1989 (Taylor Swift album)


1989 is the fifth studio album by American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, released on October 27, 2014, through Big Machine Records. Following the release of her fourth studio album Red, which critics considered Swift's emergence from her trademark country styles to straightforward pop, Swift sought to completely move away from country. Inspired by 1980s synth-pop, she enlisted a production team whose key figures included herself, Max Martin, Shellback, Ryan Tedder, and Jack Antonoff, who shaped the album's overall 1980s-styled sonic coherence. Martin and Swift served as the album's executive producers.
Titled after Swift's birth year, 1989 is a synth-pop record that uses heavy synthesizers, programmed percussion, and processed background vocals. While the album is primarily about reflections on past romantic relationships, Swift's recurring theme, it presents more mature and wistful perspectives, expressing self-discovery. Critical reaction to 1989 was generally positive; the pop production polarized reviewers, but Swift's songwriting received mostly favorable responses. The album was included in the top ten in year-end lists issued by publications including Billboard, Rolling Stone, and Time. It won Album of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Album at the 58th Grammy Awards, making Swift the first female solo artist to win the former category twice.
The album debuted atop the US Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 1.287 million copies, making Swift the first artist to have three million-selling albums within first week of release in the country. It also reached number one in several markets including Australia, Canada, and the UK. 1989 was among the best-selling albums of 2014 and 2015 globally, and has sold 6.215 million copies in the US and 10.1 million copies worldwide. The album was promoted by seven singles, including three Billboard Hot 100 number-one entries: "Shake It Off", "Blank Space", and a remix of "Bad Blood" featuring Kendrick Lamar. The album was promoted by the 1989 World Tour that ran from May to December 2015 and grossed over $250 million, becoming the highest-grossing concert tour of 2015.

Background

released her fourth studio album Red in October 2012. Contemporary critics noted Reds emerging departure from the signature country sound of Swift's previous releases. This was the result of the collaborations with renowned Swedish pop producers Max Martin and Shellback, who introduced straightforward pop hooks and new genres including electronic and dubstep to Swift's repertoire, as showcased on three songs—"22", "I Knew You Were Trouble" and "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together". The album's associated world tour ran from March 2013 to June 2014.
Swift had been dubbed by the media as "America's Sweetheart" because of her wholesome public image. During promotion of Red, her reputation was suffering from what The New York Times called "a backlash" resulting from her overexposed romantic relationships with high-profile celebrities. She avoided discussing her personal life in public, as she believes that talking about it can be a "career weakness". The media scrutiny would inspire Swift to write such songs as "Shake It Off" and "Blank Space" for her upcoming album.
In June 2013, Swift was part of the CMA Music Festival line-up. At the festival's backstage, she told reporters that she was ready to work on the next album, less than eight months after the release of Red. Four months later, she released the song "Sweeter than Fiction", which she recorded for the soundtrack of One Chance. It was co-written by Swift and Jack Antonoff, the guitarist for indie band Fun., and incorporates elements of 1980s new wave. In March 2014, Swift relocated from Nashville to New York City. She initially found living in New York intimidating, but ultimately found her way to enjoy her new residence. The event inspired Swift to write "Welcome to New York", the album's opening track that finds her "bold enough, brave enough to take on this huge city in all of its blaring honesty."

