Consumer Guide Album

Taylor Swift: Evermore [Republic, 2020]
The theory that this second album of manifestly unautobiographical Aaron Dessner-etc. collabs in six months is by definition less inspired than the one they put out in July isn't what I hear here, which is that they kept going because they were just getting their groove on. Oddly, the song I noticed first is the one I now like least--the super-hooky but pat police procedural "No Body, No Crime." I mean, who needs hooks when melody is a given? So instead try "Champagne Problems," in which he's all set to ask her to marry him the same night she's all set to ditch him. Or the future Christmas classic "'Tis the Damn Season," a cheating song about the Taylor who got away. Or "Cowboy Like Me," in which she turns out to be the cowgirl after all. Or "Marjorie" with Swift's "Never be so kind you forget to be clever/Never be so clever you forget to be kind." Or "Coney Island" with Dessner's "Will you forgive my soul/When you're too wise to trust me/And too old to care?" Or "It's Time to Go," in which for 15 years "I gave it my all, he gave me nothing at all/Then wondered why I left." Or "Closure," which puts the title in quotes you can hear. A-