Ivy (Taylor Swift song)

"Ivy"
Song by Taylor Swift
from the album Evermore
Written	2020
Recorded	2020
Studio	Long Pond (Hudson Valley)
Genre	Folk
Length	4:20
Label	Republic
Songwriter(s)	Taylor Swift Aaron Dessner Jack Antonoff
Producer(s)	Aaron Dessner
Lyric video
"Ivy" on YouTube

Listen to the song Ivy (Taylor Swift song) or Buy it on amazon

"Ivy" (stylized in all lowercase) is a song by American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift. It is the tenth track on her ninth studio album, Evermore, which was released on December 11, 2020, via Republic Records. "Ivy" was written by Swift, Aaron Dessner, and Jack Antonoff, and produced by Dessner.

Musically, "Ivy" is a folk song documenting a married women's infidelity using several metaphors, the primary one being ivy vines growing over a stone house to convey the narrator's deep-rooted, irresistible attachment to her lover, where inevitable consequences could possibly dwindle the happy ending to the relationship. The song is built on a ticked arrangement of banjo, picked guitar, and trumpet, with Justin Vernon's harmonies in the background. "Ivy" is part of a series of several songs on Evermore depicting conflict and turmoil concerning marriage.

Upon Evermore's release, "Ivy" was acclaimed by music critics for its storytelling and heavily metaphorical lyrics. In the United States, it debuted at 61 on the Billboard Hot 100, number 11 on the Billboard Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart, and 33 on the Rolling Stone Top 100. Internationally, it charted at number 28 on the Canadian Hot 100, 43 on the Billboard Global 200, and 43 on the Australian Singles Chart.

Background and release

On July 24, 2020, during the COVID-19 lockdowns, Swift surprise-released her eighth studio album, Folklore, to widespread critical acclaim and commercial success. In September 2020, Swift and her co-producers and co-writers for the album, Aaron Dessner and Jack Antonoff, assembled at Long Pond Studio, located in a secluded cabin in upstate New York, to film the documentary Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions. Released to Disney+ and accompanied by a live album released digitally, Swift performed the stripped-down renditions of all 17 tracks on Folklore and recounted the creative process of developing the album. Following the release of Folklore and during the filming of The Long Pond Studio Sessions, Swift and Dessner continued writing songs, with Swift penning lyrics to Dessner's instrumental tracks:

To put it plainly, we just couldn't stop writing songs. To try and put it more poetically, it feels like we were standing on the edge of the folklorian woods and had a choice: to turn and go back or to travel further into the forest of this music. We chose to wander deeper in ... I've never done this before. In the past I've always treated albums as one-off eras and moved onto planning the next one after an album was released. There was something different with Folklore. In making it, I felt less like I was departing and more like I was returning. I loved the escapism I found in these imaginary/not imaginary tales. I loved the ways you welcomed the dreamscapes and tragedies and epic tales of love lost and found into your lives. So I just kept writing them.

— Swift on the origins of Evermore, NME

The one physical trip Dessner made during the development of Evermore was to visit Justin Vernon, frontman of the band Bon Iver who featured on Folklore, who ended up harmonizing playing the guitar and banjo on "Ivy". Dessner highlighted a wintry nostalgia on much of Evermore and chose to play sleigh bells on "Ivy" to emphasize the autumn- and winter-oriented theme of Evermore compared to Folklore, which was intended to have a more spring- and summer-focused aesthetic.

Before the release of Evermore, Swift teased the song "Ivy" as well as the album's lead single "Willow" in a social media post captioned "not a lot going on at the moment"; in the post, she sits on a couch in front of two framed pictures, one of a willow tree and one of ivy. On December 10, 2020, Swift announced that her ninth studio album and Folklore's sister album, Evermore, would come out at midnight and revealed its track listing, where "Ivy" placed tenth. In the announcement, Swift teased imageries of various tracks, including "Ivy", which was one of three songs, along with "No Body, No Crime" and "Tolerate It", that was part of what Swift described as the "'unhappily ever after' anthology of marriages." Lyric videos of each song on the album were released to Swift's YouTube channel; "Ivy" has since garnered over 7 million views as of November 2021.

Composition and lyrics

The chorus of "Ivy" encapsulates an affair using the metaphor of ivy vines growing over a stone house and eventually covering it, referring to how the narrator's heart has been conquered by her lover so profoundly, in spite of the narrator's marriage to someone else.