Recording

Swift began songwriting for her fifth studio album in mid-2013, when she was touring in support of Red. Desiring to create a "sonically cohesive record", Swift aimed to recruit a coherent production team of four to five personnel that she "always wanted to work with, or loved working with". Speaking to the Associated Press in October 2013, she suggested that she could work again with Max Martin and Shellback, whom she described as "absolute dream collaborators" because they would take her ideas in a different direction, which challenged her as a songwriter. She confirmed their collaborations in February 2014.
After recording several tracks, Swift realized she had "been making '80s synth pop" and subsequently decided to embark on this direction, titling the album 1989 after her birth year. Scott Borchetta, president of Swift's then-label Big Machine, was initially reluctant towards Swift's decision to completely eschew her signature country sound. He attempted to persuade Swift to record a few country tracks, but Swift insisted on following her choice. Borchetta ultimately accepted Swift's artistic decision, and that the new songs would not impact country radio. Martin and Shellback produced seven out of 13 tracks for the album's standard edition; the former and Swift served as executive producers.
Jack Antonoff, with whom Swift had teamed up on "Sweeter than Fiction" in October 2013, co-wrote and co-produced two tracks on the standard edition. Swift told Entertainment Weekly two months following the release of "Sweeter than Fiction" that there was a high chance of her and Antonoff working together again because of his 1980s-styled production. Antonoff sent his finished instrumental track of "Out of the Woods" to Swift while she was on a plane, and she sent him back a voice memo containing the lyrics roughly 30 minutes later. The song, for which Swift wrote the lyrics on an existing track, marked a departure from her traditional songwriting. The pair's other collaborative product, "I Wish You Would", stemmed from Antonoff's experimental sampling of snare drum instrumentation on Fine Young Cannibals' 1988 single "She Drives Me Crazy", one of their mutual favorite songs. Antonoff played his sample to Swift on an iPhone and subsequently sent it to her to re-record. Antonoff produced one more track for the album's deluxe edition, "You Are in Love".
Swift contacted OneRepublic frontman Ryan Tedder, whom she had always wanted to work with, through a smartphone voice memo. He co-produced two songs—"Welcome to New York" and "I Know Places". For the latter, Swift scheduled a meeting day with Tedder at the studio, and the recording process was finalized the following day. For "Clean", Swift approached English producer Imogen Heap in London after having written the song's lyrics and melody. Heap helped complete the track by playing instruments on it, and the two finished recording after two takes within one day at Heap's studio. Nathan Chapman, Swift's longtime collaborator, co-produced the track "This Love". Recording sessions took place at Conway Studios in Los Angeles, Jungle City Studios in New York, Lamby's House Studios in Brooklyn, MXM Studios in Stockholm, Pain in the Art Studio in Nashville, Studio Elevator Nobody in Göteborg, and The Hideaway Studio. The whole album was mastered by Tom Coyne within two days at Sterling Sound Studio in New York City. Swift finalized the record upon completing the Asian leg of the Red Tour in mid-2014.

Music and lyrics

Overview

Swift described 1989 as her "first documented, official pop album" that was inspired by pop music of the 1980s and artists from that period, such as Peter Gabriel and Annie Lennox. She acknowledged that her previous album Red blended country and pop elements, thus envisioning a "blatant pop" production for 1989 because "if you chase two rabbits, you lose them both". In an interview with Rolling Stone in September 2014, Swift described the 1980s as an experimental period when artists abandoned the "standard drums-guitar-bass-whatever" generic song structure and experimented with stripped-down synthesizers, drum pads, and overlapped vocals. She asserted that she was inspired by the era's experimental energy that embraced "endless opportunities, endless possibilities, endless ways".
1989 features a more electronic-oriented production compared to Swift's previous releases. The standard edition is composed of 13 tracks, and the deluxe edition includes three extra original songs. The album's instrumentation incorporates heavy synthesizers, programmed percussion, and processed background vocals. Sasha Geffen from Consequence of Sound characterized 1989 as a synth-pop album that incorporates hip hop-influenced beats and 1980s-styled basslines. Jon Caramanica writing for The New York Times opined that on 1989, Swift avoided hip hop and R&B crossover trends of her contemporaries and managed to embrace music of the mid-1980s when "pop was less overtly hybrid". The Observers Kitty Empire also noted the formative influence of 1980s synth-pop on the album that conveys Swift's evolved "stylistic and tonal variation".
The album addresses the emotions and reflections ensued from romantic relationships, Swift's recurring themes. It further expresses self-discovery, a difference from her previous releases. Rolling Stone observed that the album was Swift's first "in years" to not speak ill of her ex-lovers and instead express "wistful and nostalgic" perspectives on romance. Pitchforks Vrinda Jagota summarized 1989 as a "fully-realized fantasy of self-reliance, confidence, and ensuing pleasure", where Swift views heartbreak as "observing a painting on a wall", rather than "a feeling she desperately needs to articulate".

