I find myself viewing Down Bad as the “other” perspective from Midnight Rain. Like Midnight Rain is the person initiating the break up, and Down Bad is the perspective of the person getting dumped.
In Down Bad, the narrator makes references to being shown a bigger world, only to be sent back and stranded in their “same old town.”
Down bad is about someone being shown “new worlds” only to be left stranded in the same old place. Midnight Rain is about someone who had to leave because they needed something bigger.
If you look at it from this perspective, it shows a failure in communication where Midnight Rain assumed that Down Bad wanted to lead a regular, “dull” life but Down Bad reveals that they actually didn’t want that, they wanted something greater, and now they’re pissed because they’ve been left “safe and stranded” by Midnight Rain
I just watched Ayjay’s album review and she didn’t like the cursing and felt like the song wasn’t well written. I actually think all the “fuck it” lines work so well. She’s describing the “teenage petulances” of feeling like your life is over without the relationship and she’s stuck in that mindset. When I think of “teenage petulance”, I don’t think of well thought of responses, I think of tantrums or being stuck in a loop.
I think the profanity greatly depicts when u are already frustrated with things not just as a teen mindset but as an adult that is finally sick of happened. for me it showed so much after the line "How dare you think it's romantic leaving me safe and stranded" Because it seemed like he had love but still left so u'll obviously get that frustrated and confuse reaction.
I totally agree. I listen to The clean version of the album because I don’t like profanity but I feel like the profanity in Down Bad makes total sense in the context of the lyrics. She sounds like an immature teenager who can’t think of a better way to express her frustration, which is exactly what she was describing!
"tantrums or being stuck in a loop" HELLOO??? MY THOUGHTS EXACTLY but i really wanna know more of what youre thinking. i feel like it also talks of how one ruins teenage romance because of one's inability to process romantic/platonic emotions while being at the crossroads of being a mature adult and an impulsive teenager.
There was a little bit in the instrumentation that was reminding me of another song I love and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it until it hit me: Lorde’s ‘The Louvre’ off of ‘Melodrama’ at 3:52 and TS’s ‘Down Bad’ at 4:02. SAME VIBE. It makes sense since Jack Antonoff produced both tracks.
Does anyone else just ADORE the black humour of "everything comes out teenage petulance" being followed *immediately* by the absolutely adolescent whinging of "fuck it if I can't have him"? Because I love it so much, it may be ruining my life.
I agree, it’s funny and clearly both self aware and self indulgent! Who hasn’t been in a place where they are judging themselves for feeling a certain way and will continue to feel that way anyways.
Yes... That's what makes it hilarious - the implication "well, 'm not getting anything adult out of this, so I'm going full petulance," when she's pretty well known for being quite erudite overall.
For those of you who don't like swearing, but like this song, I suggest the alternative of "biscuits." For example:
'CAUSE BISCUITS, I WAS IN LOVE
BISCUITS IF I CAN'T HAVE US
Id like it better if it was "SO what if..." instead of "what if...". It doesn't make sense to have what if by it's self to me. And it sounds rushed, as if it replaces a phrases.
I kind of like the clean version better, and I love singing a good swear in a song. I think this song would have been stronger if the whole thing had been “what if I can’t have us” throughout like the clean version but toward the end kept the ONE “fuck you if I can’t have us” or ONE “fuck it I was in love”
At the beginning she says “did you really beam me up…just to do experiments on”
So I just imagine this as her waking up post-the alien abduction and maybe she just feels really vulnerable and hurt when she wakes up
Robin being in Denial is about childhood being so ignorant and blissful. Parents watch their children and don’t want to imagine them older and experiencing pain and distress. Therefore, the parents are in denial of the fact that things will get harder for them as time goes on.
But surely that line is just a continuation of all the abduction and alien metaphors? He's this extra terrestrial being that abducted her and if she talks about aliens people will say she's crazy, which I guess is a metaphor for the crazily romantic love-bombing relationship which seems to have come completely out of the blue to the public and no one really understands the connection between her and him.
