Taylor Swift’s VMAs Performance Will Make You Love ‘Lover’ Even More
Taylor Swift is fresh off the heels of her Lover album release and back on the VMAs stage. Yup, after a long absence from performing at the event, the singer returned to MTV's biggest night on Aug. 26 to perform two tracks from her new album, which fans are loving just as much as she loves Joe Alwyn. So, what songs made the cut? Swift performed "You Need To Calm Down" and her latest love ballad, "Lover." And Taylor Swift's 2019 VMAs performance marks the first time Swift ever performed "Lover" on stage, and the performance did not disappoint.
Swift revealed on her Instagram story the day of the VMAs that she would be performing two songs from Lover to open up this year's show. She revealed one of the songs would be one she had already performed live, which fans now know was "You Need To Calm Down." The second was up in the air, but Swift gave a pretty heavy-handed clue in her Instagram story video by using the Lover Instagram filter. With the Lover glitter-heart logo over her eye and the word "Lover" floating over her head, Swift kept on saying, "Which one's it gonna be?!" This heavily implied the song was going to be "Lover," which was released on Aug. 22 as the last single and music video release before the entire album dropped on Aug. 23.
This was one of Swift's more obvious music clues. And her performance of "You Need To Calm Down" and "Lover" at the VMAs did not disappoint.
Just like the "YNTCD" music video, a litany of queer celebrities appeared alongside Swift, including Todrick Hall, who appeared in the video and doubled as Swift's co-executive producer on the video.
This performance marks Swift's first VMAs performance since 2015. The last time Swift graced the VMAs stage, she performed a mashup of "The Night Is Still Young" and "Bad Blood" with Nicki Minaj. The year before that, it was the 1989 era, and Swift performed "Shake It Off." It's not as if Swift hasn't had any kind of presence at the VMAs in the years since, however.
Almost two years ago to the day, Swift debuted the "Look What You Made Me Do" music video during the 2017 VMAs on Aug. 28. Katy Perry was the host that year, making things kind of awkward considering she and Swift were still feuding at that time. Fast forward to 2019, though, and Perry and Swift have squashed their beef via the "You Need To Calm Down" music video. My, my, my, how the times have changed.
Swift's fans are living for her VMAs opening performance. If she has made anything explicitly clear with her upbeat, loving song choices for her performance, it's that the dark Reputation era is officially over. Swift is all about sunshine and butterflies and joy and happiness now with this Lover album, so best believe her performances at award shows from here on out are going to be a shot of joy straight to the bloodstream.