Songs

The opening track "Welcome to New York", inspired by Swift's relocation to New York, recalls her feelings when she first moved into the city. Backed by pulsing synthesizers, the song finds Swift embracing her newfound freedom while getting lost in the city. "Blank Space", set over a minimal hip hop-influenced beat, satirizes the media's perception of Swift as an "overly attached man-eater" who dates men only for her songwriting material. Swift targeted the song at the scrutiny on her image, "Every few years the media finds something that they unanimously feel is annoying about me. Me, my character, the way I live my life, the way I talk, the way I react when I win stuff." The composition of "Style", a funk-flavored track, was inspired by "funky electronic music" artists such as Daft Punk. The lyrics detail an unhealthy relationship and contain a reference to the American actor James Dean in the refrain.
"Out of the Woods" features a graphic imagery of a car accident surgery requiring "20 stitches in a hospital room". Swift said that the track was inspired by a relationship of hers that evoked constant anxiety because of its fragility: "every day was a struggle. Forget making plans for life – we were just trying to make it to next week." She picked it as a favorite from 1989 because it "best represents" the album. "All You Had to Do Was Stay" laments a past relationship and originated from Swift's dream of shouting "Stay" to an ex-lover despite not wanting to do so. "Shake It Off", sharing a loosely similar sentiment with "Blank Space", sees Swift expressing disinterest with her detractors and their negative remarks on her image. The track incorporates a subtle saxophone line in its instrumentation.
The bubblegum pop-infused number "I Wish You Would" uses heavy synthesizers, pulsing snare drums, guitars, and layered vocals. "Bad Blood", about betrayal by an unnamed female peer, was speculated by various publications to be about Katy Perry, with whom Swift was being involved in a heavily publicized feud. "Wildest Dreams" speaks of a dangerous affair with an apparently untrustworthy man and incorporates a sultry, dramatic atmosphere accompanied by string instruments. On "How You Get the Girl", a bubblegum pop track featuring guitar strums over a heavy disco-styled beat, Swift hints at her desire for a reunion with her ex-lover. "This Love" is a soft rock-flavored electropop ballad that, according to Jon Caramanica, could be mistaken as "a concession to country" because of the production by Swift and her longtime co-producer Nathan Chapman.
Swift said that the standard edition's penultimate track "I Know Places", which expresses her desire to preserve her unstable relationship, serves as a loose sequel to "Out of the Woods". Using metaphors of foxes running away from hunters to convey Swift and her lover's hideaway from the media scrutiny, the song is accompanied by dark, intense drum and bass-influenced beats. On "Clean", an understated soft rock-influenced number, Swift compares her relationship to an addiction and struggles to escape from it, finding herself "finally clean" after a destructive yet cleansing torrential storm. "Wonderland", the first of the three bonus songs on the deluxe edition, uses allusions to the fantasy Alice's Adventures in Wonderland to describe a relationship tumbling down the "rabbit hole". The ballad "You Are in Love" finds Swift talking about an ideal relationship from another woman's perspective. The final song's title, "New Romantics", is a namesake of the cultural movement in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Evoking strong 1980s synth-pop sound, the song sees Swift reigniting her hopes and energy after the heartbreaks she had endured.

