Seven or epiphany... ummmmm... I’ll settle for epiphany. My predictions have not been on point though :lol:

what you guys thinking just missed the top 5?!

epiphany.

Loool at me having the second lowest average given even though I thought this was a great album. At least we have RFC out here being even harsher than me! :lol:

 

Curious to know if my 3 for 'betty' single-handedly caused it to finish lower than it would have if I hadn't rated - I was thinking that giving such a low score to one song might be quite influential when so many people were handing out high scores to every single song :magic:

 

These results have mostly been pretty good, obvz 'betty' is a bit high for my tastes but I can see why it's appealed more to others, it's just not for me. 'mad woman' was done a bit dirty though and 'the 1' has also come out just a little overrated here xx but aside from those I can't really complain, all of the remaining songs were among my favourites! (in fact they are the exact 6 songs that made my personal chart though I presume they won't be in the same order)

 

'epiphany' best not be the one missing the top 5 though xx (I'm gonna predict it'll be 'seven').

Seven or epiphany... ummmmm... I’ll settle for epiphany. My predictions have not been on point though :lol:

epiphany.

'epiphany' best not be the one missing the top 5 though xx (I'm gonna predict it'll be 'seven').

one of you is right x (the answer is coming in the next 5 mins! x)

Curious to know if my 3 for 'betty' single-handedly caused it to finish lower than it would have if I hadn't rated - I was thinking that giving such a low score to one song might be quite influential when so many people were handing out high scores to every single song :magic:

 

I just checked and it would've finished 8th instead of 9th! (the average becomes a lot higher but in terms of position its just marginally, it would've had an average of 8.75, which just beats TIMT of 8.72)

 

'passed down like folk songs, our love lasts so long'

 

 

06. seven // 8.90

 

scream ferociously: HausOfGhibli, Jade [11], LJ Jord 7, MrAndrewMan, No Sleeep, ...Ready For It, UltraFolklore [10], Billy, John-James [9.5]

I hit my peak at seven: Dandy*, HarryEzra [7]

 

The song commentary:

seven is the 7th track on folklore (ofc, how could it not be) and is one of the most well regarded songs on the album and has held pretty well on streaming in accordance with its tracksuit placement! seven is another Aaron Dessner produced track and this peaked at 35 on the Hot 100, becoming another top 40 hit for Taylor! <3

seven is a folklore about a childhood friend who is hinted at having an unhappy life at home. Taylor presents the perspective of a friend of this childhood friend, exploring childhood innocence and how children try to solve unsolvable problems. the song's childhood theme feels like a darker reminiscence of It's Nice To Have A Friend. Aaron Dessner said this was the second song him + Taylor wrote and also said: 't’s kind of looking back at childhood and those childhood feelings, recounting memories and memorializing them. It’s this beautiful folk song. It has one of the most important lines on the record: “And just like a folk song, our love will be passed on.” That’s what this album is doing. It’s passing down. It’s memorializing love, childhood, and memories. It’s a folkloric way of processing.' Taylor's vocal delivery on this track has also been highly praised and the folklore theme of the album is highly prevalent in this song. the opening line of the song contains 'in the trees', which is ofc the name of the standard CD for folklore! (in the weeds is also one of the collector editions). The trees also evoke Wildest Dreams imagery & future classic Christmas Tree Farm. Explaining how the album came to be, Swift revealed that “it started with imagery. Visuals that popped into my mind and piqued my curiosity.” One of those images being “the tree swing in the woods of my childhood.” The first verse can be interpreted both literally and metaphorically that this is the most at-ease Swift felt at this age. Some people have also interpreted hitting the peak at seven as being about her new-found confidence during the lover era. (idk if I agree with that though). There's also a reference to Pennsylvania where Taylor was born. The song also delves into folklore by playing on the childhood rhyme cross my heart & hope to die and the origins of the memories with the girl are blurred but her love for her childhood friend remains. This can be seen as that the origins of folk tales may be lost to history but these stories impact our lives & become part of us! and the chorus ends with the biggest allusion to the embodiment of the album folklore with 'passed down like folk songs / the love lasts so long'. The 2nd verse is when the song gets darker as Taylor's childhood innocence is mixed with the dark reality of the illusion that the friend's father is taking his anger out on the friend, and there's domestic violence occurring. Swift's role as the friend in this song takes on a childhood/motherly role in assuring her friend everything will be fine and giving solutions. The pirates reference is something Taylor has touched upon in The Best Day. The final verse continue to show Swift's innocence & burning desire to leave and help the friend, by moving to India and only taking two items. This song is so amazing ahh.

seven is such a fabulous song and Taylor's vocals on this are AMAZING. It's one of my fave vocals of hers on a song ever, it just works so well with the tone. From a lyrical perspective its also fantastic, I love the full folklore here and the way the lyrics can be interpreted so much darker than they originally appear. This was actually my favourite song on the first listen to the album (it really stands out!), but dropped to 2nd by my 2nd listen and now I'd say its 4th for me (tho my 4-7 section rn is so close). Definitely one of my favourites tho and a song I keep going back to <3

