Fans have been quick to speculate the new album could be about Swift’s ex-boyfriend, Joe Alwyn.

By Molly Moss

Published: Monday, 05 February 2024 at 14:44 PM


While Swifties have been busy speculating about the release date for Reputation (Taylor’s Version), Taylor Swift has announced the arrival of a brand-new album while collecting her 13th Grammy award – and it’s coming out in a matter of months!

The singer was accepting the award for best pop album, for Midnights, when she announced the upcoming release of The Tortured Poets Department.

“I want to say thank you to the members of the Recording Academy for voting this way,” she said.

“But I know that the way that the Recording Academy voted is a direct reflection of the passion of the fans. So I want to say thank you to the fans by telling you a secret that I’ve been keeping from you for the last two years – which is that my brand new album comes out on April 19.”

Swift later revealed the album cover art – a black-and-white image of Swift lying on a bed with her hands wrapped around her body – on her social media accounts.

But when can we expect it to be released? Read on for everything you need to know.

Taylor Swift new album: The Tortured Poets Department release date

Taylor Swift performing on stage in a sparkly blue skirt and top.
Taylor Swift.
Marcelo Endelli/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management

Fans can expect the album to be released on 19th April 2024.

Swift revealed the release date in the caption of her post on Instagram, writing: “All’s fair in love and poetry… New album THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT. Out April 19.”

Before Swift announced the album at the Grammy Awards 2024, fans had been speculating online about whether the singer would use an acceptance speech to announce a re-recording of Reputation, continuing her project of re-recording her first six albums as “Taylor’s Versions”.

She released 1989 (Taylor’s Version) in October 2023.

Is there a Taylor Swift The Tortured Poets Department tracklist?

There are currently no details available for the album’s tracklist.

However, fans can preorder the album on Swift’s website, where it says it will include 16 songs.

What could Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department be about?

Taylor Swift in a blue dress dancing
Taylor Swift.
TAS2023/Getty Images

Little is known about the contents of the new album.

In the post on Swift’s social media revealing the album cover, the singer also included a photo of the lyrics that read: “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.”

Underneath the lyrics, Swift wrote: “All’s fair in love and poetry … Sincerely, The Chairman of The Tortured Poets Department.”

Fans have been quick to theorise that Swift’s new album could be about her ex-boyfriend Joe Alwyn, but this is just speculation at this point.

Alwyn and Swift dated for six years before they broke up last March.

Fans have unearthed a discussion that Alwyn and Paul Mescal had with Variety back in December 2022, during which they revealed they had a WhatsApp group chat with Andrew Scott called The Tortured Man Club.

“It’s the Tortured Man Club, I think. It’s me, you – and Andrew Scott started the group,” Alwyn said in the interview.