The post heard ‘round the world: Taylor Swift now owns the masters to her first six albums! This contentious battle, which resulted in the birth of the “Taylor’s Version” project, waged on for six years before finally officially coming to a conclusion on May 30, 2025. In this bonus emergency episode, Dani & Olivia return from their seasonal break to bring to you immediate thoughts, some fun stats about the initial impact of the announcement, and what we might be looking to in the future for Taylor.

For literally years now, we’ve been quoting Rob Sheffield on this podcast. Rob, who is perhaps best known for his work writing for Rolling Stone, is both a long-time fan and professional critic of Taylor Swift. He also is a self-proclaimed fan of Taylearning…so we had to get him on the podcast! Tune into this hefty TL4 Season Finale to hear us interview Rob about his life, opinions, observations, and his new book - “Heartbreak Is the National Anthem: How Taylor Swift Reinvented Pop Music.” The novel, which is a kaleidoscopic and passionate look at Taylor’s life through Rob’s eyes, has received acclaim and has quickly become a staple piece of literature in the Swiftie fandom. Hot tip- listen all the way through the end to see how you can get your hands on a signed copy!

Taylor Swift has had many fellow famous “BFFs” in her years of being in the public eye. However, one of them has been there since almost the very beginning - Selena Gomez: actress, pop star, philanthropist, producer, and businesswoman. Since meeting in 2008, Taylor and Selena, or “Taylena,” have been mostly inseparable, as far as public friendship connections go.  They consistently bring up one another, post each other on social media, and support one another’s projects. In this penultimate episode of Season 4 of Taylearning, your hosts talk through the full Taylena friendship timeline, including all of its public (and not-so-public) ups and downs. Tune in as we tackle this massive friendship and continue The Squad miniseries!

We all know someone who has become so lost in their [toxic] relationship that they cut off other loved ones. In today’s ‘Dear Taylistener’ episode - our advice column miniseries where we use Taylor Swift songs as a source of wisdom - our listener writes to us about being on the receiving end of the social chop when her close guy friend cuts her off to appease his new girlfriend. It can be difficult to convince others that your cross-gender friendship is solely platonic, but it can be even harder to watch that friendship dissolve due to others’ insecurities. What do you do? In this case, we turn to the lyrics of Taylor Swift to get by, and your hosts dispense their own wisdom from similar experiences!

For her entire professional career up until the transition between 1989 (2014) and Reputation (2017), Taylor had a predictable schedule of releasing a new album every two years. But 2016 was different, as we saw the ostensible cancellation of Taylor and her subsequent reclusivity. As a result, we got one of the most iconic and fabled pieces of lost media: Taylor Swift’s “missing” album from 2016. Nicknamed “Karma” by Swifties, the existence of this album is hotly debated, and there are good arguments on both sides. Tune in to hear your hosts discuss facts and quotes to argue both for and against the existence of “Karma,” the details surrounding the conspiracy theory, and what would’ve/could’ve/should’ve been had 2016 gone differently for our girl.

It’s time for the song that features the namesake of this miniseries to have its moment in the sun: This Is Me Trying. This track, an underrated gem from 2020’s ‘folklore,’ features Taylor singing from multiple devastating perspectives. She acts as the mouthpiece for a melancholic alcoholic, a regretful burnout, and a despondent suicidal person. Through these lyrics, she tells the story of how hard it is to simply try for some people. Sometimes, your best looks like hell to everyone else, and no one pats you on the back for the work it took you to get there. But Taylor noticed…no one ever talks about these people or tells these stories. These people who are really trying. So she decided to give us this track, and we decided to break it down for you today.

The time has come for the final installment of the Eras Tour Post Mortem miniseries. We know, we’re sad too. But it has been four months since Taylor left the Eras stage for the final time, which has given us ample opportunity to analyze what were the highest highs and the lowest lows of the 21-month-long tour! After calling out on Instagram and scouring the web, we learned what Swifties from all over the world took away from the tour, both positive and not-so-positive. Join us as we close this chapter and reminisce on the past so we can turn our focus to the future!

Two words: Lead. Singles. But what is a lead single, you may ask? It’s typically a carefully selected track from an upcoming album designed to both lend itself to potential commercial success AND give you a taste of what’s to come from an artist. Taylor Swift has 11 albums, thus she has 11 lead singles to chat about! Some were released in advance of an album, some were released alongside an album. Some were acclaimed and beloved, some were criticized and ridiculed. In today’s episode, Dani & Olivia go through each lead single and rate it as a song, success as a lead single, and they even make their own suggestions for the lead singles that could’ve been.

In 2006, Taylor released her debut album. On that album, she gave us “Tied Together with a Smile”, a sincere and heartbreaking song about a girl who struggles to hide her pain behind a fake smile. Today, your hosts dissect this track in our very first song analysis from Debut! Taylor has given us a lot of insight into this tragic tune, so tune in as we break it all down in this installment of the ‘Mental Cages’ miniseries.

From 2009-2010, Taylor Swift embarked on her first ever headlining tour: The Fearless Tour! Later in 2010, “Journey to Fearless” would be released- a docuseries all about the tour and the steps Taylor took to get there. This episode features Dani and Olivia a) talking about the reception and impact of The Fearless Tour, and b) going through each scene of the series to talk through the story it tells. Go back in time with us, head first and fearless!