Identical twin sisters Jessica and Lisa Origliasso, born on Christmas Day in Brisbane, Australia, have always had big dreams and strong sense of who they are. They are better known as alt-pop outfit The Veronicas, which they formed in the early '00s after moving to Los Angeles to pursue a career in music when they were just 19.

In 2005, they released their debut album, The Secret Life Of..., along with their breakout single "4ever." They followed up with Hook Me Up in 2007, featuring pop-rock classic "Untouched." Due to issues with their label, they would take a forced hiatus until 2014, when they could finally release new music, which would eventually be their self-titled third album.

Through it all, The Veronicas have remained 100% themselves: bold, confident and creative, always exploring new sounds and styles. They are not only bolstered by the unbreakable bond they have as twins, but also by the support of their fanbase, especially those from the LGBTQ community, as they tell us.

Not long after their breathtaking performance at L.A. Pride, and before they took to the stage at World Pride in N.Y.C. this weekend, the Recording Academy sat down with Jessica and Lisa to learn more about what new music they've been working on, and what performing at Pride means—and feels like—to them. As they finish each other's sentences, they also dive deep into their creative process, the pressures of the music industry, their biggest influences and Jessica's own journey with exploring her sexual identity.

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Okay, so let's start with new music. You guys released a new song earlier this year, "Think Of Me," which I think is your first new song in two years. How did it feel to be sharing your music again with the world?

Jessica Origliasso: It's always incredibly inspiring to be releasing new music, and for us, it's like every song is our baby. Everything that we put out is something that we've slaved over in some capacity. "Think of Me" was the beginning of a bigger picture of music that we've created, and it just felt like a relief really to have it out, the first sort of piece of the puzzle, the story.

Lisa Origliasso: Yeah, it's been fun because it has been quite some time since we've actually got in the studio to write an entire album, and we have about an album's worth of material now, but we did it in a relatively short time. So, about six to eight months we just kind of wrote out everything, and, I don't know, the universe is kind of inspired to get us at the right time, inspired writing. None of it was sort of too preplanned. It was just the right pieces fell into place, or the right inspiration was there.

Jessica: Artists that we wanted to collaborate with were available to get in the studio, and it all just sort of worked out that way. So, yeah, it felt right.

Do you want to talk a little bit more about that song specifically, and then maybe about the bigger project as well? What can we expect?

Jessica: When Lisa and I go into write an album, usually we're drawing from a lot of different influences of whatever we are listening to currently, but then also stuff we've been into for a long time. So, because of how much freedom artists have now with music, it was important for us to be able to storytell, and have elements that don't feel forced.

So, because there's so much now to be influenced by, because when we last did an album in such a short period of time, it was our second record [2007's Hook Me Up]. And at that time the Internet and Spotify were not really there. So, you had to go really searching, you had to go to see a lot of live shows and dig around for a lot of underground stuff, which we did at the time. Whereas now there's a lot to pull from.

I think with "Think of Me" in particular, we went in and just wanted to write a song, and make it as sort of simple as possible, and just embody a feeling. So, it was about a feeling, and that feeling came from a personal experience that I was going through that Lisa channeled into, and the other two writers, the producer and the other writer in the room channeled into, and we all just threw a lot of feelings into the middle, and wrote out some stories.

It's very uncensored when you're in a recording room like that. I think maybe because we're twins we have each other's back, and you automatically feel very comfortable. So we tend to throw out the rawest feelings to the room, a lot of people are probably a little shocked. Like, "How are you so comfortable?" But because we have each other, you feel immediately at home. 

Lisa: We've always had that comfortability, and it's what has made us love music so much.

Jessica: I think inspired writing is incredibly important. It's why people go, "Why do you wait so long in between records?" There's actually a really good reason for it. I mean, Adele speaks on it all the time. She's one of my favorites with that because she will not go into the studio and create a record that isn't inspired writing. Because at the end of the day, you can do it. We've done songwriting for 15, almost 16, 17 years now, professionally. So, you can go in and do it…

Lisa: And when you're doing it for other artists, it's maybe easier to do that. But for our record, and a fourth record especially, where you have so much creative freedom, I think it's really important to be able to create it from the most authentic space you can.

Jessica: This record is actually very collaborative-heavy. Over half of the record is collaborations, and we've never done that before. We've never collaborated with anyone before other than each other.

