Worldwide music superstar Taylor Swift revealed that celebrity isn’t all its cracked up to be, calling her fame “complicated’ in the August issue of Harper’s BAZAAR .
The singer may have gained fame and fortune since she first burst onto the music scene more than 10 years ago, but looking inward, Swift remarked that there is still one thing about her job that she calls “the purest thing.” Said Swift of her celebrity to the magazine that it can get “complicated on every other level,” but she finds songwriting the same “uncomplicated” process it was when she was a teenager and at the beginning of her career.
As a songwriter, Swift noted that she calls the lyrics and music that made her a household name as “clouds of an idea that land in front of your face.” Although it sounds simple enough, she noted to the publication that the entire process is a learned experience.
“A lot of songwriting is things you learn, structure, and cultivating that skill, and knowing how to craft a song,” she said in the interview. While the process can seem daunting, there are times, the Grammy-award winning entertainer can attest, that magic happens when you least expect it, calling these times “mystical, magical moments, inexplicable moments” when a song idea that is fully formed “pops” into your head.
Swift, who’s currently on her “Reputation Stadium Tour,” continues to remain vulnerable in her approach to songwriting, drawing inspiration from both the experiences and people who touch her life.
“I don’t know what it is that makes some people really creatively inspiring,” she muses. “There have been people I’ve spent a lot of time with who I just couldn’t write about. It’s just that some people come into your life and they have this effect on you.”
The Harper’s BAZAAR interview was a twist on the normal Swift-speak, with the singer and songwriter taking the reins and asking questions instead of answering. She interviewed musical muse Pattie Boyd, who was married to both George Harrison and Eric Clapton and was the inspiration for two of rock music’s most iconic love songs, “Something” by The Beatles and “Layla” by Derek and the Dominoes.
In the piece, Swift prodded Boyd on the power of being a woman whose life has been deeply influenced by songs and songwriting, calling her a muse, to which Boyd responded, “The artist absorbs an element from their muse that has nothing to do with words, just the purity of their essence.”