The Tortured Poets Department has quite the staff! Taylor Swift released her highly anticipated new double album on Friday (April 19), and across the LP’s 31 tracks lies a slew of references to celebrities inside and outside the worlds of music and poetry.
When the “Cruel Summer” singer first revealed the Tortured Poets tracklist in February, much of the attention landed on the two high-profile featured artists. Grammy-nominated alt-rock band Florence + the Machine appears on “Florida!!!” and Post Malone appears on “Fortnight,” which Swift confirmed as the set’s first single on Thursday (April 18).
Outside of those collaborations, however, the tracklist also included a song titled “Clara Bow.” Serving as the closer for the album’s first disc, “Clara Bow” also references an American actress who rose to fame during the silent-film era, transitioned to “talkies” and ultimately became a leading cultural symbol of the Roaring ’20s.
As it turns out, those tracks were just the tip of the iceberg. The Tortured Poets Department — which broke a major Spotify record in less than 12 hours — is not only inspired by Tay’s much-buzzed-about relationships with The 1975‘s Matty Healy and Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, but it also contains references to stars ranging from Boygenius‘ Lucy Dacus to Kim Kardashian.
The Tortured Poets Department serves as both Swift’s eleventh studio album and her first album of new music since 2022’s Grammy-winning Midnights. Longtime collaborators Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dessner assisted in writing and producing the record, continuing a streak that stretches back to 2014’s 1989 for Antonoff and 2020’s Folklore for Dessner.
Keep reading for a list of all the celebrities Taylor Swift name-dopped directly or indirectly on The Tortured Poets Department.
