"This is your moment! This is your time!" Justin Michael Williams shouts on his latest single, "I Am Enough," before closing with several choruses of "We are enough." The inspiring song is part of a larger project launched in February: the three-song I Am Enough EP, which also features two chilled-out meditation mixes of the single, and a hefty book entitled "STAY WOKE: A Meditation Guide for the Rest of Us."

A key element of this project is the Stay Woke, Give Back Tour where Williams brings his book and its vision of helping its readers create a personalized meditation practice that awakens their true passion and purpose to lower-income schools around the country. Each tour date, which will resume in the fall, begins with a lively school assembly where he sings "I Am Enough" and other songs with the students, leads them through meditation and gives everyone a free book to take home and dive into at their own pace. Each stop also includes a free, all-ages event for the public in the evening, to bring more people in the community into the experience.

The first tour stop was in Williams hometown of Pittsburg, Calif. in late February, followed by one in Atlanta. The tour will resume when it is safe to do so later this year, with stops to be slated for Flint, Mich., Chicago, Los Angeles, Miami, New York and more. We caught up with the L.A.-based inspirational powerhouse over the phone after his first stop to hear from him about the experience, writing "Stay Woke," I Am Enough and his personal journey to step into his own power.

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What inspired you to write "I Am Enough" and how do you hope listeners will use its message?

I think for so many of us—I said something like this in the beginning of the book—we close our eyes and we can see these lives that we haven't started living yet. We can see all these things that we want to do, whether it's our art, our music, or the relationship we want, the job, or the body or whatever it is. And so many times we feel like we are not enough for those things and we dream too small or we sabotage ourselves.

My big mission with this song in particular, with everything going on in the world today and in our lives, I just wanted a song that can inspire and empower us to feel like something greater is possible. It feels so necessary in 2020. And to have it be a song that wasn't another "We Are the World." That wasn't that kind of a vibe, but just has the pop anthemic feel with the mantra in the song, "I am enough."

What I love about the song is it always gets stuck in people's heads. And I think of how powerful it is to have the words "I am enough" stuck in your head. That's such a cool thing to have stuck in your head versus, like, "all my friends are dead."

So, that's what I hope people will take from that message—that no matter what they're going through in their life, no matter what they've been through, no matter what color their skin is, or who they love, they are enough as they are, to go after the dreams and whatever change they want to see in the world.

"No matter what they're going through in their life, no matter what they've been through, no matter what color their skin is, or who they love, they are enough as they are, to go after the dreams and whatever change they want to see in the world."

I love that. What's the yoga where you just chant? It can be really powerful, but not everyone's going to connect with it.

Kirtan. Thank you. One of the other things I feel called to say, which I think is what stops so many of us. There's this [scared inner] child, no matter how much we achieve, no matter how successful we get, no matter how old we are. That's why in the song I say, "little boy don't cry, little girl don't cry."

People come to my concerts and events who are upwards in their 60s and 70s, all the way down to kids that are 11, 12, 13, and the thing we have in common is there seems to be, no matter what, this kind of child inside of each of us, that really just needs to know, "I got you. You are enough." And be reminded, especially in those moments when we feel like we're not enough, or we can't.

And the kind of spoken-word part. That's you too, right? Do you feel it's different sides or voices of yourself?

Yeah, totally. I'm so glad you asked me. You're the first person to ask that. What I actually did, it was actually the last part of the song that got inserted. The song was already mixed and everything, but something was missing. I just felt it. And my vision was I wanted it to be processed, almost like a Martin Luther King Jr. speech vocal. Like an old vocal, scratchy and kind of screaming. I did it on a super old microphone.

The reason why I felt the talking was important for me too is because I am a musician and a transformational speaker. That is what I do. In the past, I've always had Justin the speaker and Justin the musician. And now what's amazing is they've come together, so I'm trying to integrate them in the best way possible, both sides.

I want to talk about the "Meditation Mix" versions of "I Am Enough" too. Can you tell us about the vision behind that, and about your collaborator Jon Chau?

Jon Chau really did some amazing work. The two reasons there's a shortened version and an extended version is—both of them kind of work for this—but the shortened version feels like something you can vibe out to or put on while you're working, studying, writing or creating. Oftentimes when people are working or focusing, there's music that's just cool random instrumental music. I wanted to make something that had the energy of "I Am Enough" embedded in it that was made specifically to help you get into a creative flow or focus. Not just random vibes.

And with the longer meditation mix, the reason that was done has a little science behind it. It is scientifically proven that the minimum amount of time you should meditate for it to have effects on you is 12 minutes, so that's why I made it that long. And when I was working with Jon he was like, "Do you have an example?" I'm like, "No." And this was the big reason why I did it, all of it is like cheesy nature sounds, and gongs and oceans and that's just the status quo of what we've come to accept mediation music is. But that's not actually the kind of music that most of us even like listening to.

My whole idea is to make meditation not this thing that feels like this other thing that's not for us, that's only for like this certain demographic and you have to be super hippy. This is actually for us. Its music that has the vibe that we already like, that's made for you to meditate to. Making it for this purpose was really important to me. At the beginning of the extended mix, the idea was to make it sound like crystal singing bowls, an electronic version of them, sweeping from side to side. We were trying to pull that energy through and in a new way.

You also recently released your book, "STAY WOKE." You've been touring its empowering message across the country. What do you hope readers will take away from "STAY WOKE"?

The starting point to the book was really, for me, when Trump got elected. I have been teaching mindfulness and meditation and to be totally honest with you, and I say this publicly all the time, I actually don't give a sh*t about meditation itself. I never set out to be a meditation teacher. The only reason I teach it and I got so passionate about sharing it with people, is because I grew up in a home, literally with gunshot holes etched on the outside of my house. I grew up in the hood in the Bay Area, with domestic violence, lots of stuff. And I've done therapy and all the different healing things, I've done ayahuasca. I've done everything to try to heal and overcome. The thing that has transformed my life the most, over everything, was a consistent meditation practice. And not a meditation practice to help you relax, that's good too, but a practice that actually helps you take action.

There's so much confusion about meditation. There are so many different styles and, for a lot of us, the style of trying to sit there and get your mind to stop thinking doesn't work. That's because we're modern people living in a high-tech world, we have all this sh*t to do and meditation techniques try to get you to disconnect from that. But what we want is not to disconnect, we want to connect, we want to connect more deeply to our passions and emotions and the causes we believe in. I think that's what the world needs today.

For me, meditation is about awareness. And right now, awareness is calling us to take action in our lives, for our families, for our communities, for the planet. When Trump got elected, I was like, "Okay, what do I do?" I think so many of us were there. I wasn't really engaged in politics or anything, social justice, I was kind of in the backseat. Going to Pride events, or going to a protest occasionally. And then it just came to me; for some people organizing, marching and fighting is their authentic way. But my authentic way is through my music and my teachings, showing people how to empower themselves and take action in this dark time.

"People always say we have the answers within, but nobody actually tells us how to get within. How do you get there? How do you heal it?"

People always say we have the answers within, but nobody actually tells us how to get within. How do you get there? How do you heal it? People try meditation apps. And for most, when they're really honest with me, they're like, "I tried it for like a week or two, but it didn't really stick. It didn't really work." But everyone's pretending their practices are really working for them. What I just found is a lot of the practices people are doing are just not the right recipe for them.

With my book, one of the things I use is what's called Freedom Meditation—the point of the book is to help you recognize the guru is within you. And I don't prescribe, "This is exactly what you need to do every day." I actually guide people through a process to go within and create their own practice that fits with their life. That is, for the amount of time you have, you self-generate the mantra, you decide what it's for, what it's leading you towards. And the whole book is guiding you through, kind of like a cookbook, but with fill-in the blanks that help you create the recipe for your freedom meditation practice.

I'm going on and on, you can obviously tell I'm really passionate about this. [Laughs.] But to answer the second part of your question, I hope people get a deep connection with their intuition, with their higher self, with their sense of empowerment, that can help them step in fully to the lives that they were born to live. It's meditation for the rest of us, for people who have felt left out, disengaged from the conversation. People of color, the marginalized, people of all kinds, and even people who are not marginalized but who understand why that's important.

I think, for so many people, you don't know where to start. It's like "I don't know how to listen to what I need because I've been ignoring it for the last 20 years." So I really like the guided workflow concept of your book.

