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5 highlights from Taylor Swift's 2-hour Travis Kelce podcast interview | TribLIVE.com
Music

5 highlights from Taylor Swift's 2-hour Travis Kelce podcast interview

Megan Swift
Megan Swift
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AP
Donna Kelce stands with her son Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift after the AFC Championship NFL football game against the Buffalo Bills.
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AP
This album cover image, released by Republic Record,s shows “The Life of a Showgirl” by Taylor Swift.

When the world found out this week Taylor Swift would be a featured guest on the “New Heights” podcast, fans were sent into a frenzy.

It’s hosted by Swift’s boyfriend, Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, and his brother, retired fellow football player Jason Kelce. They teased the upcoming episode at the beginning of the week, writing on Instagram that they will have a “VERY special guest.”

Many Swifties posted online and on social media platforms in anticipation of the podcast’s release at 7 p.m. Wednesday, as well as predicting what she might say about her upcoming album, the Eras Tour wrapping up or reclaiming her master tracks.

Early Tuesday morning at 12:15 a.m., Swift announced her 12th album will be called “The Life of a Showgirl,” and it has an orange theme.

Little did anyone know, Swift would discuss deeply personal aspects of her life, career and family throughout the two-hour-long podcast episode.

The Washington Post called the podcast “unprecedented,” as Swift rarely sits for interviews anymore.

Swift uploaded MySpace videos, posted photos and comments on social media, and participated in YouTube livestreams to chat with fans at the beginning of her career, the Post said, but that all scaled back as she became a worldwide name.

In the past five years, she has sat for only a few interviews, mostly focused on her music, according to the Post.

The New Heights episode reached 1.3 million live concurrent viewers, according to Pat McAfee, who posted that “history was made last night.”

And by 12:01 a.m. Thursday, the YouTube stream had 5.3 million views, the Post said.

Here are the top five highlights from Swift’s most candid and in-depth interview yet:

1. Swift teared up on the podcast as she recounted finding out she was able to purchase her master recordings.

In a post to social media on May 30, Swift revealed that she had finally been able to purchase the master recordings for her first six albums after a years-long fight to own her own music — for a rumored $360 million.

Her Nashville label sold them in 2019 to manager Scooter Braun, who then sold them to a private equity firm, the Post reported.

“I’ve been bursting into tears of joy at random intervals ever since I found out that this is really happening. I really get to say these words: All of the music I’ve ever made … now belongs … to me,” Swift wrote in a long letter posted to her website. “To say this is my greatest dream come true is actually being pretty reserved about it.”

Swift talked about how she hit the floor when she heard the news from her mother, and when she went to tell Kelce, who was playing a video game at the time, she was crying so hard she could barely speak, the Post said. He said he started crying, too.

2. Her father, Scott, had a recent health scare — a quintuple bypass surgery this summer.

Swift spent time in Florida this summer with her parents because her father had to have a quintuple bypass and her mother also had a knee surgery.

She said on the podcast that it was one of the most special times of her life, spending so much time with her family. Kelce was in Florida, too.

3. Swift and Kelce are stronger than ever.

For a singer who almost never reveals anything about her personal life — let alone her romantic life — other than through music, Wednesday’s podcast was a huge deal.

A decade ago, it was considered shocking that Swift actually said her boyfriend Calvin Harris’s name out loud at an awards show,” according to the Post. Swift dated actor Joe Alwyn for six years, and while they were photographed together, the public barely saw them interact as well.

For fans who watched the YouTube version of the podcast, they could see Swift and Kelce be affectionate in real-time, holding hands and even sharing a kiss.

The couple started dating in the summer of 2023 thanks to the New Heights podcast itself. Kelce said that he tried and failed to give Swift a friendship bracelet with his phone number on it when the Eras Tour came to Kansas City in July 2023.

“I owe a lot to this podcast. This podcast got me a boyfriend, ever since Travis decided to use it as his personal dating app about two years ago,” Swift said of the gesture. “This is sort of what I’ve been writing songs about wanting to happen to me since I was a teenager.”

4. Baking bread has been Swift’s main post-Eras Tour hobby.

Swift joked on the podcast, saying that now that the Eras Tour has wrapped, she’s reverted to 1700s-esque hobbies, like sewing.

She’s made baby blankets and children’s clothing, along with cooking.

Right now, Swift is in a bread-baking phase, and she confessed that she’s probably stalking many people’s sourdough blogs.

5. “The Life of a Showgirl” is coming out on Friday, Oct. 3 — otherwise known as 10/3, which adds to equal Swift’s number 13.

Swift’s newest album will be about everything going on behind the scenes during the Eras Tour, she said on the podcast.

She revealed to the Kelce brothers that the album cover is meant to look like she’s submerged in a bathtub, as that’s how she would normally decompress after tour shows.

For the album, Swift worked with Swedish pop writer-producers Max Martin and Shellback, who worked with her on her biggest pop hits: “Shake It Off,” “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” “Style,” “Blank Space” and more.

It will be upbeat, a contrast to the moodiness of “Folklore,” “Evermore” and “The Tortured Poets Department,” Swift said.

Kelce, who has heard all 12 tracks already, confirmed that the album has “12 bangers.”

Megan Swift is a TribLive reporter covering trending news in Western Pennsylvania. A Murrysville native, she joined the Trib full time in 2023 after serving as editor-in-chief of The Daily Collegian at Penn State. She previously worked as a Jim Borden Scholarship intern at the Trib for three summers. She can be reached at mswift@triblive.com.

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