Release and promotion

In August 2014, Swift teased the album's release upon posting multiple hints onto her social media accounts. On August 18, via a Yahoo! / ABC News live stream at the Empire State Building, Swift revealed the then-anticipated album's details, including the title 1989, the release date, and the cover artwork. The cover is a Polaroid picture with the words "T. S. 1989" written underneath. Following the live stream, Swift announced that she would distribute a total of 1989 "SwiftStakes" to her fans, as part of a competition. The winners would earn tickets to Swift's future concert shows or 1989-related merchandise. She also selected a number of fans based on their engagement on social media and invited them to her properties or hotel rooms for secret album-listening sessions, called "The 1989 Secret Sessions". The Los Angeles Timess Randy Lewis wrote that this strategy aimed to ensure Swift's audiences would continue to support her following her decision to eschew her signature country styles. The sessions took place in Los Angeles, New York City, Nashville, Rhode Island, and London throughout September 2014. Video footage of the sessions were released on October 16, a few days before the album's release.
The album was released on October 27, 2014 through Big Machine Records; both the standard and deluxe editions were released for digital download through retailer services globally, except in the US and Canada, where the deluxe edition was released as a CD exclusively by Target. Three days before the distribution, all tracks from the deluxe edition leaked online; USA Today reported that according to music experts, the incident would not affect sales. Each CD copy of 1989 includes a packet of 13 Polaroid pictures, portraying Swift during the making of the album; this strategy reportedly boosted Polaroid Corporation's ailing sales. To bolster album sales, Swift had tie-ins with Subway, Keds, and Diet Coke.
Prior to the album's release, in July 2014, Swift wrote an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal stressing the importance of albums to artists and fans, and expressing concern over predictions of "downfall of music sales and the irrelevancy of the album as an economic entity". Within 1989s first week of release, Swift removed her entire catalog from Spotify, arguing that the streaming company's ad-supported, free service undermined the premium service which provides higher royalties for songwriters. In a June 2015 open letter, Swift criticized Apple Music for not offering royalties to artists during the streaming service's free three-month trial period and stated that she would pull 1989 from the catalog. The following day, Apple announced that it would pay artists during the free trial period; Swift thereafter agreed to keep 1989 on the streaming service. She re-added her entire catalog to Spotify, Amazon Music, and Google Play in June 2017.

Singles

Swift premiered the lead single from 1989, "Shake It Off", and its accompanying music video through the August 18, 2014 Yahoo! live stream. The single debuted atop the US Billboard Hot 100, becoming Swift's second number one following 2012's "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together". It also reached number one in Australia and Canada, and number two in the UK. "Out of the Woods" and "Welcome to New York" were released through iTunes Stores as promotional singles on October 14 and 20, respectively. "Blank Space" was released on November 10, 2014 as the album's second single. It took the number-one position of Billboard Hot 100 from "Shake It Off" on the chart dated November 29, 2014, making Swift the first woman in the chart's history to succeed herself at the top spot. The single remained at number one for seven consecutive weeks, marking Swift's longest run at the top. "Style" followed on February 9, 2015, and reached number six in the US and Canada.
A remix of "Bad Blood" featuring rapper Kendrick Lamar was released as 1989s fourth single on May 17, 2015. The single reached number one in Australia, Canada, the US, and number four in the UK. Its music video featured Swift's high-profile celebrity friends including Karlie Kloss, Lena Dunham, and Selena Gomez, and won Video at the Year at the 2015 MTV Video Music Awards. "Wildest Dreams" served as the follow-up single on August 31, 2015, and became 1989s fifth consecutive Billboard Hot 100 top-ten single, peaking at number five. "Out of the Woods", previously a promotional single, was released to radio as the sixth single on January 19, 2016. On February 17, Swift announced that she would release the three deluxe edition bonus tracks to iTunes Stores in the US as promotional singles one at a time, and released the first of which, "Wonderland". "You Are In Love" and "New Romantics" followed on February 24 and March 3, respectively. The latter was released to US contemporary hit radio on February 23, 2016 as the seventh and final single from the album.