I love that you said therapy too. I found the meditation and therapy combo to work, and the science actually backs it too, about meditation basically amplifying everything else you're doing. Because if you're doing therapy but you don't have a practice of being self-aware, you're not actually going that deep. Doing meditation helps you actually really go in and understand what's happening inside of you so that you can even bring more to your therapy practices or integrate more.

One of the things I talked about on my last tour stop is how we're kind of in this wellness renaissance, and all these practices—astrology, crystals, tarot cards, honoring the earth, meditation, everything—come from marginalized people and people of color originally. From Latino cultures, indigenous cultures, African cultures, Asian cultures. Over the years, these things have been, co-opted, colonized, demonized, and now corporatized and sold back in a way that people feel like, "Oh, that's not for us. I don't relate to that." But what's happening now, as different marginalized groups are coming back to these practices and infusing it with our different cultures and our different lenses, what I keep finding is they feel like they're coming home. Like, "Whoa, this really works." That's because these practices literally come from us. And so it's this reclaiming happening I find really, really powerful.

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That's such a good point. And I feel like that gets overlooked a lot in media coverage and general discourse around, whatever it's being called now, "alternative practices."

And that's why it's such a huge mission for me to change the iconography. With the images and photos in the book too, I'm changing the image of what we see as meditation. On the last stop, I was in a community that's 40 percent Latino, 35 percent African-American, 25 percent Filipino and Asian. And there were 3,500 kids that I spoke in front of. It's so huge, to hundreds and hundreds of them now engaging with this practice.

Before my first presentation, I typed in "meditation" on Google—I wanted to see how long it would take me to find a picture of a black man meditating. And before I saw a picture of a black man meditating in the Google search results, I found a picture that someone made of a dog meditating. Of course, we also relate to this stuff, but the current image is not actually what's true. What's true is we are waking up, we are stepping up and we are claiming this movement, all people, not just black people, but queer people, trans people, everybody. We're stepping into it.

I would love to hear more about the book tour and the idea behind it, as you're directly reaching out to the communities you think will really benefit from the tools it offers. And then, about some of your experiences from your first stops.

The tour has been so fascinating. So, my publisher, Sounds True, is the biggest spirituality and mind/body publisher, so obviously, they're very white. I finished the book and they introduced me to the press tour team, and they're like, "We're going to go on a national book tour to the Upper West Side in New York and to Colorado." I'm like, "Ya'll, that's not why I wrote this book. We can go there, but that can't be the only thing." And they were like, "What do you want to do?"

I actually had this idea that I can't even say I had. You know when you're meditating and you have an idea just plugged into your brain like a flash drive? I don't know if that's happened to you, but that was my experience. And I had the idea that we go to high schools and we go to colleges in underprivileged communities all around the country, South Side Chicago, Atlanta, Oakland, Flint, with the water crisis, Miami. We go to these communities that aren't getting access to this and we give them all a free book, but most importantly, we do an event that brings this content into their context and reaches the kids in a way they feel is fun and accessible, and they can relate to. Some of these practices we take so damn seriously, it's so damn somber and still and kids are not going to jump into that.

So, the events are kind of like a TED Talk meets a concert, and I really incorporated music throughout. "I Am Enough" is a huge theme throughout it. We had 1,800 kids in each assembly, in total silence with their hands over their heart, saying, "I am enough." They create their own mantra they then can take and use in their lives and they're being taught by somebody who looks like them, who relates to them because I've gone through what they've gone through. After the event, kids were coming up to me, 14-year-olds, saying, "Can you give me advice on coming out to my parents?" Really opening up.

Anyway, what we're doing with the Sounds True Foundation, we've been raising money and we built a little website, staywokegiveback.org. It's like a Kickstarter website, but they're a 501(c)(3), and people can donate as little as $8 or like, as big as $15,000—with that I can come to whatever city they want. It started with three cities and now we're [going to be] in 15, with more getting added every week. We added three cities last week. That's how much this movement has been moving.

It's been really cool. The kids are thinking they're coming to an empowerment assembly, we don't really tell them they're getting free books or that it's about meditation. It's kind of a surprise to them. And they're kind of just in some hokey talk. Instead, I'm down in the audience and they're screaming and singing along. It's like a huge party. It ranges from being hands-over-the-heart and soft, to kids up and dancing, singing "I Am Enough."

It's never been done. We've ditched the traditional book tour model altogether. I go to a school during the day and then have an event at night that's open to the public for anyone to come. All the events are totally free and the schools don't pay for anything. We come in, give all the books, and we do sound, lighting, everything covered.

It's cool that it's already growing so fast. I'm sure it's one of those things that's going to keep morphing and expanding in ways you can't predict right now.

And this is the tie-together too, the music piece is really important. Because if it's just me up there talking, then I'm just another lecturer, one of their teachers. Music is the thing, over anything, over any language, throughout all of human history that gets us to feel something. Before I can get these kids to commit to trying a practice, to commit to believing in themselves, I need them to feel inside that they are enough. I need them to get to that place, and the easiest way in is through music. That's why I use that as a gateway in and then they're open to going into the practice. It's kind of like the sugar that makes the medicine go down.

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I want to zoom out a bit and learn more about your journey. When did you first start making or getting curious about making music? Do you have a point where you remember envisioning yourself as a recording artist?

Yeah, it's a really interesting story and I think something a lot of people share. I always wanted to do music ever since I was a little boy. When I present, I show a slide up on the screen of me at four with a guitar and a microphone over my ear. But I grew up getting teased and bullied really bad at school. I had to switch schools, kids jumped out of trees choking me, because I was a little black boy who was clearly feminine and gay, even before I knew what gay meant, growing up in the hood. When that happens and you're different, it's not safe.

So I hid that part of me forever. I always wanted to do music but I let the kids who teased me, make me think I sucked at everything. I stopped myself because of the bullying. I decided, because I grew up—I wouldn't say we were poor, but if somebody missed a paycheck, we'd be in big trouble. My coping mechanism was, "I'm going to be really successful, really smart, make a lot of money and get out of here and show everybody." That kind of was my driving force.

I got a full-ride scholarship to go to UCLA. I wanted to do musical theater, but I decided to do marketing because I wanted to do something, "safe and successful." I literally let the music dream completely die until several years ago. My grandma, who I was super close to, got diagnosed with stage four cancer. It was a shock to our family. Doctors told her she had two months to live. She was pretty young, 67, and seemingly healthy.

When I got to her house, she asked me a question that changed my life. She said, "I'm watching your life. I'm going to ask you a question. If you were in my shoes and you knew you were going to die in two months, what would you do?" I was living, what most people would say was the dream. I had my own marketing company at 23 years old, driving a BMW, living within two blocks from the beach in Venice, making six figures with five employees and an office in Santa Monica. Someone who grew up in the hood.

I told my grandma, "I would drop every single thing that I've built. And I would record an album, I would do music." And she said, "I know. That's what you would do, because that's what you've always wanted since you were a little kid. I see you climbing up this marketing mountain and I'm afraid sometime later in your life, you're going to get to the top and be like, 'Damn it, I spent all this time climbing to the top of this mountain.' This is what's been placed inside of you and I just don't want it to die. You don't need to quit your whole life, you just need to incorporate music. This is your gift and I know how important this is to you."

So even though my grandma's death was the hardest thing I went through, it gave me the greatest gift because it actually helped me live. I promised her I would do an album. It took me years. I started taking voice, piano and guitar lessons and then writing and recording my first album. When I put it out [2016's Metamorphosis], it charted on the Top 20 of the iTunes pop charts, which was amazing. Because of my marketing background and speaking business, I was able to get it to chart. So that's what got me back into music. My first time in the studio ever was when I walked in to record the first song from my album.

And everybody said I couldn't do it. Everybody was telling me, even some people in my family, "Why are you doing this? You've spent all this time building up this marketing business." And I was like, "I didn't come here to just live. I want to be alive. I want to live this life fully." It was hard, but now seeing where I'm at now I could have never even dreamed it would get this cool.

Wow. What a beautiful gift your grandmother gave you.

Yeah, it was so hard but such a such an amazing gift. And she didn't get to see any of it; she only lived for nine months after that, but she's always with me.

When did you first get into meditation and at what point did you feel like you needed to share this practice with others?

