Taylor Swift’s “Wooden” opens with instrumentation that sounds lifted straight from The Jackson 5’s “I Need You Again”: that driving four-beat drum sample, memorable bassline, syncopated rhythms, and distinctive high-pitched guitar riffs.
The disco-era groove sits to this point exterior her established palette that it takes a second to register what’s taking place. But the manufacturing isn’t essentially the most jarring ingredient.
As lyrical references accumulate, the tune reveals itself as maybe essentially the most intentionally provocative entry in her total catalog, buying and selling her normal poetic distance for unabashed directness.
The youthful, exuberant sound is sensible as a car for the content material, even when the pairing feels awkward at instances.
Swift selected pleasure and brightness to wrap what might in any other case really feel crass, a buoyant manufacturing that refuses to deal with sexual satisfaction as one thing requiring darkness or secrecy.
Swift described the monitor to Amazon Music as “a love story” constructed round superstitions like knocking on wooden, black cats, and different symbols of luck.
The tune begins genuinely harmless, nearly poetic. Swift sings “Daisy’s naked bare, I used to be distraught / He loves me not, he loves me not”, “Penny’s unfortunate, I took him again / After which stepped on a crack / And the black cat laughed”, exhibiting years of hysteria about romantic dangerous luck.
The pre-chorus affords tentative hope: “And, child, I’ll admit I’ve been just a little superstitious / Fingers crossed till you place your hand on mine”.
The repeated line “I ain’t gotta knock on wooden” suggests discovering the best particular person makes superstition irrelevant. At this stage, the monitor appears like a easy romantic anthem about getting previous relationship fears.
The flirtation begins with intelligent wordplay that doubles as particular nods to Travis Kelce. The obvious arrives within the second pre-chorus: “New Heights (New Heights) of manhood (Manhood)”, instantly referencing Kelce’s podcast, New Heights.
Swift introduces playful innuendo with “To know a tough rock is on the way in which” and “The curse on me was damaged by your magic wand”, staying simply sufficiently subtle whereas clearly speaking about intercourse.
Even “Redwood tree, it ain’t arduous to see” capabilities as each measurement metaphor and potential California reference. Swift packs in so many references that the tune seems like a personal joke between her and Kelce, with followers left to piece it collectively.
Then comes the shift from intelligent to specific. The post-chorus abandons all pretense: “Forgive me, it sounds cocky / He ah-matized me and opened my eyes / Redwood tree, it ain’t arduous to see / His love was the important thing that opened my thighs”.
Swift herself acknowledged this descent, admitting on The Tonight Present that the tune began in “a really harmless place” however she doesn’t know “how we received right here.” The completed tune celebrates sexual satisfaction extra instantly than even “Gown” or “Responsible as Sin?”
The playful power didn’t cease on the studio. When Travis Kelce and his brother Jason mentioned the monitor on their New Heights podcast, the trade completely mirrored the tune’s cheeky spirit.
Jason pressed his brother on whether or not he felt “cocky” concerning the “Redwood tree” reference, then supplied his personal self-deprecating various: if somebody wrote a tune about him, it will reference a “Japanese maple” as an alternative.
Travis, ever the diplomat, deflected with affection reasonably than bravado, insisting he merely loves Swift and appreciates any reference she makes.
Jason’s take (that the tune’s “wooden innuendos” are “infantile sufficient for me that I can get on board”) sums up what makes the tune work. It refuses to take itself significantly, and neither ought to its viewers.
The place “Gown” or “Responsible as Sin?” succeeded with sultry suggestion, “Wooden” succeeds by being intentionally, hilariously overt.
This campy, unserious tone is one thing she has lengthy included (coming from her nation roots) however by no means utilized so explicitly to sexuality.
What makes the monitor work is its sheer liberation: Swift, as a 30-something lady, is just having enjoyable and refusing to be held to the asexual “good lady” normal some nonetheless impose upon her.
It is a celebration of happiness and sexual satisfaction. Whether or not you discover it cheesy or triumphantly humorous, “Wooden” is arguably essentially the most talked-about, unapologetic declaration of affection (and lust) in her profession. Typically, a profitable soiled joke is healthier than a dissertation.
