“Are you not entertained?”
Taylor Swift has been named Time’s Person of the Year. The reveal was announced Wednesday, with a full cover spread of the “Bejeweled” singer.
The musician has had a stellar year (and career) — taking her mega-successful Eras Tour international and generating $100 million in Spotify streaming revenue for 2023.
Her relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce has also been making headlines since September, of course. She’s cheered on the athlete at multiple games, the two made cameos on “Saturday Night Live” on Oct. 14 and she publicly sealed their relationship with a kiss when she ran into his arms at one of her recent Argentina shows.
In fact, the two began dating long before the Sept. 24 Chiefs-Bears game she attended.
“By the time I went to that first game, we were a couple,” she revealed in her Time interview. “Football is awesome, it turns out. I’ve been missing out my whole life.”
The couple first connected after Kelce dropped her name on his podcast, “New Heights With Jason and Travis Kelce.”
“This all started when Travis very adorably put me on blast on his podcast, which I thought was metal as hell. We started hanging out right after that. So we actually had a significant amount of time that no one knew, which I’m grateful for, because we got to get to know each other,” she said. “I think some people think that they saw our first date at that game? We would never be psychotic enough to hard launch a first date. When you say a relationship is public, that means I’m going to see him do what he loves, we’re showing up for each other, other people are there and we don’t care. The opposite of that is you have to go to an extreme amount of effort to make sure no one knows that you’re seeing someone. And we’re just proud of each other.”
But professionally, Swift continues to be a powerhouse. And the empire she’s built is estimated to be worth $1 billion.
“I’ve been raised up and down the flagpole of public opinion so many times in the last 20 years. I’ve been given a tiara, then had it taken away,” she said in the interview. “It feels like the breakthrough moment of my career, happening at 33. And for the first time in my life, I was mentally tough enough to take what comes with that.”
For Swift, it’s been a peak year — with fans sharing friendship bracelets at her concerts and attending her “Eras Tour” film, too.
“This is the proudest and happiest I’ve ever felt, and the most creatively fulfilled and free I’ve ever been. Ultimately, we can convolute it all we want, or try to overcomplicate it, but there’s only one question,” she added. “Are you not entertained?”
Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s relationship: Here’s the inside scoop
The singer’s Swifties fanbase is so die-hard that Ticketmaster crashed when tickets for her tour went on sale last year. Although 4.1 million tickets were sold — with 2 million on the first day — and scalpers tried to sell the tickets on secondary market for up to $22,000.
“I knew this tour was harder than anything I’d ever done before by a long shot,” Swift told Time. She previously trained “like a frat guy,” but this time trained six months ahead of the first show.
“Every day I would run on the treadmill, singing the entire set list out loud. Fast for fast songs, and a jog or a fast walk for slow songs,” she said. “Then I had three months of dance training, because I wanted to get it in my bones. I wanted to be so over-rehearsed that I could be silly with the fans, and not lose my train of thought.”
“Learning choreography is not my strong suit,” she adds. She even stopped drinking — minus that “hilarious” Grammys night where she was filmed dancing and singing to Demi Lovato performing, which went viral. “Doing that show with a hangover, I don’t want to know that world.”
After a concert, Swift sticks to her bedroom to rest.
“I do not leave my bed except to get food and take it back to my bed and eat it there. It’s a dream scenario. I can barely speak because I’ve been singing for three shows straight,” she revealed. “Every time I take a step my feet go crunch, crunch, crunch from dancing in heels. I know I’m going on that stage whether I’m sick, injured, heartbroken, uncomfortable or stressed.”
She added: “That’s part of my identity as a human being now. If someone buys a ticket to my show, I’m going to play it unless we have some sort of force majeure.”
Swift also reflected on re-recording her albums [tagging them “(Taylor’s Version)”] after Big Machine Records founder Scott Borchetta sold Big Machine and Swift’s catalog to Ithaca Holdings, which wss owned by Scooter Braun at the time.
“I’d run into Kelly Clarkson and she would go, ‘Just redo it,’ ” Swift said. “My dad kept saying it to me, too. I’d look at them and go, ‘How can I possibly do that?’ Nobody wants to redo their homework if on the way to school, the wind blows your book report away.”
“It’s all in how you deal with loss,” she said. “I respond to extreme pain with defiance.”
Despite her huge success, Swift acknowledged that “nothing is permanent.”
“I’m very careful to be grateful every second that I get to be doing this at this level, because I’ve had it taken away from me before,” she told Time. “There is one thing I’ve learned: My response to anything that happens, good or bad, is to keep making things. Keep making art.”
And after being in the public eye since her teens, pushing away any negativity has become a bit easier.
“Over the years, I’ve learned I don’t have the time or bandwidth to get pressed about things that don’t matter. Yes, if I go out to dinner, there’s going to be a whole chaotic situation outside the restaurant. But I still want to go to dinner with my friends,” she said. “Life is short. Have adventures. Me locking myself away in my house for a lot of years — I’ll never get that time back. I’m more trusting now than I was six years ago.”