed thirteenth in New Zealand singles chart
- Folklore amassed over 80.6 million streams on Spotify within its first day of release
- Thus arning a Guinness World Record for the most opening-day streams for an album by a female artist
- The streaming numbers on Spotify are second overall to Drake’s Scorpion
- It also surpassed Juice Wrld’s Legends Never Die for the biggest streaming debut of 2020
- Globally, the album’s tracks claimed eight of the top 10 spots on Spotify
- There “Cardigan” debuted at number one with 7.742 million streams
- This is the most single-day streams for a song in 2020 thus far
- Folklore also broke the Apple Music record for the most-streamed pop album within 24 hours, with 35.47 million streams
- In its opening week on Spotify, Folklore was streamed more than 329.1 million times worldwide
- Globally, this marked the platform’s biggest opening week of 2020
- It is also the second-biggest streaming week for an album by a female artist in history, after Thank U, Next (375 million streams)
- Republic Records reported that the album’s first-week audio and video streams exceed totals of 500 million
- Hugh McIntyre of Forbes noted how Folklore seemed to be “outperforming” its predecessor Lover in its first week despite having no pre-released singles with several tracks from Folklore accumulating bigger streaming totals than any of the campaigned, “intensely-hyped” singles from Lover
- Music critic Tom Hull said that, “judging from download counts and reviews”, Swift has “caught the spirit of the times” with Folklore’s “long, pleasant, intricate songs”
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