"Ivy" is an intimate folk song depicting the affair of a married woman who is insatiably in love with her secret lover despite knowing the inevitable consequences that jeopardize the possibility of a happy ending. Insider described the song's lyrics as "cryptic," with "Ivy" built on the metaphor of her ivy vines growing over stone to portray her deep-rooted love. The song also features references to literary tropes. The song begins with the lyric "How's one to know? / I'd meet you where the spirit meets the bones", a reference to Miller Williams' 1997 poem "Compassion" in which he writes "You do not know what wars are going on / down there where the spirit meets the bone." The song slowly builds to a bridge, where the scene of changing seasons threatens the narrator with a looming climax to the affair: "Spring breaks loose, but so does fear / He's gonna burn this house to the ground." In the final portion of the song, Swift, as the narrator, issues an ultimatum to the subject, her secret lover: "Tell me to run / Or dare to sit and watch what we'll become / And drink my husband's wine". Such lyrics document the narrator's inescapable fate and highlights the "nonchalant foil to her anxiety." Musically, the song is set in the key of D major with a tempo of 88 to 92 beats per minute. Swift's vocals span from D₃ to A₄. Instrumented by a ticking arrangement of banjo, picked guitar, and trumpet, the song features elastic vocals from Swift, accompanied by American singer-songwriter Justin Vernon's gentle harmonies in the chorus.

Critical reception

Critics praised "Ivy" for its intense storytelling and metaphorical perspectives. Callie Ahlgrim and Courteney Larocca of Insider selected "Ivy" as one of the five best songs on Evermore. Ahlgrim described it as "profoundly listenable and delightfully cryptic," comparing its prevalent metaphors to fairytales traced with sinister themes, while Larocca applauded its intimacy and immersion: "now I'm covered in ivy, too." Sam Sodomsky of Pitchfork described "Ivy" as a "stunner", similarly comparing it to a fairytale and praising the character development that polishes "the storybook setting of Swift's early work." In a review of Evermore published in The New York Times, Jon Pareles selected "Ivy" as an example of how Swift expanded the fictional storytelling and character studies between Folklore and Evermore. Madeline Crone of American Songwriter praised the woodsy aesthetic of "Ivy" and opined that the song "meticulously employs whimsical metaphors" reminiscent of the Brothers Grimm. Hannah Mylrea of NME chose "Ivy" as an example of Swift's "vibrant" lyricism on Evermore, pinpointing its "rich metaphors." In a ranking of all 17 songs on Evermore, Jason Lipshutz of Billboard chose "Ivy" as the third-best song on the album, describing its lyrics and production as "gorgeous". Patrick Ryan of USA Today opined that "Ivy" was one of "the most devastating love songs Swift has ever written." MTV News writer Carson Mlnarik called "Ivy" a "bittersweet and tension-filled tale" which slowly builds to an "intoxicating" bridge, and "the best usage of the word "goddamn" modern music has ever seen." Rolling Stone journalist Rob Sheffield called the song "an ode to a forbidden extramarital crush", and placed it 44th on his 2021 ranking of all the 199 songs in Swift's discography. In the less favorable side, Mikael Wood of The Los Angeles Times described "Ivy" as a "pretty but aimless" leftover from Folklore.

Commercial performance

Following the release of Evermore, on the issue dated December 26, 2020, "Ivy" debuted at 61 on the Billboard Hot 100 alongside the album's 14 other songs; the next week, it dropped off the chart. It debuted at 13 on the Rolling Stone Top 100, with 98,700 units moved and 11.9 million streams in its first week. It debuted at number 11 on the Hot Alternative Songs chart, where it spent a total of five weeks. It landed at number 28 on the Canadian Hot 100, and number 43 on both the Billboard Global 200 and the Australian Top 50 Singles charts.

Credits and personnel

Credits adapted from Tidal.

• Taylor Swift – vocals, songwriting
• Aaron Dessner – songwriting, production, recording, acoustic guitar, bass, drum machine, electric guitar, percussion, synth bass, synthesizer
• Jack Antonoff – songwriting
• Justin Vernon – background vocals, banjo, drums, electric guitar, triangle
• Clarice Jensen – cello
• Bryan Devendorf – drum machine, percussion
• James McAlister – drum machine, keyboards, synthesizer
• JT Bates – drums
• Josh Kaufman – lap steel guitar
• Gerg Calbi – mastering
• Steve Fallone – mastering
• Jonathan Low – mixing, recording, vocal engineering
• Benjamin Lanz – synthesizer, trombone
• Thomas Bartlett – synthesizer
• Kyle Resnick – trumpet
• Logan Coale – upright bass
• Yuki Numata Resnick – violin

Charts

Weekly charts

Chart (2020–2021)	Peak position
Australia (ARIA)	43
Canada (Canadian Hot 100)	28
43
Portugal (AFP)	185
UK Streaming (Official Charts Company)	77
US Billboard Hot 100	61
US Hot Rock Songs (Billboard)	11
US Rolling Stone Top 100	33

Year-end charts

Chart (2021)	Position
US Hot Rock & Alternative Songs (Billboard)	54

References

This article "Ivy (Taylor Swift song)" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Ivy (Taylor Swift song). Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.

📰 Article(s) of the same category(ies)

• True Romance (Die Ärzte song)
• Dance with You (Skusta Clee song)
• Isang Puso Ngayong Pasko
• Future (Red Velvet song)
• We Belong (Dove Cameron song)
• Take Me Home (Alexandra Stan song)
• Destined for Greatness (song)

---