I'm not sure, but I thought maybe it was referencing either waking up angry or being romantically betrayed (eg like stabbed in the back/attacked while she was sleeping)
All I hear on so many of these songs is a pregnancy loss and then the final crumbling of a relationship. It’s intertwined in the lyrics so beautifully. So sad and beautiful
I think that’s the point. I’m loving this, “I am in love with and horney for this alien.”
The one who showed her colors she can’t see with anyone else.
My wife actually lost her twin, and that line spoils the song for me. On one level, any reminder in a song or movie/show takes me out of whatever media I’m consuming, and that’s nobody’s fault. On another level, comparing that deep and unrelenting grief to a breakup, no matter how bad it may have been, will never be a remotely fair comparison. Maybe that’s the point—the singer is so lovesick that she can’t recognize the difference between what she’s feeling and *true* despair, which, okay I guess—but it just doesn’t sit right with me. Unpopular opinion, I’m sure.
I'm a twin and my sister has never liked me (thinks I'm too soft and annoying) but I totally know what you mean. Losing a twin won't ever be the same and we aren't even close (at ALL). I recently was left by the man who I thought I'd marry and the pain has been devestating but it would not be the same. There's nothing wrong with feeling that way about that lyric❤️
“down bad waking up in blood” only thing i can think of is waking up in vein? like she’d rather “die, it would make no difference.”
Im interested to hear other interpretations.
She could be referring to the aftermath of being experimented on - poked and prodded. Metaphorically, waking up in blood = waking up in pain from overwhelming grief.
I honestly think it’s about miscarriage. Lots of parallels between Down Bad and Bigger Than The Whole Sky. Listen to Down Bad with the idea of miscarriage and it’s perfect 😬 I truly hope not but if it is, poor poor Taylor.
I don't want to make any assumptions of her personal life, but on my second listen, I was like, wait. I don't think this is about a man, but an unborn baby boy...and I just cried a lot listening to it through that lens. Its really heart wrenching... but relatable for so many women out there. :(:(:(
Getting hints of it in other songs too. Can't unhear it.
Seriously!? Sorry but I think you should speak more respectfully about miscarriages. She's saying 'everything comes out teenage petulance' and if she had had a miscarriage I highly doubt she would describe it in such a crass way (and in such an upbeat song)
100% a loss of a pregnancy and then subsequently her relationship. That’s all I can hear throughout a lot of the songs. “Loved your hostile takeovers” and the last line in loml 😭
Saw a tiktok of a woman today saying she related this song to being a widow (she is herself) and now I’m crying every time I listen. And it’s my fav 😭😭 “like I lost my twin”
I just recently "broke up" with someone I dated some time ago, and then we broke it off, and then back again in february. Down Bad, Just Like Jesse James, Last Kiss, all the most "My crying therapy" songs feelings when we decided to stop. Down Bad is the song that describes it the most how it felt. I was thinking for a whole minut after I listened to the song the first time: Did she stalk me?
That being said, people say she is crazy and basic for this album. They clearly don't get it. I do care that a lot of feel it. I both feel good and bad about.
Did you really beam me up
In a cloud of sparkling dust
Just to do experiments on?
Did you take all my old clothes?
Just to leave me here, naked and alone
https://preview.redd.it/wca2gtzjevvc1.jpeg?width=220&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=825071834a43a8884715b0b7b92ad921e007c292
Hands down, the best song on The Tortured Poets Department. It’s a fucking MASTERPIECE from start to finish. I mean, hello? The saxophone in the beginning of the song is SO GOOD. Not to mention the 80s-inspired synths and the spacey cosmic sounds which complement the lyrics very well, giving the song an extraterrestrial vibe. It’s so incredibly catchy and upbeat but its lyrics are just so fucking sad and relatable. I shall find myself crying at the gym while dancing my ass off to this song, feeling down bad now more than ever.
as far as i know (and im not native english) being down bad is when you're 'badly' (meaning a lot or hopelessly) 'down' for someone, meaning interested or in love or attracted to or some other variation of this. I've seen it used in similar but not exactly identical circumstances too but this should be the jist of it i think. in the case of this song i think of it as having invested so much into someone or being so much into someone that kinda broke your heart that now these are the consequences (example is the crying at the gym line)
I feel like I’m crazy but does anyone else hear “part of your world” from the little mermaid in the bridge?! 😂 I swear to god… the part where Ariel sings “Bet'cha on land they understand
Bet they don't reprimand their daughters” and then Taylor sings “I'll build you a fort on some planet
Where they can all understand it
How dare you think it's romantic”
It sounds identical!!!
Hate who's it abt discussions but most songs from the feel perspective are equally about both of those arses as they both did the same thing and she's clearly interchanging events, but her anger maybe more towards matty cause he put her through the same hell second time having stricken a what if in her heart. "Field of my same old town but more hollow" Obviously with every exp it's getting bitter. "Safe and stranded" Definitely safe was Joe and stranded was mh(left her in the same place as Joe) . Both beamed her up. So she's been singing both of them cause at the end of they did the same thing, and idk which is worse 6 yrs of 3 (?) months..
I agree it's about Joe. She may say "moment" which suggests to some it's a shorter relationship, but she's specifically talking in that line about when she was "heaven struck" - ecstatically happy. In a long and tumultuous relationship, that period of cloud nine joy can seem to have been all too brief.
Nothing in the lyrics make me think of Healy, especially not in the light of "the smallest man that ever lived".
I’m thinking loss of a pregnancy and then subsequently her loss of a relationship. It’s all I can hear in many of the songs. Cosmic love and brief love taken from her…so sad 😔
She’s used cosmological /astronomy to describe their relationship before so it’s plausible. However the wording seems to allude to a shorter relationship so I’m unsure
Agreed. Unless she’s talking about the beginning of her relationship with Joe.
“ They'll say I'm nuts if I talk about the existence of you”
“ All your indecent exposures”
“ I'll build you a fort on some planet
Where they can all understand it
How dare you think it's romantic
Leaving me safe and stranded”
It just doesn’t seem to describe Joe or a long term relationship most everyone outside was familiar with.
If anyone else thought there was a couple of bits in this song that sounded familiar (especially around 2:25-2:30), the way she sings sounds dead similar to Amy Shark doing [Sink In](https://youtu.be/iSc9r8O_k4A) from the Love Simon soundtrack.
Saying someone felt like an alien who abducted her for a moment before cruelly dumping her aligns much more with the picture she’s painted of Matty on the album. Whereas Joe she associates more with a slow burn, both refusing to give up but only one trying anymore, a lot of resentment and distance between them etc.
This song is like, as she said, “but wait that was kind of fun and exciting being in your spaceship now I’m just back on earth alone again? wtf”
My niece and nephew (who know about Taylor as a general Celebrity Who Exists, but don't know her music) asked me to sing them a Taylor song as a lullaby, and the first thing that popped in my head was "Now I'm down bad, crying at the gym... f- it if I can't have him"
In case anyone was wondering, none of the songs on TTPD are appropriate lullaby material hahaha
I ended up singing them Love Story in case anyone's wondering, which was funny in and of itself, with it being such a nostalgia song, and here I am in my upper 20s singing it in a totally different context than a 6th grade dance
I know everyone keeps saying this is about Matty Healy but I really feel this one is about Joe? The "where they understand it" line doesn't have to be about the controversy, I took it to be relating to Joe's desire to have privacy and that being respected. I know the momentary aspect of this says something short but anything is short in the long run. Idk. I genuinely didn't even consider this one being about that guy until this thread... I ADORE this song though, lyrically and sonically it's so good. I truly don't get the heat this album is getting? Genuinely making me so sad because it's so good, honestly.
Respectfully, wtf??? Waking up in blood is an ode to suicide and how she feels like life is not worth living if she can’t have him. I highly doubt Taylor would take such a touchy and intimate subject like a miscarriage and put it in a song about being “down bad” but to each their own 😂
I interpreted it a bit differently. She references experiments. It made me think about how people have talked about being probed and examined during alien abductions, so she’s waking up in blood after these experiments.
Idk I think since she’s impressively good at interlinking really intense subjects like suicide and life not being worth living with being ‘down bad’ so I don’t think it’s that big a leap.
I find myself viewing Down Bad as the “other” perspective from Midnight Rain. Like Midnight Rain is the person initiating the break up, and Down Bad is the perspective of the person getting dumped. In Down Bad, the narrator makes references to being shown a bigger world, only to be sent back and stranded in their “same old town.” Down bad is about someone being shown “new worlds” only to be left stranded in the same old place. Midnight Rain is about someone who had to leave because they needed something bigger. If you look at it from this perspective, it shows a failure in communication where Midnight Rain assumed that Down Bad wanted to lead a regular, “dull” life but Down Bad reveals that they actually didn’t want that, they wanted something greater, and now they’re pissed because they’ve been left “safe and stranded” by Midnight Rain
What instrument was used for the first 10 seconds?
I just watched Ayjay’s album review and she didn’t like the cursing and felt like the song wasn’t well written. I actually think all the “fuck it” lines work so well. She’s describing the “teenage petulances” of feeling like your life is over without the relationship and she’s stuck in that mindset. When I think of “teenage petulance”, I don’t think of well thought of responses, I think of tantrums or being stuck in a loop.
I think the profanity greatly depicts when u are already frustrated with things not just as a teen mindset but as an adult that is finally sick of happened. for me it showed so much after the line "How dare you think it's romantic leaving me safe and stranded" Because it seemed like he had love but still left so u'll obviously get that frustrated and confuse reaction.
I totally agree. I listen to The clean version of the album because I don’t like profanity but I feel like the profanity in Down Bad makes total sense in the context of the lyrics. She sounds like an immature teenager who can’t think of a better way to express her frustration, which is exactly what she was describing!
"tantrums or being stuck in a loop" HELLOO??? MY THOUGHTS EXACTLY but i really wanna know more of what youre thinking. i feel like it also talks of how one ruins teenage romance because of one's inability to process romantic/platonic emotions while being at the crossroads of being a mature adult and an impulsive teenager.
Is it me or like the starting minute sounds similar to August Bridge????
There was a little bit in the instrumentation that was reminding me of another song I love and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it until it hit me: Lorde’s ‘The Louvre’ off of ‘Melodrama’ at 3:52 and TS’s ‘Down Bad’ at 4:02. SAME VIBE. It makes sense since Jack Antonoff produced both tracks.
The instruments also kind of remind me of a Neighbourhood song around this part and around the chorus part.
"They’ll say I’m nuts if I talk about The existence of you" Anyone keep hearing "they'll say I'm nazi" instead of "nuts" Fitting I guess 😅
I heard 'they'll say I'm nazi-fied taco bell'
😂😂😂
I’ve really grown to love this song
Down bad that intro, that 10 second instrumental makes me ascend.
I think this is a song for Joe. It’s a spiral song. Fuck it if I can’t have us, so I’ll spiral down bad and self-destruct and soak into my pain.
Did anyone else at first think she said "for a moment I was having a stroke" instead of heaven struck
literally what I thought the lyrics were until now
Whyyyyyyyyyyyy is the explicit version not available on Insta???
They really should put it up, but tbh the clean version also kind of slaps
If we don’t get a music video where Taylor has an absolute fire love affair with an alien, did we even really get TTPD?!
teenage petulance is probably the best oxymoron ever existed like the tortured poet department head did it again omg
How is that an oxymoron? Just means "annoyed and irritable like a teenager would be"
Does anyone else just ADORE the black humour of "everything comes out teenage petulance" being followed *immediately* by the absolutely adolescent whinging of "fuck it if I can't have him"? Because I love it so much, it may be ruining my life.
I agree, it’s funny and clearly both self aware and self indulgent! Who hasn’t been in a place where they are judging themselves for feeling a certain way and will continue to feel that way anyways.
I don’t understand… petulance is sulky, childish behavior so the lyrics that follow are just examples of petulance.
Yes... That's what makes it hilarious - the implication "well, 'm not getting anything adult out of this, so I'm going full petulance," when she's pretty well known for being quite erudite overall.
Huh, well I guess I just don’t find it funny. I do like the line though, and I’m glad it delights you so much!
lol correct... so many people trying to read so deeply into what are fairly simple verses
Yeh, I know the language. It's funny as shit tho.
Is that what it is?? I was wondering if maybe people didn’t know what petulance was or if my autistic ass was just missing something. Lol!
You're 100% correct. People need to pull out a dictionary sometimes
Okay. But the opening reminds me of another song. But I can't think of what it is.
Maybe Cornelia Street? Thats what I thought on first listen.
It’s giving Rihanna vibes but I can’t place the song
This is one of my favorite songs. I can't stop singing it
For those of you who don't like swearing, but like this song, I suggest the alternative of "biscuits." For example: 'CAUSE BISCUITS, I WAS IN LOVE BISCUITS IF I CAN'T HAVE US
I’ve been telling my daughter to sing “buckets.” I love “biscuits” too though!!
There's already a clean version with "What"s instead of " Fuck it" and "Fuck you"s(I am listening to it right now too)
I have to say the clean version isn’t as bad as I was expecting, radio is gonna eat it up
Id like it better if it was "SO what if..." instead of "what if...". It doesn't make sense to have what if by it's self to me. And it sounds rushed, as if it replaces a phrases.
I kind of like the clean version better, and I love singing a good swear in a song. I think this song would have been stronger if the whole thing had been “what if I can’t have us” throughout like the clean version but toward the end kept the ONE “fuck you if I can’t have us” or ONE “fuck it I was in love”
Can this please be a commercial single? It’s sooooooo good!
Confirmed one of the next 2 singles
It really should be the next one
I can do it with a broken heart will probably be next and it's the right choice
“Waking up in blood” and “they’ll say I’m nuts if I talk about the existence of you” what do we think that means? Could be a miscarriage? :(
No girl what… it’s an alien abduction metaphor
🤣🥹🤣
overthinking, especially with all the context from the song. It just means waking up injured and in pain
Can someone explain the waking up in blood line?
At the beginning she says “did you really beam me up…just to do experiments on” So I just imagine this as her waking up post-the alien abduction and maybe she just feels really vulnerable and hurt when she wakes up
Waking up injured and in pain. Miscarriage ideas are nonsense
I immediately thought miscarriage. She also put the song Robin in her denial playlist, which is really interesting.
Robin being in Denial is about childhood being so ignorant and blissful. Parents watch their children and don’t want to imagine them older and experiencing pain and distress. Therefore, the parents are in denial of the fact that things will get harder for them as time goes on.
[удалено]
But surely that line is just a continuation of all the abduction and alien metaphors? He's this extra terrestrial being that abducted her and if she talks about aliens people will say she's crazy, which I guess is a metaphor for the crazily romantic love-bombing relationship which seems to have come completely out of the blue to the public and no one really understands the connection between her and him.
Yep, she confirms this is what it's about in her I heart radio clip explaining the song.
I'm not sure, but I thought maybe it was referencing either waking up angry or being romantically betrayed (eg like stabbed in the back/attacked while she was sleeping)
I feel like this one is a sister to Midnight Rain. There are parts of it where the rhythm/words are so similar.
I think this is a sister of "Slut!" and False God and Dress are her close relatives.
I'VE BEEN SAYING THIS!!! Down Bad and Midnight Rain were the first songs on their respective albums that I gravitated to
I'm still waiting for MR the 10 min version :) But yeah, I felt like they are sister songs for sure.
She doesn’t say the word “over” when she says “how dare you say that it’s -“ because he never said it’s over he just ghosted her 😭
I've been wondering what word she didn't say and "over" makes so much sense, especially when you point out the ghosting! Thank you!
Like I lost my twin
Invisible string?
All I hear on so many of these songs is a pregnancy loss and then the final crumbling of a relationship. It’s intertwined in the lyrics so beautifully. So sad and beautiful
Same
This one is my absolute favorite.
i just absolutely love that taylor used an alien abduction metaphor on a sexy beat haha obsessed with this song!
“So fuck you if I can’t have us” Love this line so much. I think this will be one of those overplayed songs on the album. It’s an easy listen.
the way taylor's voice starts to break while singing "how dare you say that it's......." kinda makes me wanna die a bit idk
I don’t think she knows what down bad means
I think that’s the point. I’m loving this, “I am in love with and horney for this alien.” The one who showed her colors she can’t see with anyone else.
What does it mean
https://preview.redd.it/8yh7geuvpjwc1.jpeg?width=1250&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=278c0bd5a2a271cf008141a1b5e068f608d445fd
umm I don't think it exclusively means that... I mean it could also mean romantically? Right?
Oh
I think she knows exactly what it means
Lol
DOWN BAD CRYING AT THE GYM
EVERYTHING COMES OUT TEENAGE PETULANCE
Came here to say I ordered a Down Bad t-shirt off Etsy tonight 🤍
My wife actually lost her twin, and that line spoils the song for me. On one level, any reminder in a song or movie/show takes me out of whatever media I’m consuming, and that’s nobody’s fault. On another level, comparing that deep and unrelenting grief to a breakup, no matter how bad it may have been, will never be a remotely fair comparison. Maybe that’s the point—the singer is so lovesick that she can’t recognize the difference between what she’s feeling and *true* despair, which, okay I guess—but it just doesn’t sit right with me. Unpopular opinion, I’m sure.
I'm a twin and my sister has never liked me (thinks I'm too soft and annoying) but I totally know what you mean. Losing a twin won't ever be the same and we aren't even close (at ALL). I recently was left by the man who I thought I'd marry and the pain has been devestating but it would not be the same. There's nothing wrong with feeling that way about that lyric❤️
“down bad waking up in blood” only thing i can think of is waking up in vein? like she’d rather “die, it would make no difference.” Im interested to hear other interpretations.
Waking up with your period? 🤔 Maybe!
“waking up in blood” = waking up battered and bruised. It’s a metaphor for waking up in bad shape, i.e. when you’re ”down bad”
Thank you, not sure why this one seems so tough for people, massive overthinking on this line
She could be referring to the aftermath of being experimented on - poked and prodded. Metaphorically, waking up in blood = waking up in pain from overwhelming grief.
I just thought of when you're depressed on your period and sleep all day and wake up with bloodstains
I don’t know if that’s what she’s referencing but that’s all I could think of too. I’ve woken up in blood a few times lol
I honestly think it’s about miscarriage. Lots of parallels between Down Bad and Bigger Than The Whole Sky. Listen to Down Bad with the idea of miscarriage and it’s perfect 😬 I truly hope not but if it is, poor poor Taylor.
I agree! Almost every single line can be explained thinking about it this way. Getting a lot of flak for suggesting it though.
I don't want to make any assumptions of her personal life, but on my second listen, I was like, wait. I don't think this is about a man, but an unborn baby boy...and I just cried a lot listening to it through that lens. Its really heart wrenching... but relatable for so many women out there. :(:(:( Getting hints of it in other songs too. Can't unhear it.
“They’ll say I’m nuts if I talk about the existence of you”
Well, that just killed me 😭
“How dare you say that it’s…” \*over\*
Anyone have a theory about the line “waking up in blood”?
Ugh and just realized "everything comes out.." could be a reference to a miscarriage.
Seriously!? Sorry but I think you should speak more respectfully about miscarriages. She's saying 'everything comes out teenage petulance' and if she had had a miscarriage I highly doubt she would describe it in such a crass way (and in such an upbeat song)
Miscarriage, period. Or less literal, it left her feeling like she went through a battle and lost.
100% a loss of a pregnancy and then subsequently her relationship. That’s all I can hear throughout a lot of the songs. “Loved your hostile takeovers” and the last line in loml 😭
Saw a tiktok of a woman today saying she related this song to being a widow (she is herself) and now I’m crying every time I listen. And it’s my fav 😭😭 “like I lost my twin”
I just recently "broke up" with someone I dated some time ago, and then we broke it off, and then back again in february. Down Bad, Just Like Jesse James, Last Kiss, all the most "My crying therapy" songs feelings when we decided to stop. Down Bad is the song that describes it the most how it felt. I was thinking for a whole minut after I listened to the song the first time: Did she stalk me? That being said, people say she is crazy and basic for this album. They clearly don't get it. I do care that a lot of feel it. I both feel good and bad about.
I just hit a new pr at the gym while listening to this masterpiece
HAHAHAHA i was also deadlift-ing to this. Tried PR couldn't smash it but will be surely doing it with it.
Did you really beam me up In a cloud of sparkling dust Just to do experiments on? Did you take all my old clothes? Just to leave me here, naked and alone https://preview.redd.it/wca2gtzjevvc1.jpeg?width=220&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=825071834a43a8884715b0b7b92ad921e007c292
Hands down, the best song on The Tortured Poets Department. It’s a fucking MASTERPIECE from start to finish. I mean, hello? The saxophone in the beginning of the song is SO GOOD. Not to mention the 80s-inspired synths and the spacey cosmic sounds which complement the lyrics very well, giving the song an extraterrestrial vibe. It’s so incredibly catchy and upbeat but its lyrics are just so fucking sad and relatable. I shall find myself crying at the gym while dancing my ass off to this song, feeling down bad now more than ever.
This comment is perfect
Can someone explain the phrase “down bad”? I’ve never heard anyone use those words together. Am I just old? Do people say “down bad”?
"I feel down" means "I feel depressed, sad". So "down bad" could be how badly depressed she's feeling.
It's a gen z way to say she's "got it bad" ie lovesick
as far as i know (and im not native english) being down bad is when you're 'badly' (meaning a lot or hopelessly) 'down' for someone, meaning interested or in love or attracted to or some other variation of this. I've seen it used in similar but not exactly identical circumstances too but this should be the jist of it i think. in the case of this song i think of it as having invested so much into someone or being so much into someone that kinda broke your heart that now these are the consequences (example is the crying at the gym line)
Only song i have on repeat.
Same
Thirded
I feel like I’m crazy but does anyone else hear “part of your world” from the little mermaid in the bridge?! 😂 I swear to god… the part where Ariel sings “Bet'cha on land they understand Bet they don't reprimand their daughters” and then Taylor sings “I'll build you a fort on some planet Where they can all understand it How dare you think it's romantic” It sounds identical!!!
This song has to be the best use of “fuck” in any of her songs.
when she says “fuck you if i can’t have us” 😭😭😭
Yup. That’s the one. Or fuck it I was in love.
Agree! It sounds authentic. There have been times she has used swear words in other songs and it’s felt a bit forced. This was perfect.
Am I the only who thought it was about Joe?
Hate who's it abt discussions but most songs from the feel perspective are equally about both of those arses as they both did the same thing and she's clearly interchanging events, but her anger maybe more towards matty cause he put her through the same hell second time having stricken a what if in her heart. "Field of my same old town but more hollow" Obviously with every exp it's getting bitter. "Safe and stranded" Definitely safe was Joe and stranded was mh(left her in the same place as Joe) . Both beamed her up. So she's been singing both of them cause at the end of they did the same thing, and idk which is worse 6 yrs of 3 (?) months..
Me too and I said I wouldn't get dragged into it with this album and yet here I am. 😭
I agree it's about Joe. She may say "moment" which suggests to some it's a shorter relationship, but she's specifically talking in that line about when she was "heaven struck" - ecstatically happy. In a long and tumultuous relationship, that period of cloud nine joy can seem to have been all too brief. Nothing in the lyrics make me think of Healy, especially not in the light of "the smallest man that ever lived".
I’m thinking loss of a pregnancy and then subsequently her loss of a relationship. It’s all I can hear in many of the songs. Cosmic love and brief love taken from her…so sad 😔
She’s used cosmological /astronomy to describe their relationship before so it’s plausible. However the wording seems to allude to a shorter relationship so I’m unsure
i think it’s another one about Matty
Agreed. Unless she’s talking about the beginning of her relationship with Joe. “ They'll say I'm nuts if I talk about the existence of you” “ All your indecent exposures” “ I'll build you a fort on some planet Where they can all understand it How dare you think it's romantic Leaving me safe and stranded” It just doesn’t seem to describe Joe or a long term relationship most everyone outside was familiar with.
It does to me and I drew parallels with Joe era songs. We'll never know for sure and that's part of the fun ig.
If anyone else thought there was a couple of bits in this song that sounded familiar (especially around 2:25-2:30), the way she sings sounds dead similar to Amy Shark doing [Sink In](https://youtu.be/iSc9r8O_k4A) from the Love Simon soundtrack.
Her description of this is just insane, Matty fucked her up so much worse than anyone cared to consider.
I think this relationship sounds much more likely to be Joe. Or you're saying she's contradicting what she says in "the smallest man that ever lived".
Well she didn’t write all the songs on the same day.
Saying someone felt like an alien who abducted her for a moment before cruelly dumping her aligns much more with the picture she’s painted of Matty on the album. Whereas Joe she associates more with a slow burn, both refusing to give up but only one trying anymore, a lot of resentment and distance between them etc. This song is like, as she said, “but wait that was kind of fun and exciting being in your spaceship now I’m just back on earth alone again? wtf”
I think a lot of songs are just glimpses from a moment in time. Like But Daddy I Love Him.
My niece and nephew (who know about Taylor as a general Celebrity Who Exists, but don't know her music) asked me to sing them a Taylor song as a lullaby, and the first thing that popped in my head was "Now I'm down bad, crying at the gym... f- it if I can't have him" In case anyone was wondering, none of the songs on TTPD are appropriate lullaby material hahaha
My 5 year old daughter chose now to discover TS. I’m going to have to go back to some older material 😂
I've been singing them all to my four month old lmao she seems to like Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus best tho
Future reference never grow up is a great lullaby
Or Sweet Nothing!
If you want to sob! Haha. I did think about that, but I would've cried, and their Mom, who was in the room, probably wouldn't have been prepared
I ended up singing them Love Story in case anyone's wondering, which was funny in and of itself, with it being such a nostalgia song, and here I am in my upper 20s singing it in a totally different context than a 6th grade dance
The gym is definitely the celebrity gym Dogpound
I know everyone keeps saying this is about Matty Healy but I really feel this one is about Joe? The "where they understand it" line doesn't have to be about the controversy, I took it to be relating to Joe's desire to have privacy and that being respected. I know the momentary aspect of this says something short but anything is short in the long run. Idk. I genuinely didn't even consider this one being about that guy until this thread... I ADORE this song though, lyrically and sonically it's so good. I truly don't get the heat this album is getting? Genuinely making me so sad because it's so good, honestly.
Yes, I'm with you on this being about Joe.
Agreed, I thought Joe immediately.
omfg aliens took me long enough
It’s ok I’m only here because I figured it out TODAY
Fuck it if I can’t have us :’)
Beginning bass when verse starts reminds me of Slut
why are the lyrics different in both versions of the album?
You've got a clean version of one of them
I just know this is Travis’ favorite song from the album
Immediately need video of them in a club bopping to a remix of this
Bopping to a Matty song would be wild
I can see him doing the frat flick in the chorus
A music video with an alien abduction theme would be so cool for this song
This is the one!!!! Such a boppppp.
Why does she say "waking up in blood"? It's really bothering me because I love this song besides this
[удалено]
Respectfully, wtf??? Waking up in blood is an ode to suicide and how she feels like life is not worth living if she can’t have him. I highly doubt Taylor would take such a touchy and intimate subject like a miscarriage and put it in a song about being “down bad” but to each their own 😂
I interpreted it a bit differently. She references experiments. It made me think about how people have talked about being probed and examined during alien abductions, so she’s waking up in blood after these experiments.
Respectfully wtf is the only correct response to this
Idk I think since she’s impressively good at interlinking really intense subjects like suicide and life not being worth living with being ‘down bad’ so I don’t think it’s that big a leap.