Wow.

Jessica: So, we've got collaborations and then we've also gotten features on other artists' stuff.

Lisa: Which is such an exciting time for us because more music is out there. And that's why we love today's climate with music. It's not just about having to slave over this one album and then you're going to have that for two years. You can get into the studio tomorrow with this awesome DJ, and we just featured on our friend Allday's new single. Even though it's not our release, it feels like our release and our fans are excited, and our fans are turning into his fans, and his fans are turning into our fans, and it's just such a beautiful sort of love fest of collaborations. Those experiences have been really, really fun.

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Jessica: But this album has been very influenced by stories, feelings and stories. It's driven by the idea of leaving the past behind and stepping into your power. And there's a lot of '80s influence, there's guitars, there's a lot of emotions...

Lisa: A little dramatic.

Jessica: Bit dramatic, but most of our records are.

Lisa: That's sort of a bit of our blueprint, to be honest.

Jessica: And then there's also like the super-stripped-back, raw, vulnerable feelings in the story. So, it's quite a juxtaposed record. Our next single…[looks to Lisa] We can say the name of it, yeah?

Lisa: Yeah. I mean, I'm always saying yes. I'm like "Yeah, get it out there."

Jessica: Yeah, the next single's called "Life of the Party," and we wrote it about essentially the last 15 years of what it's like when you first come into a space of music, and celebrity, and somewhere like Hollywood, and everyone thinks that it's this particular thing. Everyone's here to be the party. Everyone's here to be the life of everything, the center of attention, and how that becomes old very quickly.

Lisa: The reality of that.

Jessica: What is of true value to you, as people? We wrote this song with our friend, Allday, and the hook is like, "Everybody wants to be the life of the party, but I just want to find somebody. I just want to have something real."

Lisa: It's that sort of feeling, that melancholy sadness intertwined with a lot of '80s pop or hip-hop elements.

You put out your debut album back in 2005. What was it like coming of age in the music industry? How has your growth and personal identities shifted within the context of The Veronicas?

Lisa: Well, we have an incredibly interesting dynamic and journey because we are twin sisters, who literally created a band together. Nobody tells you when you start music, that you're about to also embark on a social experiment of celebrity. That is one of the wildest concepts. Nobody has the conversation with you when you enter the public eye for what you love to do, which for us it was songwriting first. We weren't even focused on being artists first, it was songwriting and then we moved into being artists. Nobody tells you at that point, you're going to be entering some weird public social experiment of position, of power, of dynamics, of having money for the first time, of having people recognize you, of knowing how to navigate—

Jessica: The attention.

Lisa: And being completely exhausted.

Jessica: The tabloids.

Lisa: Negative attention, or positive, overly positive attention.

Jessica: Well, and then you put, on top of that, the fact that we are twin sisters…

Lisa: …and young women who are growing, and becoming independent from each other as well.

Jessica: Yes. Becoming independent from each other, and growing into the people that we are. Because you get two twin sisters in a band, people are going to compare you to each other. So, there's the comparisons, there's the interviews. "What's your favorite thing? What's the worst thing about your sister?" And it's kind of like you're constantly navigating this sort of dynamic, that in itself, is just a crazy thing.

Lisa: Well, you don't give it that much observational thought until every single interview it's, "Who's always late? Who's the better cook? Who's the better songwriter? Who's the better singer?" Literally, I would say every single interview from the past 15 years, at least one of those questions will come up.

Jessica: And at the beginning, it would be like, what? Who's the better singer? What a stupid question. Like, wait, who's the better cook? Well I guess I am, or I guess that you are. Who's messier? Well, I'm messier. But then it becomes a competition. So, it's funny that you become this sort of social experiment that you're not ready for. Lis and I, we're very blessed that we grew up with a very grounded family and grounded sense of self. So, for us, none of that was taken on board really. We're very blessed in that. For us it's always just been about music, and about our family and being real.

Lisa: But it is a wild experience, and we've been doing it 15 years now, and you find that after 15 years, success is cyclic. Success is...

Jessica: It's very individual to the person. What is true success? We would say, at this point, true success is creative freedom. Having the freedom to be able to create how and what you would like without compromise. Now, at the beginning of your career, you're told there's a lot of compromise that has to happen, in order to have success.

