Taylor Swift Is an Inspiration for Us All
The world is full of serious problems right now but I’m going to take a point of personal privilege to talk about Taylor Swift.
I went to the Eras concert movie this weekend with my two daughters and it was great.
And by “great” I mean supremely inspiring on an intellectual, emotional, and spiritual level.
Let me explain.
I like Swift as an artist. She’s an excellent songwriter and a gifted performer.
But what I love about her—what I find genuinely inspiring—is her approach to her career and her willingness to fight the larger forces in the music industry.
Historically, the music industry is a wicked business.
Record companies, agents, and producers use their standing as capital holders and middlemen to take advantage of the musicians who actually make the product: From “race records” and the exploitation of African-American musicians, to Col. Tom Parker sucking Elvis dry, to Epic Records not releasing Aimee Mann from her contract even though they didn’t want her albums, the story is always the same: An individual artist can make music for free. But if they want to turn their art into a career, then they have to relinquish control—and a great deal of the value they create—to the companies that own the infrastructure.
Taylor Swift had the guts to challenge this system and beat it.
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