It's like the perfect segue, because after I went to college, everything in my life, on the external, changed when I got to college. I was out of the closet, I had a full-ride scholarship so I had money for the first time. I went from living in the hood to living in Westwood. I was getting good grades, and I had done everything by the book. I was like, "I did everything. Now I'm supposed to be happy, right?" My whole life looked exactly like I had dreamed, if not better. But inside I still felt like that little boy who was on the outside of it. I couldn't be my authentic self, I didn't know how. I felt miserable inside. I think we all have this experience. It's like you mentioned at the beginning, trying to change the external to hopefully make the internal feel better.

I felt like I had been cheated. I was like, "I worked my whole life to do this and I'm not happy." When I was 18 or 19, in 2007, one of my mentors recommended I try meditation. You have to remember, Oprah had not done a meditation challenge yet. I was like, "Medi—what? Isn't that a cult?" I did not know what he was talking about.

I started first with yoga and got into meditation soon after. Then I met a teacher named Lorin Roche, who took me under his wing as a mentee and taught me everything he knew. He's a world-renowned meditation teacher and has written books that have been in print for like 30 years. Back then when I was 20, I was asking him, "Why are you doing this?" He charges $1,000 an hour to teach private meditation at big companies and literally I had him on like speed dial, talking multiple times a week.

He said, "In all my 30 years of teaching, I've never seen someone your age who looks like you and who's gone through what you've gone through and is interested in this practice. I think one day, there's going to be people who need to hear your voice who don't need to hear mine." So I apprenticed with him for three years and traveled and helped him build his teacher training program. And when that started taking off in the online world, I used my marketing to help take his business online. Then he was like, "I think you need to start teaching." And I said, "I don't need to teach meditation." To which he said, "It's just such a shame because so many people could use your voice."

So I just started hosting little classes which turned into big classes. That turned into 1,500 people livestreaming online, me going on tour with Wanderlust and Yoga Journal and all that kind of stuff. It just kind of happened. And I never intended to write a meditation book. If you had told me four years ago I would've done this, I would have said no way that's happening. But it just was one of those moments where I anchored into letting myself be of service. I let myself be a vessel to be used by the universe for the highest good and this is what came all the way through, and then music came along with it fully. And that's the thing I feel so grateful for. It feels like a privilege but also a responsibility to me. People are shocked that I've been teaching meditation for a decade. I'm only 32. I'm lucky enough to have the experience and the knowledge of somebody who's like double my age but I'm young enough that kids can still relate to me.

As we've been discussing, your work is such cool intersection of music, mindfulness and activism. What are your beliefs and hopes around music bringing forward important messages of change and social justice?

Yeah. That's really the whole message. What I know is the revolution we all want actually starts inside. And my mission and my message with music is even a song like "I Am Enough" is revolutionary—when you're a trans person singing that song, when you are a person who's grown up in poverty singing that song or a disabled person singing that song. Today, one of the schools' administrators sent me video from of one of their special-needs students, a young Latina girl, who went to one of the administrators singing "I Am Enough."

And that first step of stepping into your power inside is necessary for us to start creating change in the world. As we look at the past, I think what we've all learned now, our generation and the generations after us, is if we don't take care of ourselves, we are internalizing the same oppression that we're trying to fight against.

And it's not self-care like get a massage every week. That's great, but I'm talking about really focusing on the internal and really empowering ourselves. My mission and my commitment with music moving forward is to make music that connects us to that something greater that lives inside of each and every one of us. That isn't limited by your religion, race, gender, who you love or your identity. That connects us into that power of something greater so that we can see and make the change that we want in the world. That's the kind of music I want to make and it doesn't mean that I'm going to just make motivation music always. But I want it to have a message, even if it is about mourning or loss or whatever, that connects us into this space of possibility. That's really my mission.

What advice do you have for young people who feel at odds with the world and want to make a difference but don't know where to start?

So many of us feel like we don't get involved because we don't know what to do or how to do it or we feel like beginners or we're not sure where we would make an impact. And I think the most important thing we have to first do is unapologetically decide what causes or missions we authentically care about most. In the book I call this your justice values. It's a practice on page 264 [called "Become A Better Activist (A How-To Guide)"]. It's your values, we all have them. And it's not saying you don't care about other things. But if you spread yourself too thin, it's just like, "Well, I don't know what to do, because there's so much going on." We're all getting overwhelmed with that because in the media right now there's so much going on.

When you know your values, or what really fires you up, what makes you feel angry, what makes you feel like you want to fight towards something, then the question is, "How do you use your talents, gifts, skills and these things that you believe in and care about to help serve the world and other people?" Sometimes people think the only way to be involved in activism is by organizing and protesting, but it's not. I am an example of that, my form of activism is teaching meditation and using music. So what is it that the you have? Do you write? Do you have poetry? Do you want to volunteer somewhere? Is there anything that you can do that would help use your voice on the right side of this movement, the movement for change?

I ask people to look inside themselves, and the book really guides people. I have a whole section on meditation for social justice. The book guides people through processes of how to go in to see and discover "What is the way that I can authentically get involved in the movement?" And the most important thing is just to try. And there are thousands of organizations out in the world that are fighting for the same mission you care about. A quick Google search will lead you to one of them and you can see how to get involved. The most important thing is just start by doing something, don't get overwhelmed by the options, take the thing that really fires you up the most and take action towards it.

"The most important thing is just start by doing something, don't get overwhelmed by the options, take the thing that really fires you up the most and take action towards it."

I think that's such a good reminder that all you need to do is take that first step. I feel it's so easy for us to think of what's out of our control, but if we just do one thing tomorrow, we have no idea what the year-from-now version of that thing will be.

Yeah, absolutely. And that's the big thing, what are your gifts and talents and skills? And I have marketing as a skill of mine and some people have drawing or whatever, contribute that. If they work at a bank and they're good at accounting, how many nonprofits need help with accounting? You know what I mean? We think of our professional lives and our passions as separate things from our political and activism lives. What we actually need, and what really meditation and yoga and all of it helps us remember, is that it's all about integration and union and when we do that, we can all really help.

I think it comes back to what I was saying in the beginning, that ultimately what I want with this book, and what I believe meditation is calling us to do right now, is to not just sit our asses on our meditation cushion and send love and light. That's important. But more importantly, what it's calling us to do right now is to do something. The reason why meditation is such an important precursor to doing is because we first drop into our hearts and do it from that space versus doing from our heads and ego.

What I keep finding, like you said, especially with this book and not expecting it to be this way, is when you drop into this heart space and you show up, the universe has a plan that's bigger for your life than you could have ever dreamed of. We just have to take the step and let it lead us forward, and remember we're enough.

Thundercat’s New Album Is A Balm For Troubled Times

"...and you're watching Disney Channel!" For anyone who grew up in the 2000s, those five words likely trigger some pretty vivid imagery: a glowing neon wand, an outline of Mickey Mouse's ears, and every Disney star from Hilary Duff to the Jonas Brothers. 

Nearly 20 years later, many of those child stars remain instantly recognizable — and often mononymous — to the millions of fans who grew up with them: Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez and Demi Lovato. Nick, Kevin and Joe. 

Each of those names has equally memorable music attached to it — tunes that often wrap any given millennial in a blanket of nostalgia for a time that was, for better or for worse, "So Yesterday." And all of those hits, and the careers that go with them, have the same starting point in Hollywood Records, Disney Music Group's pop-oriented record label.

This time in Disney's history — the core of which can be traced from roughly 2003 to 2010 — was impactful on multiple fronts. With its music-oriented programming and multi-platform marketing strategies, the network launched a procession of teen idols whose music would come to define the soundtrack to millennials' lives, simultaneously breaking records with its Disney Channel Original Movies, TV shows and soundtracks.

Now, two decades later, Disney Music Group launched the Disney 2000s campaign, honoring the pivotal, star-making era that gave fans a generation of unforgettable pop music. The campaign will last through August and lead directly into D23 2024: The Ultimate Fan Event with special vinyl releases of landmark LPs and nostalgic social media activations occurring all summer long. April's campaign activation was Disney 2000s Weekend at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood, which featured special screenings of 2008's Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert and 2009's Hannah Montana: The Movie and Jonas Brothers: The 3D Concert Experience.

