You may think this is an odd claim; this song seems pretty straightforward in most regards. Taylor has said before that this is a love song her to her whole crew while on tour, especially her band. This reading certainly holds up; there are many lines that can't really be read any other way.
"We were the kings and the queens
And they read off our names"
"I said remember this feeling
I passed the pictures around
Of all the years that we stood there on the sidelines
Wishing for right now"
"'Cause for a moment a band of thieves in ripped up jeans got to rule the world"
This song in a nutshell
There's no doubt that Taylor wrote this song for her whole production team when you read these lines. The ambiguity comes from other lines that focus the scope down to just one other person. While this performer is never explicitly framed as a love interest there are some lines that really make you wonder.
"Can you take a moment
Promise me this:
That you'll stand by me forever
But if God forbid fate should step in
And force us into a goodbye
If you have children someday
When they point to the pictures
Please tell them my name"
Plus some others which just single people out.
"We are the kings and the queens
You traded your baseball cap for a crown"
"You held your head like a hero
On a history book page"
So what's going on? If this song is supposed to be a straightforward show of gratitude to the people who make her shows possible then why confuse the audience by focusing the lyrics on just one person? As I see it there are four possibilities.
1. The Trees in the Forest
Bands are composed of people. Maybe when she singles those people out it's to pay homage to details about actual people that have helped make her work possible. This theory is by far the least interesting among the possibilities so let's just move on.
2. Superposition
A single phrase can have more than one meaning. Taylor may have written this song for her band and for a man in her life that she was entangled with in a more romantic way. Certain lyrics only work with one or the other, but most can be interpreted as being about both one person and many. The following lines could be about just one person or a whole group. Taylor may have intentionally made this unclear so that one song can fulfill multiple purposes.
"And they read off our names
The night you danced like you knew our lives"
"Singing long live all the mountains we moved
I had the time of my life
Fighting dragons with you
And long, long live the look on your face
And bring on all the pretenders
One day, we will be remembered"
English has some issues with its pronouns, including a notable lack or a second person plural pronoun. If you're from the American South you may use "y'all", but the rest of us have to use "you all", "you guys", or just "you". This typically only leads to confusion, but Long Live manages to turn this weakness in English into a strength. Lines using "you" can be interpreted to be about just one guy or her whole band. This subtle double meaning has led people to hear this song in completely different ways which I think is very interesting, especially considering how straightforward the lyrics seem at first.
It's like how some people see a duck and others see white and gold
3. You. Yes, you!
There is a chance that this song was written about no single person in particular. Taylor may have included lines singling out single people to make the audience feel like the song is more about them. Think about it, I think this song wouldn't be quite as compelling if it was only about hey band. By inventing a fictional character, the listener gets to feel as if they were a part of the action making it a lot more emotional. This option is the one discussed the least (with the exception of my final, original theory), probably because it requires reading into decisions made during the songwriting process with more depth than is usually necessary. Luckily that has become my forte.
4. The Royal We
Hey, that's the title! So, some royalty does this thing where the monarchs refers to themselves with plural pronouns. It's supposed to indicate an allegiance with a higher power, but it stuck because it makes you sound really cool. My original theory is that this was Taylor's secret intention here. If you replace all the instances of "we" with "I" in this song then it totally changes meaning in the most hilarious way possible. It goes from a humble union or musicians to an egomaniacal self-view on the par with literal royalty. Considering the imagery of royalty utilized in this song it might just be more valid than you expect. But hey, that's just a theory. A Taylor Swift theory.
See you tomorrow,
-C
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