Live performances

Swift further promoted the album on several live TV appearances. On August 24, 2014, Swift performed the album's lead single "Shake It Off" at the 2014 MTV Video Music Awards in Inglewood, California. She was part of the 2014 iHeartRadio Music Festival line-up on September 19 in Las Vegas, where she performed 1989s lead single among several of her previous songs including "Love Story" and "I Knew You Were Trouble". Swift later performed "Shake It Off" again on the British and Australian editions of the TV music competition The X Factor on October 12 and 20, respectively. On October 23, she presented the lead single and "Out of the Woods" on Jimmy Kimmel Live!. She sang the two songs again the following day at CBS Radio's "We Can Survive" benefit concert, held at the Hollywood Bowl.
Concurrently with the release of the album on October 27, 2014, Yahoo! and iHeartRadio live-broadcast Swift's final "1989 Secret Session", which took place in Manhattan and featured five songs—"Welcome to New York", "Out of the Woods", "Style", "Blank Space", and "Shake It Off". The following day, Swift performed "Welcome to New York" on Late Show with David Letterman. Two days later, Swift presented three songs from the album—"Welcome to New York", "Out of the Woods", and "Shake It Off"—live on Good Morning America. On November 24, Swift performed "Blank Space" at the 2014 American Music Awards, where she received the ceremony's inaugural Dick Clark Award for Excellence. She performed the song again at the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2014 on December 2 in London, where she also performed "Style". Swift headlined the Jingle Ball Tour 2014, broadcast by KIIS-FM on December 5, where she performed the singles "Shake It Off" and "Blank Space". The album's supporting world tour ran from May to December 2015 and accumulated over $250 million, becoming the highest-grossing tour of 2015.

Critical reception

1989 received generally positive reviews. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 based on reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 76 based on 29 sources. On behalf of NME, Matthew Horton considered Swift's transition to pop "a success" had the album excluded the "soft-rock mush" of "This Love" and "Clean". The New York Times critic Jon Caramanica complimented Swift's avoidance of contemporary hip hop-R&B crossover trends, which distinguished her from other mainstream artists. Robert Christgau, while noticing the "treated hooks and doctored vocals" that had been prevalent in Swift's music, applauded her departure from country to experiment with new styles. Writing for Rolling Stone, Rob Sheffield characterized the record as "deeply weird, feverishly emotional, wildly enthusiastic".
The A.V. Clubs Marah Eakin praised Swift's maturity from overtly romantic struggles to more positive themes. Neil McCormick of The Daily Telegraph commended the album's " observation and emotional engagement" that contrasted with lyrics found in "commercialised pop". Slant Magazines Annie Galvin also observed that Swift maintained her clever songwriting that had distinguished her earlier releases, but was somewhat disappointed with the pop production. Alexis Petridis from The Guardian acknowledged the "clever", "sharp" and "perfectly attuned" 1980s-styled direction that was the result of Swift's songwriting rather than the producers' efforts. By contrast, Entertainment Weeklys Adam Markovitz was critical of the heavy synthesizers, which he said undermined Swift's conventionally vivid lyrics, but still praised her as "too unique, too identifiably herself". Andrew Unterberger from Spin similarly disliked the excessive synthesizers that leads to "lyrics occasionally getting buried", but was positive towards the 1980s synth-pop sonic coherence.
Shane Kimberlin writing for musicOMH deemed Swift's transition to pop on 1989 "not completely successful", but praised her lyrics for incorporating "enough heart and personality", which he found rare in the mainstream pop scene. In a less favorable review, AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine found the album shallow, describing it as "a sparkling soundtrack to an aspirational lifestyle" that fails to transcend the "transient transparencies of modern pop". Mikael Wood, in his review for the Los Angeles Times, called 1989 a "sleekly-produced pop record" that does not incorporate meaningful lyrics and "needs to have some real life". Pitchforks Vrinda Jagota, in a 2019 retrospective review, found the album freed from the dramatic heartbreak on Swift's previous records, which shows that "everything doesn't always have to be so serious".

