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Posted on 06/12/2026 2:35:53 PM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege
Steven Spielberg praised Taylor Swift while inducting her into the Songwriters Hall of Fame on Thursday:
“I am honored to be here tonight to introduce the youngest female ever to be inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame...A woman who has no peer when it comes to shattering records as a writer, singer, and storyteller. A singular artist and a genuine phenomenon whose place in our culture rivals that of the composers of the American Songbook, Lennon and McCartney of the ’60s, and the singer-songwriters of the 1970s like Carole King and Stevie ‘Let’s Go’ Nicks.”
He continued by lauding Swift’s “innate gifts” and “fearless determination to stand up for all artists’ rights” as well as her respect for producers, co-writers, and fellow songwriters, who have influenced her since she first picked up a 12-string guitar.
Spielberg later admitted, “I asked AI if it could tell me how many words have been written about Taylor Swift. And you know what? It couldn’t tell me,” he recalled.
“Then I asked it, how many words have been written by Taylor Swift? And it couldn’t tell me that either. And I just thought, wow, she is such a force that the depth of her achievements [defies] AI. I should have known that something that starts with ‘artificial’ wouldn’t have a clue. Because no algorithm can replace the soul of a true original who defies the status quo.”
After describing Swift’s fearless embrace of artistic risks and “impermeable” connection with fans, Spielberg closed out his speech by saying, “Thank you, Taylor, for the gift of your stories and for insisting on being an authentic voice in a world where the line between real and fake is increasingly blurred.”
(Excerpt) Read more at consequence.net ...
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No... he meant, NO OTHER FEMALE has made as much money in the music business. None.
SecondHandSongs (a comprehensive database of cover versions) lists Taylor Swift with 226 originals. Many of these—especially her hits—have dozens of documented covers.
Her top-covered tracks include:
"Shake It Off" (~89 artists)
"Blank Space" (~79)
"I Knew You Were Trouble" (~60)
"We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together" (~58)
"Love Story" (~56)
And others like "Style," "Bad Blood," "You Belong with Me," etc., with 40–50+ each.
mostlymusiccovers.com
To my mind, a great songwriter is not defined as someone who works alone, or with a consistent partner. It's someone who writes songs that a LOT of people want to hear.
People like to hear, and re-hear songs that connect in some way to their own experiences. Taylor does that.
One of my favorites as always been "Everything has changed". It's a collaboration she wrote with Ed Sheeran way back in 2012. They wrote it together, at her house in Nashville. Ed has said Taylor brought most of the song and he contributed changes.
IMO, there's a lot to like. It's a touching story. A nice build to the music. Interesting rhythm changes, harmony, and catchy chorus. I could listen to most any day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1oM3kQpXRo&list=RDw1oM3kQpXRo&start_radio=1
The people who wrote on 70% of her songs should be equally credited. But like Madonna and Mariah she puts her name on the creations of others for the royalty money.
I have heard her. She is just O.K. and not great at all. I think she is blessed with a P.R. machine that has topped all female vocalists P.R. machines, ever.
Spielberg is wrong and trying to stay relevant.
I am sure she has had lots of help that wasn’t acknowledged. Her songs seem innovative or creative. Nothing to them.
It is so easy to write songs these days because of technology. Not too much effort or work. Knowledge isn’t necessary.
Writers in the past were not blessed with the aids people nowadays have.
Watching the Get Back documentary made appreciative and knowledable of how hard it was. In addition watching doucmentaries on how the Beatles albums were created showed how innovative and creative they were.
But does she really write the songs?
Maybe the middle-aged Swedish guys who orchestrate them do a lot of song doctoring.
Who says they’re not getting credit? Sheeran was listed as “co-writer”. He’s the one that said it was mostly Taylor, not her.
I think most musicians would love to collaborate wth TS.
Business is one thing. Musical supposed talent is another, and there is little to none in this callous individual and her daddy, that’s just fine.
Spielberg is full of .. Spiel as in the yiddish “a play or long rambling speech”. And, being in the entertainment business is what he is seeking/giving backing—to or from her for his partnership or whatever. Again, just fine— but has nothing to do with talent, and nothing to do with saying that NO other songwriter in the Hall of Fame can compare. That is palpably ridiculous, provably so. Others here will list the major songwriters all the way back to golden age/Tin Pan Alley and they number as giants in the hundreds. Not opinion, fact. This is Spielberg’s opinion.