Lisa: And success back then is a number one hit, fame, money. But 15 years later, that is not the same value system.

Jessica: Yeah, you redefine what success is, what is the true value on it. That's really what a lot of this record is about; what is of true value?

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Yeah, I can't imagine like being a young woman in the music industry, when people are literally staring at you like you're not there, and there's just such an emphasis on women's looks. But you both seem so grounded.

Lisa: We were very young, we were very naïve.

Jessica: Yeah, we were 19 when we moved to America. We had lived in our family's home with our parents up until 19, up until we moved here by ourselves.  But the thing about us from the beginning has been that we've always had a very big sense of self, of who we are. And yeah, when we moved here, it was weird because a lot of that was internally going on in the industry. I think we were really lucky to have each other because...

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Lisa: We never felt pressured to ever have to compromise on those things. I remember, our first music video was shot in a pool and…

Jessica: …we were wearing like skater boy pants, and just quite horrible fashion honestly. But we didn't want a stylist, okay? We were very much like, we know who we are, and God bless, we really were true to that.

Lisa: They would try and get us in bikinis and all kinds of stuff. We were like, "Why would we do that?"

Jessica: It didn't even make sense to us. I didn't even own a bikini.

Lisa: [looks down at all-black outfit] I own goth attire and that's what I'm going to wear, and just give us the money for the budget because we'll go buy what we like.

Jessica: Which at time was like Dickies shorts.

Lisa: It was a different time, Hot Topic was our favorite shop. I mean, it looks like I'm wearing Hot Topic right now, but the point is that we always had each other's back, and we always were like, well that's stupid.

Jessica: We were always going to fight for who we are and fight for our career.

Lisa: And now, sometimes, people who work with us are like, "Wow, you girls are..."

Jessica: …hard a**es. We don't ever step on people to get to where we want to be, but we're quite stern with what we want. When you've had to fight for 15 years, with people calling you a b*tch for having an opinion because you're a girl in pop music, you learn to value your integrity, and your position through the years of learning where the actual power lies. The actual power lies in you, your ability to create, and nobody can take that from you.

We had a record company shelve of us for four years because they went through internal changes, at the peak of our career, and how debilitating that is for an artist, I cannot even put into words. That can literally destroy you.

Lisa: So crazy.

Jessica: We had dedicated eight years to this, and then they just literally didn't have a single person there to be able to help with our release.

Lisa: And then they also wouldn't let us off the company. So, we had no other choice but to just sit there, and the only way that we could actually take the power back was to get back in the studio. And throughout that time we kept writing, but it was a pretty dark time.

Jessica: And that's why for us, it always comes back to writing. Always comes back to being the songwriters because nobody can ever take from you. Tabloids can't take that from you…

Lisa: That's our voice.

Jessica: Record companies can't take that from you, managers can't take that from you, they can take your money, they can take pretty much everything else, your freedom to be able to release, but they can't take your ability to write. So, for us it's always what it comes back to. As long as we have that, and we've always placed so much value in having that voice.

Lisa: I think that's why there's these big writing camps with the best songwriters in the world, and they come out with these amazing songs, but it's like, well, it's going to take us a little longer because…

Jessica: …that process is the most important for us.

Lisa: It feeds our soul as artists, it feeds our soul as Lisa and Jess, not just The Veronicas.

Jessica: But there is a machine that works, and it works very quickly these days, and so people get a little bit frustrated, like, "Why haven't you got your album out yet? What's taking so long?" And I don't think people realize, because of how quickly music works now, that unless you have the team that's feeding that, it's impossible for one artist or two artists to do everything. But we're trying to do everything.

Lisa: We love to do everything.

Jessica: We would love the time to do everything.

Lisa: Or you find a team that can help facilitate that, but that's also very difficult. It's almost impossible.

Jessica: Well, let's also be real. We really know what we want, and more often than not, we're not satisfied with someone else doing it. It is nice when you find those people you can collaborate with. It's just so rare to find that special connection, I think we're lucky we have it at each other. And so you almost expect other people to be on that same wave, and more often than not, I'm sure we're on a wavelength of our own. I mean, maybe no one else can actually get on this frequency.

Lisa: They probably don't want to. It's probably a bit much.

Were there specific artists or someone that made you feel like you had a place in music when you were younger?

Jessica: We had a very eclectic [musical] upbringing.

