Taylor Swift on the meaning of ‘Bad Blood’

MANILA, Philippines – Fans may have speculated that Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood” is about singer Katy Perry, but Taylor said that the song – and what she previously said about it – never pointed fingers at anyone. 

In an interview for a cover story on GQ, the singer-songwriter said:

“You’re in a Rolling Stone interview, and the writer says, ‘Who is that song about? That sounds like a really intense moment from your life.’ And you sit there, and you know you’re on good terms with your ex-boyfriend, and you don’t want him – or his family – to think you’re firing shots at him.

“So you say, ‘That was about losing a friend.’ And that’s basically all you say. But then people cryptically tweet about what you meant. I never said anything that would point a finger in the specific direction of one specific person, and I can sleep at night knowing that.

“I knew the song would be assigned to a person, and the easiest mark was someone who I didn’t want to be labeled with this song. It was not a song about heartbreak. It was about the loss of friendship.”

Although GQ writer Chuck Klosterman pointed out that nobody thought that the song was about a guy, Taylor insisted that people still would have assumed that it was. “And nothing could be further from the truth. It was important to show that losing friendships can be just as damaging to a person as losing a romantic relationship.”

Earlier in the GQ article, Taylor pointed out that by not specifying who her songs are about, the public tends to assume, and these assumptions become facts “in the general public’s mind.” 

Her explanation for “Bad Blood” on GQ was given in response to a question about her allowing the public to “dictate the meaning of her work.” 

Taylor told Rolling Stone in 2014 that the song was about a female artist who tried to sabotage her arena tour. Because 3 of Taylor’s backup dancers left her Red tour early to join Katy’s Prismatic tour in 2014, rumors flew that the song was about Katy.

As the GQ interview points out, that “Bad Blood” was about losing a friend was not all Taylor said about the song to Rolling Stone. 

“She did something so horrible. I was like, ‘Oh, we’re just straight-up enemies.’ And it wasn’t even about a guy! It had to do with business. She basically tried to sabotage an entire arena tour. She tried to hire a bunch of people out from under me,” Taylor said in that interview. 

In the same Rolling Stone interview, she also said, “But I just want people to know it’s (‘Bad Blood’) not about a guy. You don’t want to shade someone you used to date and make it seem like you hate him, when that’s not the case.”

Katy has mostly kept silent about the whole “Bad Blood” issue, though she previously tweeted who tweeted a cryptic message after the interview came out, saying: “Watch out for the Regina George in sheep’s clothing…”

Most recently, Katy did tweet something that had many fans talking. In July, Taylor misunderstood Nicki Minaj’s tweet about not being nominated for an MTV Video Music Award, thinking that Nicki was “pitting women against each other.” In response to Nicki and Taylor’s exchange, Katy tweeted, “Finding it ironic to parade the ‘pit women against other women’ argument about as one unmeasurably capitalizes on the takedown of a woman.” 

The “Bad Blood” music video features Taylor and her female celebrity friends gearing up for a battle as Taylor sings, “Now we got problems/And I don’t think we can solve them.” – Rappler.com