New Taylor Swift album a story of sleepless nights

NEW YORK • Late on Sunday, American singer Taylor Swift announced her 10th studio album, Midnights, to be released on Oct 21, which she described on social media as "the story of 13 sleepless nights scattered throughout my life".

"This is a collection of music written in the middle of the night, a journey through terrors and sweet dreams," the 32-year-old added. "The floors we pace and the demons we face."

An image posted to Instagram shows Swift posed at a table in dim light, resting her head in one hand and holding the receiver of a landline phone in the other.

Midnights, which Swift began selling through pre-orders on her website - available on vinyl and CD, as well as on cassette and download - will be the singer's fifth album in just over two years.

In 2020, she released a pair of LPs recorded in quarantine, Folklore and Evermore. Folklore, which arrived in July 2020, won the Grammy for Album of the Year. And last year came Fearless (Taylor's Version) and Red (Taylor's Version), the first of her planned series of re-recorded simulacra of her old albums.

There has been a buzz about a possible new version of 1989, her pop breakthrough from 2014, especially since a new take on Bad Blood from that album was used in the soundtrack to DC League Of Super-Pets, a new animated comedy film.

Midnights will come too late to qualify for the next Grammy Awards as the eligibility window for the 65th annual ceremony closes on Sept 30.

But it has a strong possibility of becoming one of the year's biggest commercial successes, rivalling releases like English singer Harry Styles' Harry's House, Puerto Rican singer Bad Bunny's Un Verano Sin Ti and Disney's Encanto (2021) soundtrack.

Swift's competition this year has been notably soft. Despite the arrival of new albums by high-profile artistes - Drake, Lizzo, Post Malone, Megan Thee Stallion, even BTS - few have had huge debut weeks or much staying power on the charts. One of the few new releases that have held fast in the top five lately is pop superstar Beyonce's Renaissance.

The last artiste to sell one million copies in a week was Swift, with Reputation in 2017.

Swift teased the announcement of Midnights on Sunday in an acceptance speech at the MTV Video Music Awards, where All Too Well: The Short Film - from her Red re-recording project - won three awards. About an hour later, her website began taking orders.

NYTIMES