Keeping in mind that without Toby Keith’s help in this cutthroat industry, she would not have made any more than a miley cyrus kind of impression. She said nothing at his death, and that says a lot (he was not grooming or “doing” her).
Not arguing taste— which is foolish to argue always. Example:: lutefisk is a preserved fish Christmas fish/cod that gains a gelatinous quality (revolting to most who are not Finns, Swedes or Norwegians) when re-hydrated. No arguing taste- it either is or isn’t. Gelatinous is a good comparison to a lot of fakirs in “music” of which there are legions.
Right. Post is trying to say- “that’s a real man”. Fools making quick money before burning out are available as a beard in the NFL. His best friends, real ones, are telling him to ruuuuun! In the sense that many heads are more experienced than the one being followed.
Can’t sell “im 17” when one is 36 going on 37”. The audience is not crafted for a “marriageable” male. Hopeless mommies take their unmanageable daughters to these concerts as some sort of training— political, not musical. Guess it could have been Cardi B... so there’s that. A surface phenomena, from a surface superficial person.
But again, there’s no accounting for taste. And noone in the US music biz ever got rich underestimating the market for dreck.
Agree in general. But, in specifics we know by looking up the songs in ASCAP or BMI the major royalty houses who have locked the “industry” up into piles of formulaic crapola, as to who has writer’s credits. In re: country music there are several well done “mashups from nashville” on copycat bar by bar music (key not being important but the mechanical “tune” is altered just enough). The studio guys know who is whom, to market themselves for work- a very hard life.
It is quite revealing. Major hits from the completely untalented “houses”. They used to be able to print money in the Boomer generation days of “there’s a hit song, it’s on an album, mom take me to the mall to buy the album”. Digital has altered that and compressed the time lines and..any creativity or originality. Those days are gone.
Friends deep in the surviving real music world have described this to me
as yet another phase and they are better inside informed. Goes around comes around— and there are a lot of fakes.There is no “writer” who has bought rights to another’s song, who will give credit- as that is part of the transaction. All bets are off. Or as Knopler’s tune about Ray Croc (great groove)—
-
“it’s dog eat dog, rat eat rat....Croc Star Boom Like That!”
Stay positive. Be Well!
Good one! A vapid song over which the fanzoids freak out.
So deep (/sarc ON!) a song.
Elton John/Bernie Taupin as a team... phenomenal. Taupin a genius lyricist. And real reflective thought— starting out with an album to appeal to real Nashville, and America.
Anti-War, in fact, and haunting, this: “Where To Now, St. Peter?” from the Tumbleweed Connection third album based on Americana and Country/Western themes. Eerie and brilliant, yeah 1970. Check the lyrics. For all those who crossed over in service to Freedom— the many of good faith.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrCdgJ3teRg&list=RDQrCdgJ3teRg&start_radio=1
It ain’t genetic. It just isn’t. Who ever heard of Marjorie Finlay. In all fairness, opera is an even worse cabal of worse snotty people, who never learned where opera came from.
Think you’d appreciated this from the “code” digital standpoint.
6 exactly the same country “hits” from Sir Mashalot’s analysis.
Brilliant, lyric beat, tone changes.
Boom Boom!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FY8SwIvxj8o&list=RDFY8SwIvxj8o&start_radio=1
“Boom Like That” 2004 (22 yrs ago, I know)
Mark Knopfler
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mau829SUR8o&list=RDMau829SUR8o&start_radio=1
Re: generational. I mean nurture more than nature. I don’t think banking is genetic either. Taylor’s operatic grandma introduced her to piano as a toddler apparently.
Re: lib female artists. Both Cardi B. and Taylor pander. Cardi to race politics and Taylor to gender. But both epitomize capitalism to the n’th degree. Cardi was once quoted saying:
“Uncle Sam is my most expensive boyfriend. He takes half my money.” (And then something about needing receipts from the government LoL.)
And in practice, Taylor is culturally quite traditional.
Nicki Minaj appeared with Erika Kirk at TPUSA’s Amfest and then ar the White House after that, so she decided to just take the plunge!
Well, gonna end this tête-à-tête with the fact that for Niki Minaj the “plunge” was a leap to the heavens. On the wings of angels to the Lord. But of course trivialized by the vapid, empty Left, whose religion is totalitarian servitude. Nothing people.
Brave.
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