 

Omg and whilst doing my lyrical commentary I'm full on having a stan freakout. She says 'love you to the moon and to Saturn', which references children's bedtime story Guess How Much I Love You which was my absolute FAVOURITE childhood story growing up :heart: :heart: and Taylor stretches the original quote with 'and to Saturn' and I always used to add a further place than the moon when I was younger too omg. suddenly this has cemented it's place as 4th x

 

The rate commentary:

and onto 6th place, we have seven just missing out on 7th!! seven is ofc the 7th track on the album, however there's no seven's in its verge with an incredible 8.9 score, just a bit shy of a top 5 finish! Seven is the 2nd song to depart which received two 11's (from Haus and Jade), whilst picking up a similar amount of 10's and 9,5's to the 1! seven also got barely any low scores, with its low scores being 2 seven's, fittingly. this was top 5 for most of the rate but the two 7's came in the last two rates which meant it fell out!! It's a shame this missed a 9+ average but still fabulous *.* seven was seen by many as an immediate standout and I did think it would make the top 5 here!

 

top 5 coming in the next two days, we're nearly there! predict away! (imma see how y'all done with predictions so far + post the top 5 under this! x)

So your top 5 is:

august

cardigan

epiphany

exile (ft. Bon Iver)

the last great american dynasty

 

Which song are you guys rooting for to win? 5th and 4th coming tomorrow!

 

(oops for quadruple posts x)

'seven' should be top 5 minimum :cry: rooting for 'epiphany' to win out of those left!

cardigan to win.

Ah I should have stuck with seven as my prediction lol :unsure: :lol:

 

Okay so I’ll stick with my original hope of Epiphany for the win.

 

Despite my terrible predictions up until this point, the top 5 is as I predicted so I’ll stick with the order I predicted previously:

5 - epiphany

4 - august

3 - last great American dynasty

2 - cardigan

1 - exile

 

Looking forward to seeing the results !

P R E D I C T:

exile (ft. Bon Iver)

cardigan

epiphany

august

the last great american dynasty

 

---

 

W A N T:

exile (ft. Bon Iver)

epiphany

august

cardigan

the last great american dynasty

 

Solid top 5. But I'd swap out cardigan and the last great american dynasty for this is me trying and Betty.

for fun, here's how y'all that predicted the top 10 are doing so far! <3

 

Cremey 3/5

Jade 1/5

...Ready For It 1/3

Ansel 0/5 (been co close with so many!!)

London81 0/5 (at least you've had 1 correct with what you wanted aha!!)

 

omg the way I thought everyone was getting everything right until I did this ahaha!! we love to see it *.* (I probs would've got 0 or 1 if I didn't know the results :lol:)

 

#5 is incoming within the next hour, and I can reveal it's the closest race between 2 spots in the entire rate. who is 5th :o

Haha yeah my predictions started off well but tailed off a bit :’)

 

I’m thinking top 5:

01 exile

02 cardigan

03 august

04 the last great american dynasty

05 epiphany

 

Feel like that must be the top two but I’m not sure about 3-5...

 

What I’d want:

01 august

02 exile

03 cardigan

04 epiphany

05 the last great american dynasty

 

 

'the last great american dynasty' has really outdone my expectations!

'I had a marvellous time ruining everything'

 

 

05. the last great american dynasty // 9.00

 

stole his dog and dyed it key lime green: Ansel, Billy, LmLou, SKOB [11], London81, Nina West, ...Ready For It, UltraFolklore [10]

Bitch Pack friends from the city: LJ Jord 7, RabbitFurCoat [7]

 

The song commentary:

the last great american dynasty is the 3rd track on folklore and is another one of the most well regarded songs on the album and has held the 4th best on streaming globally as many people keep going back to this track! the last great american dynasty is another Aaron Dessner produced track and his 4th highest here and this peaked at Taylor's fave number 13 on the Hot 100, becoming another top 20 hit for Taylor! <3 It's a shame this didn't go top 10 in America but at least we got a 13 peak if it had to miss *.*

