Keith Urban is a big swiftie.
The country superstar and Taylor Swift have a long history – they’ve been friends since she opened for him in 2009 – but even he’s blown away by her new album Midnights, which he’s listened to multiple times since it was released on October 28 and considers it “extraordinary… This is among Taylor’s finest. This and 1989. Absolutely stunning, stunning work,” he says.
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“The lyrics, the fresh meters down to some of the cadences she sang,” he enthuses to Billboard about the set, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with the biggest week for an album in seven years. “Jack Antonoff’s production is just exquisite for a guy like me who’s obsessed with fine, fine detail. If you put on headphones, as an audiophile like me, I can swim in this album without the vocals. It’s just so beautifully put together like some sort of LSD trip, Jackson Pollock painting. It’s just beautiful. I absolutely love it, top to bottom. I think it’s one of their best albums ever.”
At a time when individual songs trump entire albums, Midnights — which Swift described as “the stories of 13 sleepless nights scattered throughout my life” — “is the perfect example of why you make an album,” says Urban.
Swift and Urban have worked together several times over the years. In 2012, Urban played guitar on Tim McGraw and Swift’s duet “Highway Don’t Care.” Then last year Urban appeared with Swift on great versions of “That’s When” and “We Were Happy” from the Taylor’s Version re-recording of their 2008 album Fearless. (They are two of the six additional songs on 2021’s Fearless [Taylor’s Version] which were written for the original but didn’t make it and were freshly recorded for the remake.)
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“His music has inspired me endlessly,” Swift tweeted when she announced he was on both songs. In 2015, she brought Urban on stage to perform his hits “John Cougar, John Deere, John 3:16” and “Somebody Like You” during their 1989 world tour.
Urban reached out to Swift and Antonoff to tell them how much he loved their new job. He’s heard of Antonoff, but not yet of Swift. “I think she’s a bit busy,” he says, laughing.
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