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But before Miley and the JoBros, Hollywood Records' formula for creating relatable (and bankable) teen pop stars began with just one name: Hilary Duff. At the time, the bubbly blonde girl next door was essentially the face of the network thanks to her starring role in "Lizzie McGuire," and she'd just made the leap to the big screen in the summer of 2003 with The Lizzie McGuire Movie. In her years with Disney, Duff had dabbled in recording songs for Radio Disney, and even released a Christmas album under Buena Vista Records. However, her first album with Hollywood Records had the potential to catapult her from charming tween ingénue to bonafide teen pop star — and that's exactly what it did.

Released on August 26, 2003, Duff's Metamorphosis sold more than 200,000 copies in its first week and debuted at No. 2 on the Billboard 200. The following week, the bubblegum studio set performed the rare feat of rising from No. 2 to No. 1, making the then-16-year-old Duff the first solo artist under 18 to earn a No. 1 album since Britney Spears.

The album's immediate success was no fluke: Within a matter of months, Metamorphosis had sold 2.6 million copies. Music videos for its radio-friendly singles "So Yesterday" and "Come Clean" received constant airplay between programming on the Disney Channel. (The latter was eventually licensed as the theme song for MTV's pioneering teen reality series "Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County," giving it an additional boost as a cultural touchstone of the early '00s.) A 33-date North American tour soon followed, and Hollywood Records officially had a sensation on their hands. 

Naturally, the label went to work replicating Duff's recipe for success, and even looked outside the pool of Disney Channel stars to develop new talent. Another early signee was Jesse McCartney. With a soulful croon and blonde mop, the former Dream Street member notched the label another big win with his 2004 breakout hit "Beautiful Soul."

"When 'Beautiful Soul' became the label's first No. 1 hit at radio, I think that's when they really knew they had something," McCartney tells GRAMMY.com. "Miley [Cyrus] and the Jonas Brothers were signed shortly after that success and the rest is history.

"The thing that Disney really excelled at was using the synergy of the channel with promoting songs at pop," he continues. "I did appearances on 'Hannah Montana' and 'The Suite Life of Zack & Cody' and my music videos were pushed to Disney Channel. The marketing was incredibly brilliant and I don't think there has been anything as connected with an entire generation like that since then."

By 2006, Disney had nearly perfected its synergistic formula, continually launching wildly popular tentpole franchises like High School Musical and The Cheetah Girls, and then giving stars like Vanessa Hudgens and Corbin Bleu recording contracts of their own. (Curiously, the pair's HSM co-star Ashley Tisdale was never signed to Hollywood Records, instead releasing her first two solo albums with Warner.) 

Aly Michalka showed off her vocal chops as sunny girl next door Keely Teslow on "Phil of the Future," and fans could find her off-screen as one half of sibling duo Aly & AJ. In between their 2005 debut album Into the Rush and its electro-pop-charged follow-up, 2007's Insomniatic, Aly and her equally talented younger sister, AJ, also headlined their own Disney Channel Original Movie, Cow Belles. (Duff also helped trailblaze this strategy with her own early DCOM, the ever-charming Cadet Kelly, in 2002, while she was simultaneously starring in "Lizzie McGuire.")

Even after years of proven success, the next class of stars became Disney's biggest and brightest, with Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez, Demi Lovato and the Jonas Brothers all joining the network — and record label — around the same time. "Hannah Montana" found Cyrus playing a spunky middle schooler by day and world-famous pop star by night, and the network leveraged the sitcom's conceit to give the Tennessee native (and daughter of '90s country heartthrob Billy Ray Cyrus) the best of both worlds. 

After establishing Hannah as a persona, the series' sophomore soundtrack introduced Miley as a pop star in her own right thanks to a clever double album that was one-half Hannah's music and one-half Miley's. It's literally there in the title: Hannah Montana 2: Meet Miley Cyrus.

From there, Cyrus' stardom took off like a rocket as she scored back-to-back No.1 albums and a parade of Top 10 hits like "See You Again," "7 Things," "The Climb," "Can't Be Tamed," and the ever-so-timeless anthem "Party in the U.S.A."

At the same time, Gomez had top billing on her own Disney Channel series, the magical (but less musical) "Wizards of Waverly Place." That hardly stopped her from launching her own music career, though, first by fronting Selena Gomez & the Scene from 2008 to 2012, then eventually going solo with the release of 2013's Stars Dance after the "Wizards" finale aired.

For her part, Lovato — Gomez's childhood bestie and "Barney & Friends" costar — got her big break playing Mitchie Torres in Camp Rock alongside the Jonas Brothers as fictional boy band Connect 3, led by Joe Jonas as the swaggering and floppy-haired Shane Gray. Much like Duff had five years prior in the wake of The Lizzie McGuire Movie, Lovato released her debut solo album, 2008's Don't Forget, just three months after her DCOM broke records for the Disney Channel. 

Building off their chemistry from the movie musical, nearly the entirety of Don't Forget was co-written with the Jonas Brothers, who released two of their own albums on Hollywood Records — 2007's Jonas Brothers and 2008's A Little Bit Longer — before getting their own short-lived, goofily meta Disney series, "Jonas," which wrapped weeks after the inevitable Camp Rock sequel arrived in September 2010.

As the 2000s gave way to the 2010s, the Disney machine began slowing down as its cavalcade of stars graduated to more grown-up acting roles, music and careers. But from Duff's Metamorphosis through Lovato's 2017 LP, Tell Me You Love Me, Hollywood Records caught lightning in a bottle again and again and again, giving millennials an entire generation of talent that has carried them through adulthood and into the 2020s.

To commemorate the Disney 2000s campaign, GRAMMY.com crafted a playlist to look back on Disney's golden age of pop with favorite tracks from Hilary Duff, Vanessa Hudgens, the Jonas Brothers, Miley Cyrus and more. Listen and reminisce below.

Editor’s note: This story was updated on April 19 to reflect the release of The Tortured Poets Department.

The world now knows Taylor Swift as a global pop superstar, but back in 2006, she was just a doe-eyed country prodigy. Since then, she's released 11 studio albums, re-recorded four as "Taylor's Version," and cultivated one of the most feverish fan bases in music. Oh, and she's also won 14 GRAMMY Awards, including four for Album Of The Year — the most ever won by an artist.

Swift has become one of music's most notable shapeshifters by refusing to limit herself to one genre, moving between country, pop, folk and beyond. A once-in-a-lifetime generational storyteller, one could argue that she is music's modern-day maverick, constantly evolving both her music and the culture around her.

Every album era has seen Swift reinvent herself over and over, which has helped pave the way for artists to explore other musical avenues. In turn, Swift hasn't just become one of the biggest artists of all time — she's changed pop music altogether.

To celebrate Taylor Swift's newest era with The Tortured Poets Department, GRAMMY.com looks back on all of her albums (Taylor's Versions not included) and how each era shaped her remarkable career.

Taylor Swift: Finding Her Place In Music

In a genre dominated by men, the odds were already stacked against Swift when she first broke into country music as a teenage female artist. The thing that differentiated her from other writers — and still does to this day — is her songwriting. She didn't want to be just "another girl singer" and knew writing her own songs would be what set her apart. 

Written throughout her adolescence, Taylor Swift was recorded at the end of 2005 and finalized by the time Swift finished her freshman year of high school. Serving as a snapshot of Swift's life and teenhood, she avoided songwriting stereotypes typically found in country music. Instead, she wanted to capture the years of her life while they still represented what she was going through, writing about what she was observing and experiencing, from love and friendship to feeling like an outsider. 

As a songwriter, Taylor Swift set the tone for what would be expected of her future recordings — all songs were written by her, some solely and others with one or two co-writers. One writer in particular, Liz Rose, applauded Swift's songwriting capabilities, stating that she was more of an "editor" for the songs because Swift already had such a distinct vision. 

The album's lead single, "Tim McGraw," an acoustic country ballad inspired by Swift knowing her relationship was going to end, represents an intricate part of Swift's songwriting process; meticulously picking apart her emotions to better understand them. With its follow-up, "Our Song" — which spent six consecutive weeks on the top of Billboard's Hot Country Songs chart — she became the youngest person to solely write and sing a No. 1 country single; she also became the first female solo artist in country music to write or co-write every song on an album. 