Accolades

1989 placed at number six on Metacritic's list of the best-received records of 2014, based on inclusions in publications' year-end lists. It was ranked as the best album of 2014 by Billboard, Cosmopolitan, and the Houston Chronicle. The album was ranked within the top ten in various publications, being placed at number three by Drowned in Sound, number four by American Songwriter, The Denver Post, and Time, number five by The Daily Telegraph, number eight by Complex, number nine by Newsday, and number ten by Rolling Stone and The Philadelphia Inquirer. On behalf of NPR, critic Ken Tucker ranked 1989 at number three on his list of 2014's best albums, lauding it as "gleefully bold" and comparing it to The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, as both records were "designed to be listened to from first cut to last." Caramanica of The New York Times placed 1989 at number seven on his list, praising Swift for " her self" despite revising her musical style. The album placed at number seven on Pazz & Jop, an annual mass critics' poll conducted by The Village Voice, and was ranked at number 15 by The A.V. Club and PopMatters, number 31 by Pitchfork, and number 32 by musicOMH.
1989 was included in best-of lists of the 2010s decade by Varietys journalist Chris Willman, Chorus.fm, The A.V. Club, Slant Magazine, Billboard, Rolling Stone, Consequence of Sound, NME, Uproxx, Paste, Stereogum, and Cleveland.com. Consequence of Sound also ranked it the sixth best pop album of the 2010s. The album also placed at number 89 on The Guardians list of the 100 Best Albums of the 21st Century in 2019.
1989 won Favorite Pop/Rock Album at the 2015 American Music Awards, Album of the Year at the 2015 Japan Gold Disc Awards, and Album of the Year at the 2016 iHeartRadio Music Awards. It also earned nominations for Best International Pop/Rock Album at the 2015 Echo Music Prize, International Album of the Year at the 2015 Juno Awards, and Best International Album at the Los Premios 40 Principales 2015. At the 58th Grammy Awards, the album won Album of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Album. Swift became the first female solo artist to win the former category twice—her first win was for Fearless in 2010.

Commercial performance

1989 was released amidst a sharp decrease of traditional album sales because of the emergence of digital download and streaming platforms. Its sales performance was therefore subject to considerable speculation within the music industry, given both the decline in album sales and Swift's decision to eschew her characteristic country roots that had cultivated a sizable fan base. One week prior to the release, Rolling Stone reported that US retailers predicted the album to sell from 600,000 to 750,000 copies within its debut week. Exceeding expectations, 1989 debuted atop the US Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 1.287 million copies, according to data compiled by Nielsen SoundScan for the chart dated November 15, 2014. Swift became the first artist to have three million-selling albums within the first week of release, together with 2010's Speak Now and 2012's Red. 1989 also immediately became the only album released in 2014 to sell one million copies. The album's actual first-week sales were higher because copies sold for $0.99 through a Microsoft promotion were not counted in accordance with Nielsen SoundScan's policy of not including sales priced under $3.99. Billboard attributed the album's overwhelming success to Swift's heartwarming interactions with fans via social media, tie-ins with large companies, and withdrawal from free streaming services.
The album exceeded two million copies in its third week of release. It spent a total of five non-consecutive weeks at number one for the 2014 chart history. It was the best-selling album of 2014 in the US, with sales of 3.66 million copies. 1989 topped the Billboard 200 for six additional weeks during the 2015 chart history, accumulating a total of 11 weeks on the number-one position. With this achievement, it became the fourth album since 2000 to spend more than ten weeks at number one, following Swift's Fearless, Adele's 21, and the soundtrack Frozen. 1989 spent its full first year of release in the top ten of the Billboard 200, the fifth album to do so. It was the best-performing album on the Billboard 200 of 2015, and was certified nine times platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America, which denotes album-equivalent units of nine million copies. As of January 2020, the album has sold 6.215 million pure copies in the US. In Canada, 1989 debuted atop the album chart and was 2014's best-selling album in the country with sales of 314,000 units. It was certified six times platinum by Music Canada, which denotes shipments of 480,000 units there. The album was the fifth best-selling album of the 2010s decade in Canada, with sales of 542,000 copies.
1989 debuted at number one on the UK Albums Chart with first-week sales of 90,000 units, becoming 2014's fastest-selling album by a female artist in the country. It has sold 1.25 million copies and earned four times platinum certification from the British Phonographic Industry. 1989 managed to chart within the top five of various European countries, reaching number one in the Netherlands, Ireland, and Norway, number two in Denmark, number three in Portugal and Switzerland, number four in Germany and Spain, and number five in Austria and Italy. In Oceania, the album peaked atop record charts of both Australia and New Zealand, and received nine times platinum and three times platinum certifications from the Australian Recording Industry Association and Recorded Music NZ, respectively. The album was similarly successful in Japan, where it reached number three and was certified platinum by the Recording Industry Association of Japan. It also became one of the best-selling digital albums in China, crossing one million sales units as of August 2019. According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, it was the second and third best-selling album of 2014 and 2015, respectively, and had sold 10.1 million copies worldwide by the end of 2016.

