In a move that literally no one saw coming — including me, and I pride myself on my knowledge of Swiftie conspiracy theories — Taylor Swift just announced she's dropping her eighth album, Folklore, at midnight.
As is tradition, the announcement came minutes after Taylor started posting a series of Instagram photos marking a brand-new aesthetic for her brand-new era.
And she followed the photos up with a surprise announcement: Folklore, which Taylor has "poured all her whims, dreams, fears, and musings into" over the last few months, will drop at midnight.
Surprise 🤗 Tonight at midnight I’ll be releasing my 8th studio album, folklore; an entire brand new album of songs I’ve poured all of my whims, dreams, fears, and musings into. Pre-order at https://t.co/zSHpnhUlLb
"Before this year I probably would’ve overthought when to release this music at the ‘perfect’ time," Taylor wrote in an accompanying statement, "but the times we’re living in keep reminding me that nothing is guaranteed. My gut is telling me that if you make something you love, you should just put it out into the world.
"That’s the side of uncertainty I can get on board with," she concluded.
Not content with freaking us all out with a surprise announcement, Taylor also revealed the tracklist, which consists of 16 songs and one bonus track, and includes a collaboration with Bon Iver.
She revealed 11 of the songs were cowritten or produced with the National's Aaron Dessner, who posted his own announcement about the album on Instagram.
In addition to the album, Taylor also announced she'll be releasing a self-directed music video for "Cardigan", also at midnight, just in case she wasn't feeding us enough.
The music video for “cardigan” will premiere tonight, which I wrote/directed. A million thank you’s to my brilliant, bad ass video team - Cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto, producer Jil Hardin, executive producer Rebecca Skinner, AD Joe ‘Oz’ Osbourne