Although Swift's eponymous debut is underappreciated now — even lacking its own set on Swift's Eras Tour — Taylor Swift's forthcoming rerecording is arguably the most anticipated by fans, who are eager to hear the songs with the singer's current and more refined vocals. Still, for fans who haven't properly explored Taylor Swift, it's easy to tie together Swift's earlier work to her current discography. 

On the track "A Place In This World," a song she wrote when she was just 13, Swift sings about not fitting in and trying to find her path. While her songwriting has developed and matured, feeling like an outsider and carving her own path is a theme she still writes about now, as seen on Midnights' "You're On Your Own, Kid." 

Even as a new country artist, critics claimed that she "mastered" the genre while subsequently ushering it to a new era — one that would soon see Swift dabble in country-pop. 

Fearless: Creating A Different Kind Of Fairytale

If Taylor Swift was the soundtrack to navigating the early stages of teenhood, Fearless is Swift's coming-of-age record. More than its predecessor, Fearless blurs the line between country and pop thanks to crossover hits like "Love Story" and "You Belong With Me," yet still keeps the confessional attributes known in country songwriting. 

Most of Fearless is Swift coming to terms with what she believed love to be. On the album's liner notes, Swift says Fearless is about "living in spite" of the things that scare you, like falling in love again despite being hurt before or walking away and letting go. The 2008 version of Taylor wanted to "believe in love stories and prince charmings and happily ever after," whereas in Swift's Fearless (Taylor's Version) liner notes, she looks back on the album as a diary where she was learning "tiny lessons" every time there was a "new crack in the facade of the fairytale ending she'd been shown in the movies." 

Much of Fearless also sees Swift being reflective and nostalgic about adolescence, like in "Never Grow Up" and "Fifteen." Still wistful and romantic, the album explores Swift's hopes for love, as heard in the album's lead single "Love Story," which was one instance where she was "dramatizing" observations instead of actually experiencing them herself. 

Unlike the slow-burn of Taylor Swift, Fearless went straight to No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and stayed there for eight consecutive weeks. It won Swift's first Album Of The Year GRAMMY in 2010, at the time making her the youngest person to win the accolade at age 20. To date, it has sold 7.2 million copies in America alone. It might not be the romantic tale Swift dreamed of growing up, but her sophomore album signalled that bigger things were to come.

Speak Now: Proving Her Songwriting Prowess

Everything that happened after the success of Fearless pushed Swift from country music's best-kept secret to a mainstream star. But this meant that she faced more publicity and criticism, from naysayers who nitpicked her songwriting and vocals to the infamous Kanye West incident at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards.

For the first time since becoming an artist, she was forced to reckon with the concept of celebrity and how turning into one — whether she wanted it or not — informed her own writing and perception of herself. No longer was she the girl writing songs like "Fifteen" in her bedroom — now she was working through becoming a highly publicized figure. Speak Now is the answer to those growing pains. 

Along with having more eyes on her, Swift also felt pressured to maintain her persona as a perfect young female role model amid a time when her peers like Miley Cyrus and Demi Lovato were attempting to rebrand to be more mature and sexier. During her NYU commencement speech in 2022, she reflected on this era of her life as one of intense fear that she could make a mistake and face lasting consequences, so the songs were masked in metaphors rather than directly addressing adult themes in her music. But that also resulted in some of her most poignant lyrics to date.

Read More: For The Record: How Taylor Swift's 'Speak Now' Changed Her Career — And Proved She'll Always Get The Last Word

Writing the entire album herself, Swift used Speak Now to prove her songwriting prowess to those who questioned her capabilities. Much like her previous two albums, Swift included songs that were both inspired by her own life and being a fly on the wall. The album's title track pulled from the saying, "Speak now or forever hold your peace," inspired by a friend's ex-boyfriend getting engaged; meanwhile, "Mean" was everything Swift wanted to say to a critic who was continuously harsh about her vocals.

Retrospective and reflective, Speak Now is an album about the speeches she could've, would've and should've said. From addressing the aforementioned VMA incident in the forgiving "Innocent" to a toxic relationship in "Dear John," Speak Now also hinted that her rose-colored glasses were cracked, but Swift (and her songwriting) was only becoming stronger because of it.

Red: Coming Into Her Own

Highly regarded as Swift's magnum opus, Red sees the singer shed the fairytale dresses and the girl-next-door persona to craft a body of work that has now been deemed as her first "adult" record. On Red, Swift focused on emotions evoked from a hot-and-cold relationship, one that forced her to experience "intense love, intense frustration, jealousy and confusion" — all feelings that she'd describe as "red." 

Unlike most of her previous writing that had been inspired by happy endings and fairytales, Red explores the lingering pain and loss that can embed itself within despite trying your hardest to let go. In her liner notes, she references Pablo Neruda's poem "Tonight I Can Write," stating that "Love is so short, forgetting is so long" is the overarching theme for the album. She plays with time — speeding it up in "Starlight," dabbling in the past in "All Too Well," and reframing it in "State of Grace" — to better understand her experiences. 

After releasing country-pop records, Red toed the line between genres more than ever before. Swift leaned further into the full pop territory by working with esteemed producers Max Martin and Shellback for the dubstep-leaning track "I Knew You Were Trouble," the punchy lead single "We Are Never Getting Back Together," and the bouncy anthem "22." But even when the pop power players weren't involved, her country stylings still leaned more pop across the album, as further evidenced with the racing deep cut "Holy Ground" and the echoing title track. 

The slight change of direction became polarizing for critics and fans alike. Following the more country-influenced Speak Now, some critics and fans found the pop songs on Red were too pop and the lyrics were too repetitive, possibly indicating that she might be selling out. If that wasn't enough, Red became an era where Swift's personal life went from speculation to tabloid fodder, with misogynistic headlines and diluting her work to just "writing about her exes." It's an era that would eventually inspire many tracks on Red's successor, 1989, like "Blank Space" and "Shake It Off."

Commercially, Red debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 and sold 1.2 million copies in its first week, becoming the fastest-selling country album and making Swift the first female artist to have three consecutive albums spend six or more weeks at the top of the chart. The impact of Red extended beyond its own success, too. Often mentioned as a record that inspired a generation of artists from Troye Sivan to Conan Gray, Swift's confessional, soul-bearing authenticity set a new standard for straightforward pop music. 

1989: Reinventing Into A Pop Genius

The night Red lost the GRAMMY for Album Of The Year in 2014, Swift decided that her next album would be a full-on pop record. After years of identifying as a country artist and flirting with pop, Swift departed her roots to reinvent herself, no matter what her then-label or critics had to say. And in true Swiftian fashion, turning into a pop artist didn't just prove her genre-shapeshifting capabilities — it further solidified her as an artist who is at her best when she freely creates to her desires and refuses to adhere to anyone.

1989 was lauded by critics for its infectious synth-pop that was reminiscent of the 1980s, yet still had a contemporary sound. Swift opted to lean more into radio-friendly hits, which resulted in songs like "Style," "Wildest Dreams," "Blank Space," and "Shake It Off," all of which became singles. And where some might trade a hit or two at the expense of their artistic integrity, Swift didn't falter — instead, her lyrics were just as heartfelt and intimate as they were on prior albums.

After exploring pop-leaning sonics she first found with Red, Swift worked with Martin and Shellback again on most of 1989. This reinvention brought new (and very important) collaborators as well. Swift's now-frequent collaborator Jack Antonoff credits her as the first person to take a chance on him as a producer with "I Wish You Would" and "Out Of The Woods"; both tracks exemplified how future Antonoff-produced songs would sound on albums like reputation, Lover and Midnights.

At the time, 1989 became Swift's best-selling album to date. It sold nearly 1.3 million copies within release week in the U.S., debuting atop the Billboard 200 and reigning for 11 non-consecutive weeks. The album also earned Swift several awards — including her second Album Of The Year GRAMMY, which made her the first female artist to ever win the award twice. 

Following the release of 1989, Swift became a cultural juggernaut, and the album has had an omnipresence in music since. Swift didn't just normalize blending genres, but proved that you can create a sound that is uniquely yours by doing so. In turn, Billie Eilish, Dua Lipa and more pop stars have refused to conform or stick to what they've done prior. 

reputation: Killing The Old Taylor

For years, Swift was on a strict two-year cycle — she'd release an album one year, tour the next, and then release a new album the following year. But following the heightened scrutiny and highly publicized tabloid drama that followed the end of the 1989 era, Swift completely disappeared for a year. She stayed away from public appearances, didn't do any press, and missed the album schedule fans became accustomed to. It wasn't until summer 2017 when she returned from her media (and social media) blackout to unveil the fitting title for her new album: reputation.