Lisa: Our parents were super into a lot of different stuff. So, they were playing records around the house, but I mean it was anything from a glam rock band from Australia, called the Skyhooks. It was very camp, it was fun, it was rock and roll.

Jessica: They'd be in make-up and dresses, super gender-bending.

Lisa: Australia's very innovative, especially with rock and roll music.

Jessica: We loved them. And we grew up in musical theater. So, Jesus Christ Superstar and Rocky Horror Picture Show. I mean, this is stuff that our mom was really into, so she was just constantly playing it around the house. For us, it was just the coolest thing we've ever seen when Frank N. Furter comes out in this women's corset, just rocking our world. And then on the other side it's like k.d. lang, Dean Martin, Elvis Presley...

Lisa: INXS. A lot of rock and roll. And Kylie Minogue was kind of Jessie's fave. And then, I mean Michael Jackson was...his songwriting… So it was a pretty eclectic range of music.

Your performance at L.A. Pride was amazing; you said it was your first show in L.A. in eight years, and you two seem so natural and powerful on stage. How did it feel to be back?

Lisa: There's something so beautiful about the LGBTQ community in particular. Wherever you go, they're the most supportive, loving crowd. In L.A., we've lived here for 15 years so, we're sort of L.A. natives a little bit in that way. You're kind of spoiled here, everybody comes through, you can see your favorite artists in rare, small shows. We're very lucky, but with having played for the first time in eight years, especially to such a huge crowd in L.A. But the LGBTQ community in general, wherever you are [shows up], and in L.A., for this particular show, they showed up hard for us and it was the best feeling.

Jessica: Oh my god. It was so much love coming our way. And just looking down, seeing people just…

Lisa: …Loving it. And knowing all the songs.

Jessica: Singing every word and just giving us all their love and energy. It was overwhelming. I was like, "Oh my gosh, this is my fave. I wasn't expecting want everybody to know all the songs, all the words.

Lisa: We got off stage and we were like, "I think that was the best show we've ever done." I couldn't even think of a show where we left feeling that good.

So, during the L.A. Pride performance you guys were like, "Okay, it's time for the gay national anthem," and then sang "Untouched." That was kind of amazing.

Lisa: I was thinking about it because so many people we've been playing for—we played Pride in Orlando as well—and so many people said like, "Your music helped me when I was coming out." There were these beautiful stories that we were hearing from every single person that we were meeting. And I thought, I wonder what it is? What could it be that connected with the queer community in general in such a huge way at that time, beyond obviously we wrote lyrics like, "I want to kiss a girl, I want to kiss a boy." We were just writing out our feelings at the time.

But even beyond that, what was it about the music? What was it about it that really captured the community in such a big way? Well it makes sense because we grew up with the queer community. We grew up in theater from the age of five, where every single friend of ours was gay or queer or in some form of the community. Our main director at the theater company was a gorgeous gay man, and every song was some kind of an anthem for that time as well.

Jessica: Free love and celebration.

Lisa: Yeah, free love, celebration, liberation, sexual freedom. I thought to myself, we've taken that on board in our songwriting, in what we're attracted to sonically. So, we've created music that has essentially embodied a history of music that has engaged the LGBTQ community.

So, that's what we have then been influenced by and created. So, people say that we gave the gays "Untouched," but I'm like, gays actually gave us "Untouched." And that's why I call it the gay anthem.

Jessica: You're right. It's the culture and queer community, and even entertainment was ingrained. It was such a huge part of our upbringing.

Lisa: It's our DNA, and our blueprint. And that's why we've gone on to create this music.

Jessica: Yeah. It's funny thinking about it because I guess I haven't really thought back, but that really stems from our mom. Our mom was just the most loving, giving soul there was. From the theater company, she would have all of our best friends sleep over, and it was all the cute boys, and we'd play fairies and wizards and they'd always want to be the fairies. So we had to be the wizards.

Lisa: She encouraged so much, and she always took in, and always loved people for who they were. We grew up in the most diverse upbringing that you could possibly have.

You'll also be performing at World Pride in N.Y.C. this weekend, which is huge, as well as a few other city's Pride celebrations. Why was it important for you this year to celebrate Pride on stage?