Retrospective appraisal and impact

Swift's transition to pop on 1989 is often cited as an example for a commercially successful crossover. By 2015, the album was the second album to spawn five or more US top-ten singles in the 2010s decade, following Katy Perry's Teenage Dream. Writing for New York magazine, Sasha Geffen attributed the album's commercial success to Swift's songwriting: in contrast to mainstream pop songs' themes of opulence and fame, 1989 relates to listeners about emotional hardship and breakups, "a reply to the aspirations of other pop songs, but aspirational all the same." Geffen further noted the album's reminiscence to 1990s pop, which was a refreshing move compared to her peers' hip hop/R&B crossover trends and helped the album "sell like it was the '90s again." Consequence of Sounds Michael Roffman compared 1989 to Michael Jackson's 1982 album Thriller, as both albums yielded a string of successful hits that became "part of our American life".
1989 was cited as an influence by British pop band The Vamps for their album Wake Up and American singer-songwriter Conan Gray, who found it "life changing". Jennifer Kaytin Robinson cited the album as an inspiration for her 2019 directorial debut Someone Great; she recalled that the album, specifically the track "Clean", was a source of emotional support to help her recover from her breakup. American rock singer-songwriter Ryan Adams released his track-by-track cover album of 1989 in September 2015. He frequently listened to the album, which he found to be a "joyful" record, to cope with his broken marriage in late 2014. On his rendition, Adams incorporated stripped-down, acoustic instruments of indie rock and country genres, which contrasts with the original's electronic production. Swift was delighted with Adams's cover, saying to him "what you did with my album was like actors changing emphasis".

Track listing

Personnel

Credits are adapted from liner notes of 1989.
;Studio locations
;Production
;Instruments

Weekly charts

Year-end charts

Chart Position
Australian Albums 3
Austrian Albums 47
Belgian Albums 33
Belgian Albums 125
Canadian Albums 1
Dutch Albums 35
French Albums 82
German Albums 56
Irish Albums 7
Japanese Albums 30
Mexican Albums 20
New Zealand Albums 7
Spanish Albums 56
Swiss Albums 40
UK Albums 6
US Billboard 2001

Chart Position
Australian Albums 17
Belgian Albums 94
Canadian Albums 17
New Zealand Albums 19
UK Albums 44
US Billboard 20017

Chart Position
Australian Albums 32
US Billboard 200101

Chart Position
Australian Albums 36
US Billboard 20082

Chart Position
Australian Albums 46
US Billboard 200116

Decade-end charts

All-time charts

Certifications and sales

Release history

Citations