Born as a response to the naysayers and name-callers, reputation follows Swift shedding her public image — which includes the pressure to be perfect, the drama, and the criticism — by declaring, "There will be no further explanation. There will just be reputation." Leaning on the same tongue-in-cheek songwriting techniques she used while penning "Blank Space," Swift wrote from the mindset of how the public perceived her.

When Swift released the lead single "Look What You Made Me Do," a song she initially wrote as a poem about not trusting specific people, many assumed the album would center on vengeance and drama. Although Swift said that the album has its vindictive moments — even declaring that the "old Taylor" is dead on the bridge of "Look What You Made Me Do" — it's a vulnerable record for her. Swift described reputation as a bait-and-switch; at their core, the songs are about finding love in the darkest moments. 

Swift still remained in the pop lane with reputation, largely leaning on Antonoff and the Martin/Shellback team. The sound almost mirrored the scrutiny Swift faced in the years prior — booming electropop beats, maximalist production and pulsing synthesizers dominate, particularly on "End Game," "I Did Something Bad," and "Ready For It…?" But the "old Taylor" isn't entirely gone on songs like "Call It What You Want," "So It Goes…" and "New Year's Day," where she lets her guard down to write earnest love odes.

Even after Swift spent some time away from the spotlight, the public didn't immediately gravitate toward her return. And even despite matching the 1.2 million first-week sales of her previous releases, some concluded that the album was her first commercial failure when compared to 1989. With time, though, it became clear that the response to reputation became muddled with the public's overall perception of her at the time — some even claimed that Swift was ahead of her time with the album's overall sound.

For her 2023 TIME Person of the Year profile, Swift described reputation as a "goth-punk moment of female rage at being gaslit by an entire social structure." For years, she felt the pressure to be "America's Sweetheart" and to never step out of line. Writing reputation became a lifeline following the events that catalyzed it  — a way to shed the so-called snakeskin and make peace with however the public wanted to view her. 

Lover: Stepping Into The Daylight

After finding love amongst chaos with reputation, Swift was learning to deal with the anxiety and fear of losing her partner — became a major theme of another aptly titled album, Lover. Both sonically and visually, Lover was a complete change from reputation. After touring reputation, Swift found that her fans saw her as "a flesh-and-blood human being," inspiring her to be "brave enough to be vulnerable" because her fans were along with her. Stepping away from the dark and antagonistic themes around reputation encouraged Swift to step into the light and be playful with her work on Lover.

Swift also found a new sense of creativity within this new mindset, one where she aimed to still embed playful themes in her songwriting but with less snark than that of "Blank Space" and "Look What You Made Me Do." Leaning into Lover being a "love letter to love," Swift explored every aspect of it. Tracks like "Paper Rings" and "London Boy" exude a whimsical energy, even if they center on more serious themes like marriage and commitment. Other songs, including "Death By A Thousand Cuts" and "Cornelia Street," are Swift at her most vulnerable, reflecting on a love lost and grappling with the extreme worry that comes when you could potentially lose someone. 

Looking at Lover retrospectively, it's an album that almost symbolizes a bookend in her discography. She was playful yet poignant, picking apart her past lyrics and feelings and looking at them with the perspective of someone who was once on top of the world, hit rock bottom, and survived in spite of it. This evolution is mentioned throughout Lover, particularly in a direct callback to 2012's Red, "Daylight," which sees her describe her love as "golden" rather than "burning red." 

Lover also marked the first time Swift divulged into politics and societal issues, like campaigning against Donald Trump, releasing the Pride-infused "You Need To Calm Down," and feeling disillusioned by the political climate with "Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince." Swift's documentary Miss Americana explores this change further, discussing how she regrets not being vocal about politics and issues prior, in addition to opening up about her body image issues and mental health struggles.

Lover became Swift's sixth No. 1 album in America, making her the first female artist to achieve the feat. But Lover was more than any accolades could reflect — it was Swift's transitional album in many ways, notably marking the first album that she owned entirely herself following leaving Big Machine Records for Republic Records in 2018.

folklore: Looking Beyond Her Personal Stories

After the pandemic started and Swift cancelled her Lover Fest, she spent the early stages of quarantine reading and watching a myriad of films. Without exactly setting out to create an album, she began dreaming of fictional stories and characters with various narrative arcs, allowing her imagination to run free. The result became folklore, 2020's surprise archetypal quarantine album.

Crafting a world with characters like the folklore love triangle between those in "betty" and "august," as well as Rebekah Harkness from "the last great american dynasty" (who once lived in Swift's Rhode Island mansion), was Swift's way of venturing outside her typical autobiographical style of writing. She'd see visceral images in her mind — from battleships to tree swings to mirrored disco balls — and turned them into stories, sometimes weaving in her own personal narrative throughout, or taking on a narrator role and speaking from the perspective of someone she had never met. 

She worked remotely with two producers — again working with her right-hand man Jack Antonoff, and first-time collaborator Aaron Dessner from The National. Some songs, like "peace," were recorded in just one take, capturing the essence and fragility in the song's story, whereas the lyrics for the sun-drenched "august" were penned on the spot as Swift was in her makeshift home studio in Los Angeles.

Another aspect that separated folklore from her previous work was the obvious decision not to create hits made for radio play, so much so that Dessner claimed that she made an anti-pop record at a time when radio wanted clear "bops." Sonically, it ventured into genres Swift hadn't explored much outside of a few folkier tracks on Lover. Rather than relying on mostly electronic elements, Swift, Antonoff and Dessner weaved in soft pianos, ethereal strings, and plucky guitars.

folklore's impact on the zeitgeist at a time where everyone was stuck at home helped shape people's quarantine experience. Fans rejoiced at having songs to comfort them during difficult times, and artists like Maya Hawke, Gracie Abrams, and Sabrina Carpenter credit folklore for inspiring them to create and be even more emotionally honest in their songwriting. After its release, folklore became the best-selling album of 2020 after selling 1.2 million records. At the 2021 GRAMMYs, folklore took home Album Of The Year, making her the fourth artist in history to win three times in the Category. 

evermore: Embracing Experimentation

It was exciting enough for Swifties to experience one surprise album drop from Swift, an artist who typically has an entire album campaign calculated. So when evermore was released just six months after folklore, fans were in shock. 

Like its (literally) folklorian sister, evermore was a surprise release at the end of 2020, marking the first time Swift didn't have distinct "eras" between albums. She felt like there was something "different" with folklore, stating in a social media post that making it was less like she was "departing" and more like she was "returning" to the next stage of her discography. In turn, the album served as a similar escape for Swift as folklore did.

Bridging together the same wistful and nostalgic themes as heard on its predecessor, evermore sees Swift venture even further into escapism. She explores more stories and characters, some based in fiction like "dorothea," and some real, like "marjorie," written in dedication to Swift's grandmother. 

Evermore follows folklore's inclusion of natural imagery and motifs, like landscapes, skies, ivy, and celestial elements. In contrast to the fairytale motifs and happy endings of Fearless, evermore saw Swift become fixated on "unhappy" endings — stories of failed marriages ("happiness"), lifeless relationships ("tolerate it"), and one-time flings ("'tis the damn season"). 

Sonically, evermore is a slight departure from its sister record; where folklore relies on more alt-leaning and indie-tinged sounds, evermore takes the sonics from all of Swift's past records — from pop to country to indie rock — and features all of them on one album. Country songs like "cowboy like me" and "no body, no crime" reaches back to Swift's earlier work in narrative building, seamlessly crafting a three-party story with ease. "Closure" is a "skittering" track that has the same energy as tracks like Lover's "I Forgot That You Existed," whereas the ballad "champagne problems" is thematically reminiscent of Swift's Speak Now track "Back To December" where she takes responsibility for her lover's heartache. 

Working mostly with Dessner on evermore, Swift was emboldened to continue creating and opted to embrace whatever came naturally to them rather than limiting themselves to a sound. Swift felt a "quiet conclusion" after finishing up evermore, describing that it was more about grappling with endings of all "sizes and shapes," and the record represented a chapter closing. Even so, its poetic lyricism and mystical storytelling cleverly foreshadowed what was to come with subsequent albums, particularly The Tortured Poets Department.

Midnights: Encapsulating Her Artistic Magic

After coming out of the folklorian woods following folklore and evermore, fans and critics alike were intrigued to see what direction Swift would take on her next studio album. On Midnights, Swift leaves behind indie folk sounds and returns to the pop production of 1989 and Lover.

Her most conceptual album to date, Midnights charts 13 sleepless nights and explores five themes, from self-hatred and revenge to "what if" fantasies, falling in love, and falling apart. They are the things that keep her up at night, like the self-critiquing in "Anti-Hero," her rise to fame in "You're on Your Own, Kid," and the anxiety of falling in love again in "Labyrinth." Similarly to Swift's cheeky songwriting style that sees her create caricatures of herself in songs like "Blank Space" and "Look What You Made Me Do," she doubles down on claims she's "calculated" on "Mastermind," a song about devising a plan for her and her lover. 

Although the album is a departure from the two pandemic sister albums, the overall creation process didn't differ too much. In addition to working alongside Antonoff (and bringing Dessner in for the bonus-track-filled 3am Edition), Swift's worldbuilding is still the throughline that connects Midnights and Swift's recent albums, whether she's dreaming of a Parisian escape in "Paris" or using war imagery as a metaphor for the struggle of love in "The Great War."

Read More: 5 Takeaways From Taylor Swift's New Album 'Midnights'

Following the success with folklore and evermore, Swift's intrigue was at a then-all-time high upon the release of Midnights. Along with breaking several streaming records — including becoming the first album to exceed 700 million global streams in a week — it was Swift's 11th No. 1 debut on the Billboard 200, and was the highest-selling album of 2022 (and, remarkably, the second best-selling of 2023).

To say that Swift's celebrity has become otherworldly since the release of Midnights would be an understatement. Celebrating her genre-defying and varied discography through The Eras Tour has resulted in old songs having a resurgence, new inside jokes and Easter eggs within the fandom, and a plethora of new listeners being exposed to Swift's work. 

As a result, there has arguably never been more excitement for a Taylor Swift album than for The Tortured Poets Department — especially because the announcement came on the heels of her lucky 13th GRAMMY win in February. Midnights helped further solidify Swift's larger-than-life status at the finale of the 2024 GRAMMYs, too, as she became the only artist in history to win Album Of The Year four times. 

The Tortured Poets Department: A Grief-Stricken Poetic Odyssey

It’s been a while since Swift has penned a full-fledged breakup album. On The Tortured Poets Department, she navigates the five stages of grief — denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance — after her long-term relationship ended. Taking a page from the release of folklore and evermore, she dropped a double album and announced The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology at 2 a.m. on release day. Throughout a total of 31 tracks, the prolific songwriter shelved the glittery pop radio-friendly tunes in favor of more subdued, synthy and heart-wrenching songs. 

On Instagram, Swift described the album as a collection of poetic songs that reflect the "events, opinions and sentiments from a fleeting and fatalistic moment in time," Swift pulled out the fountain and quill pens to craft songs about the "tortured poets" in her life — sometimes musing about lovers, sometimes taking aim at villains, and sometimes pointing the finger at herself. 

TTPD is also her most confessional album thus far. It pokes fun at so-called fans who overstep with her personal life ("But Daddy I Love Him"), says goodbye to a city that gave her a home ("So Long London"), and muses on how her own celebrity has stunted her growth ("Who's Afraid Of Little Old Me?"). To help explain this chapter of her life, Swift brings together a myriad of collaborators — from Stevie Nicks as fellow poetess, to duets with Florence Welch and Post Malone — and leans on real and fictional characters, like Clara Bow, Peter Pan ("Peter"), and Patti Smith.

In the same post, Swift declared that once she’s confessed all of her saddest stories, she’s able to find freedom. Yet The Tortured Poets Department (and its accompanying 15-track anthology) spends much time reflecting: she toys with her own lore, self-referencing past songs from albums like 1989 and poems from her reputation era. 

Fourteen years ago, Swift declared that she would never change, but she’ll never stay the same either. The Tortured Poets Department proves that in the throughline of Taylor Swift's many artistic eras is a commitment to exploration and a love of autobiographical lyricism.

When the Backstreet Boys released "I Want It That Way" on April 12, 1999, they likely had no idea how beloved their smash hit would still be a quarter-century later.

Written by the Swedish powerhouse team of Andreas Carlsson and Max Martin, "I Want It That Way" is undoubtedly BSB's signature hit, particularly thanks to its memorable undulating melody and its long-debated cryptic meaning. But perhaps the most surprising part of the song's legacy is how it has resonated across genres — from a TikTok cover by Korn to a hip-hop sampling by Lil Uzi Vert.

As the Backstreet Boys celebrate the 25th anniversary of "I Want It That Way," take a look at how the song has been diversely covered, lovingly lampooned and karaoke jammed by an array of voices in the business.

Weird Al Yankovic (2003)

When the king of parody songs selects one to skewer, you know it's an iconic song. Weird Al Yankovic paid tribute to the largeness of the Backstreet Boys classic when he used "I Want It That Way" as the basis of a song called "eBay" in 2003.

Yankovic's chorus replaces the original's with, "A used pink bathrobe/ A rare mint snow globe/ A Smurf TV tray/ I bought on eBay." The Backstreet Boys send up appears on Yankovic's album Poodle Hat, which won Best Comedy Album at the 2004 GRAMMYs.

One Direction (2013)

Three years One Direction formed on "The X Factor," the five lads — Harry Styles, Zayn Malik, Niall Horan, Liam Payne and Louis Tomlinson — included a cover of "I Want It That Way" on their 2013 concert set lists, the young boy band paying homage to the ones that came before them. Though their English accents poked through at times, their version was loyal to the original, and got their crowds singing along.

"Glee" (2013)

Poking fun at the presumed rivalry between *NSYNC and Backstreet Boys, a medley of the former's "Bye Bye Bye" and "I Want It That Way" was featured in Season 4, Episode 16 of "Glee." In the episode — aptly titled "Feud" — choir director Mr. Schuester (Matthew Morrison) and glee club heartthrob Finn (Cory Monteith) face off in an epic boy band battle, which ultimately proved the groups' respective music was more cohesive than divisive.

Brittany Howard and Jim James (2016)

The lead singers of Alabama Shakes and My Morning Jacket covering a boy band classic. It doesn't sound real, but Brittany Howard and Jim James did just that in 2016 when they recorded "I Want It That Way" for an animated short cartoon called "A Love Story."

Released by the fast food chain Chipotle Mexican Grill, the clip was part of a creative campaign to showcase the company's focus on natural ingredients. Howard and James highlight the poignancy and versatility of the song by adding lush string arrangements and dramatic beats.

Backstreet Boys x Jimmy Fallon and The Roots (2018)

The 2018 live performance of "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys, Jimmy Fallon and The Roots for "The Tonight Show" is arguably the sweetest rendition of the song — and not just because they're using a mini xylophone, baby tambourine and other toy classroom instruments. It's even more endearing than the previous collaborations between Fallon and Backstreet Boys: a barbershop singing version of Sisqo's "Thong Song" and a "Bawkstreet Boys" version of "Everybody (Backstreet's Back)," with everyone dressed like fluffy birds.

The 1975 (2020)

British rockers The 1975 performed a fairly faithful cover of "I Want It That Way," hitting all the high notes at several of their 2023 world concert tour stops. But it's not the first time frontman Matty Healy has hinted at the Backstreet Boys' influence on his band: he told Pitchfork in 2020 that "College Dropout-era Kanye West meets Backstreet Boys" was part of their veritable moodboard at the time when working on their own song called "Tonight (I Wish I Was Your Boy)."

Lil Uzi Vert (2020)

In 2020, Lil Uzi Vert released a rap song called "That Way" that includes a refrain of "I want it that way" sung to the tune of the Backstreet original, but with an AutoTune twist. From there, the lyrics become quite a bit naughtier than anything the BSB guys have uttered in any song.

"I don't know how [the idea of] Backstreet Boys got involved in this song, I really don't," the song's producer Supah Mario told Splice at the time. "I think it was all Uzi. But it was a game changer."