the last great american dynasty is another clear example of folklore on the album as the story follows the life of Rebekah Harkness, a patron of the arts and the previous owner of Taylor's Rhode Island mansion which she bought in 2015. Taylor compares her life there to the days of the Holiday house during Harkness' time there and also explores how Rebekah & Taylor are both targets of harsh criticism. the style of the song differs to most of the album as it follows Taylor's more poppier tendencies such as transitioining to a higher octave at the end of the song, whilst also having elements of folk music in it. The first verse introduces us to the story straight away to Rebekah's narrative. Rebekah grew up in an emotionally frigid family and Bill is the hair to Standard Oil, which made Rebekah one of the richest people in America whilst dealing with old money snobs (gauche wedding, new money) which was v. typical of the time period (hi the great Gatsby). This foreshadows from the beginning the game of society was rigged against Rebekah's favour. Bill died of a heart attack and Rebekah is blamed for his death here, showing the sexist attitudes Rebekah is subjugated to in this period. This is emphasised in the chorus through the titular lyric as the society find it easier to Pina ll the blame on here as she's an easy target as an unconventional woman during this period. Rebekah's experiences parallels the sexism Taylor has received. There's also a nod to track 12 mad woman with 'there goes the maddest women', once again commenting on the patriarchy condemning and judging women. The 2nd verse references the Bitch Pack, which was Rebekah's self-named squad of female friends that took delight at subverting high society events, again a link can be created here to the squad and the use of Bitch shows the sexist overtones detractors exude and how they are claiming this word. the pool with champagne is reminiscent of this is why we can't have nice things and this was an anecdote from Rebekah's life! Rebekah was known for being a dance patron & being friends with Dali, explaining more of the references throughout the song! The bridge is also incredible. The fab lyric of 'she stole his dog and dyed it key lime green' is really clever. In actuality Rebekah stole her neighbours cat and dyed it green, so its insane this is actually true! However Taylor changing it to a dog can be tied to the concept of folklores and how they are passed down, being warped with details changed overtime!!! Damn this lyric is clever I can't with her at times! Taylor bought the house from the previous owners so the Holiday House went under the radar until Taylor's purchase, also emphasising the lyrics. Rebekah's death marked the end of the tales of the debauchery & eccentric parties in the Rhode Island property. The song culminates with the telling message about sexism in society with the change of octave + the change of pronouns to first person to draw a parallel between Taylor & Rebekah. While all of Rebekah’s actions would most likely be praised if she was a man, because she is female, she is looked down as as “mad” and “shameless”. In Rebekah, Taylor finds a compatriot. This shows how women are consistently judged upon in society and once she knows that Rebekah wasn’t doing anything but chasing her happiness, just as herself, Taylor embraces all of the things she was accused and says she had a marvellous time doing what she thought was right, which is how the song wonderfully culminates. Damn I love this song so much, a future classic.

the last great american dynasty is one of my absolute major highlights on the album and I'd probs place it 5th atm so yasss at matching positions again *.* The production on this song is fabulous and it really stands out on the album as one of the fastest moments!! Though the highlight of this song is ofc Taylor's storytelling, this might be my favourite song lyrically. I love a song which tells a story through its lyrics and damn this one does SO well, Rebekah's story is now iconic *.* and omg we need TO TALK ABOUT THAT BRIDGE. whew. one of the best bridges in her career and that's certainly saying something. the production is marvellous during the bridge. and I had a marvellous time ruining everything is probs in my top 5 lyrics on the album, which if u saw how many lyrics I posted in the favourite lyric thread, that means something x A song I keep going back to & one of my faves <3 and the song title is epic ofc.

 

The rate commentary:

kicking off the top 5 we have the fabulous the last great american dynasty, the 3rd track on the album and one of the most popular songs from folklore! TLGAD is the first song to pass a 9.0 average in this rate, hitting that number exactly! I'm not too shocked it came top 5 but what did surprise me is that this picked up the SECOND most 11's in the entire rate!!! I def wouldn't have predicted that, but TLGAD managed four 11's in this rate <3 The song also received a few 10's and is the first song in a while without a 9.5 score!! Once again the lowest scores here are 7's but it received quite a few more 8's than the last couple songs. However all those 11's was enough to secure a top 5 finish!! I'm so glad this made the top 5 <3

 

however in the closest part in this entire rate yet, if the last great american dynasty had one person giving it 0.5 higher than they did, it would've finished 4th!! (it would've won the tie cos of all the 11's). whew we love closeness. 4th will be coming about 5pm and 3rd place in the voters averages around 11pm probs x

for fun, here's how y'all that predicted the top 10 are doing so far! <3

 

Cremey 3/5

Jade 1/5

...Ready For It 1/3

Ansel 0/5 (been co close with so many!!)

London81 0/5 (at least you've had 1 correct with what you wanted aha!!)

 

omg the way I thought everyone was getting everything right until I did this ahaha!! we love to see it *.* (I probs would've got 0 or 1 if I didn't know the results :lol:)

 

#5 is incoming within the next hour, and I can reveal it's the closest race between 2 spots in the entire rate. who is 5th :o

 

Wow :o :lol:

For a few days last week, this song was my favourite and if I’d done the rate then it would have got my eleven. I’ve since moved on and a had a couple more absolute favourites :lol:

I love the last great american dynasty, I think it being sandwiched between cardigan and exile doesn’t help though as they’re both so strong. I almost forget it’s there but when it does come on I love it, if that makes sense? Haha. Looove the whole story behind it, definitely one of my favourites lyrically.

My predictions are all messed up.

number 4 is coming in the next hour, let's get onto a new page before that :cheer: