On November 12, a sob washed over social media when Taylor Swift dropped her 10-minute version of “All Too Well.”
One Twitter user wrote, “The way we are all collectively crying and referring to all too well has me genuinely concerned,” summing the effect Swift’s song was having on the web generation.
She told Seth Meyers in a very recent interview, after writing it while travel in 2010, “All Too Well” (From the Vault) was originally Swift’s favorite track on her 2012 album “Red.” Her record label didn’t want to release it as one because they didn’t think it’d be a success. But the song became a firm favorite for “Swifties” — the name given to Swift’s loyal fans.
With the chorus and chord progressions identical because of the original, The integral parts of the song are nothing new. Yet, it set the web ablaze.
Why “All Too Well” hit different this point around is what we looked into.
There’s a scientific reason why it should have a stronger emotional pull than a current song
When she heard the extended version of “All Too Well,” which she’d been paying attention to for years, Swiftie Eve Santos, who has been a lover of Swift’s since 2009, told Insider she felt “nostalgic and emotional.”
“Even when they’re decades old, her songs always feel familiar. As if they’re about your life too is how she sings and writes them,” she said.
Why a re-release was particularly poignant? There is also a scientific reason.
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The music we heard while we were growing up particularly tightly is what research has found that humans tend to carry onto. As teenagers, hormones and intensity of feelings mean we take in songs and therefore the emotions behind them quite we do when we’re older.
Dr. Frederick Barrett, a prof of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, told Insider a song may be a chic reasonably memory cue. Similarly to how memories can come flooding back once you walk into a house and it’s the identical smell because of the home you grew up in.
Starting off once they were in their teens or early 20s, called “period nostalgia,” Swift’s “All Too Well” may have dredged up a selected emotional response in people that recollect it.
Also contributing to why “All Too Well” was such a sensation, Swift’s ability to have interaction along with her fans online has created a robust connection to her life.
Swift incorporates a powerful connection to her fans. The music video has been viewed 41 million times on YouTube which Swift held a premier for.
“Instead of just a far-off celebrity idolization, this creates the perception of a real-life closeness more sort of a friendship,” Simonian said.
Swift is famously secretive about her sex, except when it involves her music. That’s why fans analyze and knock every single lyric, and search tirelessly for the Easter eggs Swift leaves for them in her album art and social media posts.
When she decodes the meaning of Swift’s songs, this is certainly true of Santos, who finds, even more, to relate to.