Buffalo, N.Y. (WBEN) - Love her or hate her, Taylor Swift is the biggest musical artist in the world right now, and Western New York "Swifties" are very excited to hear her latest offering that dropped Friday: "The Tortured Poets Department."
"One of the things I love about Taylor is how much she loves her fans. And she makes it really fun for us to get excited about an album," said Danielle Cumpston, the creator of the "Swiftie Mafia" Facebook page.
The "Swiftie Mafia" is a group of nearly 1,000 Western New York Swift fans who share theories about the "easter eggs" or clues she leaves for her fans surrounding details about her upcoming songs and albums, as well as share Swift-themed events and listening parties going on in the area in addition to everything else associated with the "Fearless" musician.
"The best part of this lead up to the album release is just all of the easter eggs, she's hidden for us," explained Cumpston.
"And it gets that excitement going. And I mean, she's a marketing genius - because we're all talking about it. The group on Facebook is where we predominantly do most of our planning, promotion, discussion. We're all trying to figure out what the songs are going to be about, who they're about. It's just a really, really fun way for our community to just get together and communicate even more about something that we all are passionate about."
Meanwhile, Revolver Records shop owner Phil Machemer and his staff on Thursday were busy processing and listing the couple hundred Taylor Swift vinyl records that arrived to his Transit Road location that afternoon.
Machemer says it's always a busy time everytime Taylor Swift drops a new album.
"There's so many people that are getting into collecting her records, and she always has different variants and different versions of the record to buy. She's definitely a business woman. To be honest, it's a lot of work for us to prepare for these types of things, but it is exciting in a sense that the stores will be very busy and people will be here excited to buy physical media. That's exciting for sure."
As a matter of fact, Cumpston bought a record player just so she could start collecting Swift albums - which is certainly music to the ears of our local record stores.
"I got into vinyls because of Taylor. I had never purchased vinyl. I did actually buy "Midnights" on CD even though I had no players to play on. I wanted to have that physical copy. Revolver Records, they had signed copies of "Midnights." So, of course, I rushed there. And that's when I started collecting."
Many artists nowadays not only sell one variant of their "limited edition" vinyl records. Some artists do exclusive colored or patterned vinyls for select retailers like Target, Walmart and even Urban Outfitters. And sometimes artists do limited edition vinyls just for local record stores to sell. For example, many artists will release or re-release music for special days like Record Store Day - which is coming up this Saturday, Aug. 18. A day that Machemer says is typically the busiest for him, even bigger than the holiday season.
Cumpston says one of the greatest things about being a Swiftie aside from the positive vibes of the Swiftie community is that her songs are relatable and promote positivity, people can resonate with her messages of navigating through life and addressing serious issues like mental health.
"You hear a song and it's easy to remember the feelings that her lyrics are conjuring up for you. And you can put yourself right back into her shoes or yours. And so I just feel like she writes for herself as a form of therapy, she has said that, but also for all of us. So I feel like no matter your age, or where you are in your life, there's a song that's gonna resonate with you. And I also think that it's really exciting that she writes songs that are timeless."
Cumpston also notes she writes more than just breakup songs!
There are a few Swift-themed events happening in Buffalo. One being a release party at VENU Buffalo from 5:30 p.m. - 9:30 p.m. on Friday. In addition, Revolver Records is hosting their own listening party on Sunday at noon at their 6840 Transit Road location, which is free to the public.
Machemer hopes that this listening party will spawn more listening events at his locations, as listening parties have kind of dissolved out of the mainstream, especially since the pandemic and the birth of digital music.
"I don't mind my daughter is going to be there. And she's really excited about it. I feel like with physical media being not as popular as it was, people don't really celebrate new releases as much as I did when I when I was a kid. A new release would come out, we would skip school and we would go home with the hits or go downtown in the record shop that we loved and buy the new record and listen to it -- it was an event."