Taylor Swift could actually become an even bigger deal after ‘The Tortured Poets Department’

Taylor Swift’s ‘Tortured Poets Department’ will test if there’s a ceiling to her accomplishments or if there is such a thing as flying so high you can’t see the top.

There’s sweat on your brow. You start to feel your heart beat a little faster. The acrobatics you feel in your stomach are tumbling just enough to make you mildly queasy. You get a little wobbly in the knees as the anxiety, stress and anticipation shoot through every limb of your body. No, you’re not getting sick; you’ve got Taylor Swift album release fever. And you’re not alone. Swifties know the feeling because they’ve lived through the experience before, and are about to do it again with the release of Swift’s 11th studio album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” out Friday. What’s different this time: Swift – the breaker of records, the new face of NFL broadcasts and the touring machine who turned the eyes of the government on Ticketmaster – doesn’t have a lot left to prove. Not that it’s dulling anyone’s excitement. “This is probably the most anticipated album ever that I’ve seen in my career,” Tom Poleman, the chief programming officer & president for iHeartRadio, told CNN in a recent interview. “It’s not just a music event, it’s a pop culture event that I think that everybody in America will be talking about and celebrating together.” “Tortured Poets” is Swift’s latest album following the 2022 release of “Midnights” and the 2023 release of “1989 (Taylor’s Version).” Both of those albums broke so many streaming, sales and chart records that listing them all would not only read rote, but in the larger scheme of her success, the stats and the term “record-breaking” almost begin to lose meaning. Imagine that: Being so successful that your success is sort of boring. (Disclaimer: The term “record-breaking” is still going to pop up a lot throughout this story.) It’s hard to imagine how Swift’s achievements can even be measured at this juncture. One major record label executive with nearly two decades of experience, who asked not to be named so he could speak candidly, said for an artist like Swift, achieving “huge commercial milestones” is as important as the conversation with and involvement of fans.