The interpolation was so good, in fact, that Nick Carter even invited Lil Uzi Vert to collaborate: "Now you're gonna have to be featured on our next album bud," he tweeted upon the song's release.

Korn (2022)

Fans of Korn know that the nu metal band has a sense of humor, but few could've expected that Jonathan Davis and crew would post a TikTok of themselves singing "I Want It That Way" in 2022.

"I never wanna hear you say… 'Worst Is On Its Way,'" reads the caption on the post, a tongue-in-cheek reference to Korn's 2022 song of the same name.

Backstreet Boys responded on the app via a hilarious Duet video with Nick Carter. In the video, Carter — who sports fabulous metal eye makeup and a long silver wig — doesn't actually say or sing anything, he just drops his jaw in amazement.

Backstreet Boys x Downy (2022)

Downy hired the Backstreet Boys to poke fun at "I Want It That Way" with the now-viral "Tell Me Why" commercial in 2022. All five members — Nick Carter, Howie Dorough, Brian Littrell, AJ McLean and Kevin Richardson — appear as a Backstreet Boys poster on the wall that comes to life, using the "tell me why" hook of their hit to engage a woman doing laundry in a conversation about washing her clothes.

As Saatchi group account director Jen Brotman told Muse at the time, the nostalgic ad also spawned some memories for the folks working on the ad campaign.

"The moment [BSB] stood in front of the camera, they rehearsed 'I Want It That Way' just to get the notes right, and we felt like we were getting serenaded on set," Brotman recalled. "We couldn't believe how emotional we all got — there may or may not have been tears in some eyes. The song has always been a karaoke favorite of the team, so we knew which 'tell me whys' we wanted them to hit, and we still can't get it out of our heads."

Ed Sheeran (2023)

When he fancies singing a bit of karaoke, Ed Sheeran loves leaning on "I Want It That Way," as the star showed at his favorite Nashville bar in July 2023. A patron caught him on camera and his happiness level is undeniable when belting out this enduring pop classic.

As Sheeran told CBS News a few months later, he grew up on the pop hits of everyone from Backstreet Boys to Britney Spears. But what he said about "I Want It That Way" specifically may be the best way to describe its long-lasting impact: "You can't be in a bar, a couple of beers in, and 'I Want It That Way' comes on and not be like, 'This is a good song.' You can't."

24 Songs Turning 20: Listen To 2004's Bangers, From "Yeah!" To "Since U Been Gone"

The dawn of Taylor Swift's "tortured poet" era is upon us. The reigning Queen of Pop is set to release her highly anticipated 11th studio album, The Tortured Poets Department, on Friday, April 19. 

Ever since she announced the new album during the 2024 GRAMMYs — while accepting her lucky 13th GRAMMY Award for Best Pop Vocal Album for Midnights —- Swifties have been meticulously analyzing every detail of her existence for clues about the release of The Tortured Poets Department.

Fortunately, Swift has been serving a lot of information to snack on. After revealing the cover art in an Instagram post before accepting her record breaking fourth win for Album Of The Year, she didn't stop the feast. From the full track list to a five-stage breakup playlist — and, of course, all the bonus tracks and special editions — here's all the breadcrumbs GRAMMY.com collected in preparation for The Tortured Poets Department. 

All The Art Is Black And White

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The cover art for The Tortured Poets Department displays a black-and-white inset photo of Swift in repose on a stack of white pillows, with the album's title in uppercase white letters above her. The photography accompanying the album, including back covers and special editions, captures Swift in reflective solitude: standing before a body of water wearing an oversized white button-up, and in a pensive self-embrace against a stark black backdrop.

The photography for the album was shot by Swift's photographer since 2020, Beth Garrabrant, who also shot the covers of Swift's folklore, evermore, Fearless (Taylor's Version), Red (Taylor's Version), Midnights, Speak Now (Taylor's Version), 1989 (Taylor's Version). She's known for using a medium-format film photography that evokes an emotional closeness to her subjects — especially fitting for an album titled The Tortured Poets Department.

The Album Features Two Notable Collaborations

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On GRAMMY night, alongside the album announcement, Swift posted the complete track list on her Instagram. The post included a photo of the album's back cover, showing a close-up of Swift with her hand on her forehead, overlaid with the text "I love you, it's ruining my life" in all-caps. 

The 16-track release has been split into four sides and also features collaborations with Post Malone on Side A opener "Fortnight" as well as Florence + The Machine on Side B's "Florida!!!" 

Check out the full track list:

**Side A**
“Fortnight” (feat. Post Malone)
“The Tortured Poets Department”
“My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys”
“Down Bad”

**Side B**
“So Long, London”
“But Daddy I Love Him”
“Fresh Out the Slammer”
“Florida!!!” (feat. Florence + the Machine)

**Side C**
“Guilty As Sin?”
“Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?”
“I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)”
“loml”

**Side D**
“I Can Do It With a Broken Heart”
“The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived”
“The Alchemy”
“Clara Bow”

Bonus Tracks:

“The Manuscript”

“The Black Dog”

"The Albatross"

The Album Title Hints At Another Ex 

Mere moments after Swift dropped The Tortured Poets Department album name, the internet was ablaze with viral speculation that the title is derived from a play on ex Joe Alwyn's group chat, "The Tortured Man Club" with Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott. 

Alwyn and Mescal revealed their "club name" during an interview with Variety in December 2022 and it didn't take long for fans to connect the dots. Upon unearthing the tie-in, Swifties rushed to share memes and comment on the original interview across various social channels.

There Are Three Bonus Tracks (So Far)

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Swift has revealed at least three bonus tracks for different editions of the album, each marked with its own "file name." The initial track list release, referred to as "The Manuscript," includes a bonus track sharing this name.  

On Feb. 23, Swift posted a slideshow on Instagram to promote a special edition named "The Albatross." It featured the bonus tracks and revealed the back cover, which presented a track list alongside a contemplative close-up of Swift overlaid with the question, "Am I allowed to cry?" 

Then, on March 3, she introduced the bonus track “The Black Dog” through a similar post that showcased new cover art, with the album's reverse side portraying Swift and the haunting text, "Old habits die screaming." 

Lyrics Have Already Been Shared

Unlike her previous album campaigns, Swift hasn't unveiled any music ahead of The Tortured Poets Department’s release — but she has dropped plenty of hints at the subject matter to come. Handwritten lyrics first appeared in the album announcement post, in a stack of papers inside a folder tabbed with a monogram of the album's name.

"And so I enter into evidence/ My tarnished coat of arms/ My muses, acquired like bruises/ My talismans and charms/ The tick, tick, tick of love bombs/ My veins of pitch black ink," is written above the sign-off, "All's fair in love and poetry… Sincerely, The Chairman of The Tortured Poets Department."

Then, in an Instagram story posted on April 8 — the date of the total solar eclipse — Swift shared an image of a typewriter loaded with a sheet of paper stamped with the words, "Crowd goes wild at her fingertips/ Half moonshine, Full eclipse." 

Swift Created Five Playlists To Mirror The Stages Of A Breakup

Gearing up for the release, Swift dropped a 5-part playlist series on Apple Music on April 5 featuring previously released work arranged in playlists that reflect the five stages of grief. The playlist for "Denial: I Love You, It’s Ruining My Life Songs," features hits including Midnight's "Lavender Haze," and Lover's "Cruel Summer" and "False God." 

The other playlists run through the emotional gamut with titles like "Anger: You Don’t Get to Tell Me About Sad Songs," the midpoint "Bargaining: Am I Allowed to Cry? Songs," "Depression: Old Habits Die Screaming Songs," and finally "Acceptance: I Can Do It With a Broken Heart Songs." Each one takes listeners on a Taylor Swift escapade through love won and lost, representing what many believe to be a musical voyage through Swift's stages of grief following the end of her relationship with ex Joe Alwyn. 

Each playlist also includes a description from Swift. For "Denial," it says, "This is a list of songs about getting so caught up in the idea of something that you have a hard time seeing the red flags, possibly resulting in moments of denial and maybe a little bit of delusion. Results may vary.”

As April 19 nears closer, take a deep dive into everything Swift has unleashed so far — and get ready for a lot more divulging once The Tortured Poets Department arrives.