Sorry, Tay Tay, but I’d rather not know which ex you’re dissing next

A band I like released a new album six weeks ago, and I’ve only just found out about it. No countdown had taken over my social media feed; no hive buzzed with speculation about which track might be about which of the frontman’s glamorous and toxic ex-girlfriends. There was no weeks-long teaser campaign, no elaborate puzzle that, once decoded, revealed that you are the biggest, best, most dedicated, most rabid fan; basically their real-life best friend.

When I put the album on, I nod along, hum to a hook that will stay stuck in my head for a week, and discover something curious and quite unfamiliar: missing context.

Credit: Robin Cowcher

They sing about a girl with famous friends, they try to win her back with a pick-up truck full of pink carnations, and they don’t even try to fill in the blank spots. Who is this messy-haired rogue they’re talking about? What films do I know her from? When is the album that tells her side of the story coming out?

There’s no huge map on the wall, no push pins, no red twine drawing lines between rumours and open secrets, no dots to connect between public feuds and fan lore. There’s no backstory detailed enough to fill an encyclopaedia or warrant a university elective. There’s no homework. I couldn’t even tell you the lead singer’s name, or where they’re from.

I didn’t know that was allowed any more. This just isn’t the way music is sold now. It’s never ambiguous, only mysterious. Permission to invent our own meaning has been revoked.

The way Dickens and Capote told their stories week to week, month to month, musicians now chronicle their stories album to album, era to era. It’s a serial. It’s a narrative. It’s a treasure hunt. It forges a community and creates its very own cinematic universe, each line and bar a brushstroke in the masterpiece that is a teen idol.

I know we’re both thinking about the same pop star right now. I tried really hard not to bring her up, but it’s almost impossible to avoid. We passed saturation point a few weeks ago, and with 10 months left on her global tour and a chokehold on pop culture so tight that her dinner plans make the homepage of national broadsheets, relief isn’t coming any time soon. If we don’t already know everything about her, the new album being released in April will surely fill any gaps.

She didn’t invent the art of a smear campaign via songwriting, or even perfect it; she’s just following the footsteps of the folk and soft rock foremothers. Once again, and on a bigger scale than ever before, the only thing catchier and more compelling than the song itself is the story behind it. On the eve of every new release or re-release comes some version of the same viral sentiment, “[insert famous ex-boyfriend’s name here] must be terrified right now”. Out comes the track list, and out come our magnifying glasses. It’s almost compulsory. Will I ever see a red scarf again and only see a red scarf, or has a certain chart-topping hit forever turned them into a metaphor?

She’s not the only one. It now takes a cipher to be anyone’s fan. You feel, somehow, like you get less out of the work if you don’t know the story behind every lyric. It’s not just a catchy line, it’s an inside joke, and you’re the only one who doesn’t get it.

Thanks to the Spotify algorithm, I know everything about an ex-Disney star’s divorce, what happened in that elevator, how a British rock star fell out of love with an it-girl, and all the tortured details of a love triangle between three people I’d never heard of until one of them wrote a song about getting her driver’s licence.

Maybe my 30s and the cultural decay of late-stage capitalism has turned me cynical, but it’s all suddenly too transparent to enjoy. Gossip isn’t a side effect of fame, it’s a strategy, and some superstars play it better than others. Next time one of them complains about their privacy’s erasure, we all might shrug, point to their streaming numbers, and tell them to take it up with their marketing manager.

The next track plays. The nameless singer from that band I like starts telling a story about attending a wedding and finding himself so heartbroken watching an old flame marry someone else that his only recourse is to vomit in the aisle. It’s unhinged and unbelievable and kind of fantastic: I have no idea who he’s talking about. I hope I never do.

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