Jessica: I think for me personally, my journey sort of coming to celebrate my sexuality, and I always have been very comfortable with my sexuality, but it has been a particular journey for me. Especially because it's all been quite public, and now I'm in a relationship with a trans man, and he's the absolute love of my life. And how I've identified previously, I've had a very bisexual journey, but through it I've realized that my preference is women, but that's in my 30s now realizing that that's how I would identify.

I just feel so proud to be doing what I love to do, in a relationship that is so wonderful and healthy, and loving, passionate and exciting, and be the most comfortable and happy with. I guess it's continuing to always honor myself, and honor every process and step that I'm going through and to be in a community with people that are going through that for the first time.

But also knowing that in some parts of the world and, in other times of the year, it's not accepted. It's not acceptable to a lot of people still. I take so much pride and honor in being a voice to that, and just a creative force in that, and an ally in every way.

Lisa: Bringing our voice, and that visibility as well I think is so important for us, and especially as music is a universal language. So, through our music, that's why we want to be there. We want to use our voices, we want to use that platform to celebrate love and spread that message. And especially because it's my twin sister too, and part of her journey, and I'm so proud of her in literally every way. So, yeah, it's the best feeling to be here celebrating with everyone.

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Jessica: I guess because we've grown up next to so many fans, and a lot of them are part of the LGBTQ community, we wanted to be able to celebrate in every way that we could with them. Over here in America too, because we do a lot in Australia, and we do a lot of activism, a lot of the rallies in Australia. But marriage equality was only passed last year in Australia, and it's still kind of up there somewhere in the legislation being seen through properly.

But to come here, and I know it's been legal here for a little while, and just being able to celebrate that, and like Lis said, visibility, as there's so many issues within the community that need highlighting. Trans women of color, and the risks and danger that they face still daily, is a huge part of that. Obviously, legislation around transgender visibility, and freedom, and acknowledgement is still a huge, huge thing. And now, being with a trans partner, it's very important for us to be able to embrace those issues.

So, it's really just like being here for that time, and then to be completely honest, the LGBTQ community has shown up for us in the biggest ways at some of the darkest times of our life. When it's a really hard to be an artist in a time when maybe you're having a down time or a hard time in the press, or whatever it is, and they rally around you and lift you up no matter what.

We played a party the other night, called Heaven Party, it's like an underground queer goth warehouse party. It's amazing.

When we came off stage there was a row of the most beautiful drag queens you've ever seen in your life. And every single one of them kissed me, and was like, "You were amazing. You're so gorgeous. Thank you." And I was like, by the third, I was crying because I just feel so lucky.

What is your message for young LGBTQ+ people this Pride, right now?

Jessica: I think just to feel proud of your journey, feel proud of who you are. [Pauses.] Gosh, there's so many messages. I'm trying to think of something to sum up in a soundbite for you.

That you are beautiful, that you are seen, we see you, we're so proud of you, continue to shine brightly. Know that even if you haven't come out yet or if you don't feel safe there, or in the community that you're in currently, that it will get better, and there will be a time when you can live as authentically, and entirely as you wish to be.

That there are people here who love you and there always will be. And as long as we are creating music, we will continue to try to reach out and inspire people in every way that we can. You're so loved, and that family, and that sense of family and community that is available to love and accept you, might not be blood, and that's okay. Love is love and that there really truly is a community here who will embrace and love you, and to always remember that.

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In her latest track "Off Switch," Australian dance-pop artist VASSY captures the exhilarating intensity of a budding romance. She loves the rush but, at the same time, wishes she could fight the feeling, even if only for a few seconds.

"There's something electric between you and I/ The way we connected I can't describe/ We're right on the edge of blurring the lines/ Don't know why I'm scared of this rush inside," she sings in the intro. "I wish my heart, it had an off switch/ 'Cause, boy, I don't know how to stop this."

In this episode of Global Spin, watch VASSY deliver an acoustic performance of her track, playing guitar and using a pair of castanets for added rhythm.

VASSY released "Off Switch" on Jan. 5 with an electrifying music video swirling with vibrant neon lights. 

Recently she wrapped a string of appearances supporting Aqua's United States leg of their world tour and earlier this month, performed a headlining show in San Diego. On May 18, she will take the stage at the BASSINTHEGRASS music festival in Darwin, Australia.

Press play on the video above to watch VASSY's lively performance of "Off Switch," and remember to check back to GRAMMY.com for more new episodes of Global Spin.

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"...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."

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