Saying this song is average is like saying the average human has one breast and one testicle. It's technically true, but in a very counter intuitive way. In the same fashion, I think Look What You Made Me Do alternates between being great and awful which makes it, on average, totally normal.
I'm just going to say it: I hate the chorus to this song. I find it musically uninteresting and lyrically lazy. "Look what you made me do" is a good line, but it can't hold up a song on it's own. I will admit that it's good at getting stuck in your head, but not for the right reasons. Taylor's best hooks are so catchy because of the melodic way they present relatable ideas. Pure repetition might make for a good earworm, but critically it doesn't set a song up for success. The only redeeming part of the chorus is that it has nearly the exact same cadence as I'm Too Sexy by Right Said Fred. If you weren't already aware of this similarity then I'm sorry because it's impossible to unhear.
I haven't been able to find an actual statement on how this came to be, but my guess is that it was a complete coincidence and they only realized it after the production was nearing it's end. To avoid legal action they actually have the three main members of Right Said Fred listed as songwriters, something they weren't even aware of until the song was released.
So what can make up for what is arguably Taylor's worst chorus? Well, it would take a lot, and surprisingly the rest of the song delivers. It has an incredibly strong intro and does a great job of building tension. It starts small and quiet, and when the bridge rolls around it really brings the energy up and promises a more exciting chorus than what we get. Like I said, I think the chorus fails to deliver, but that doesn't make these good sections of the song worse by themselves.
When it comes to sound design, I think this song is top notch. It has a very unique style that it goes all in for, and I think that it really works with Taylor's performance for almost all of the song. I do feel that this style somewhat put Taylor in the corner when trying to write the chorus because it would have been very strange for this song to have a high energy chorus. So I'm not really sure what I wanted, but this wasn't it.
But what about the song's subject matter? Again, some people love it and some hate it. My gut tells me that it's pretty dumb to hate this song just because of it's petty subject, but I will reiterate that a song written out of spite will have a harder time delivering a message that's compelling over many listens.
So is this the worst song Taylor has ever written? Yes, but also no. It's complicated! As a whole, this song is on the weaker half of Reputation, but does having extreme highs and lows make a song better or worse than the sum of it's parts? There's no way I can answer that today, but I will be trying to address it a little in the remaining days of this project. Until then, have a good one!
See you tomorrow,
-C
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