Taylor Swift releases five playlists framed around the stages of grief ahead of new album

A fortnight remains until the release of Taylor Swift’s 11th album, “The Tortured Poets Department,” and the singer has created five new playlists on the Apple Music platform to correspond with the stages of grief: denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance.

Following the announcement of her white, beige and black aesthetic album, fans theorized that the album may correspond to the five stages of heartbreak.

“So naturally, she’s created a series of exclusive playlists, choosing songs of her own catalog that fit each stage,” says a press release from Apple Music. Each of the stages include a narration from Swift.

First up is denial: I Love You, It’s Ruining My Life Songs. Here are some of the tracks included:

• “Lavender Haze”
• “Snow On The Beach (feat. More Lana Del Rey)”
• “Sweet Nothing”
• “Glitch”
• “Betty”

Swift says: “This is a list of songs about getting so caught up in the idea of something that you have a hard time seeing the red flags, possibly resulting in moments of denial and maybe a little bit of delusion. Results may vary.”

Next is anger: You Don’t Get to Tell Me About Sad Songs. Here are some of the tracks:

• “Vigilante Shit”
• “High Infidelity”
• “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve”
• “Exile”
• “Illicit Affairs”

Swift says: “These songs all have one thing in common, I wrote them while feeling anger. Over the years, I’ve learned that anger can manifest itself in a lot of different ways, but the healthiest way that it manifests itself in my life is when I can write a song about it, and then oftentimes, that helps me get past it.”

Third is bargaining: Am I Allowed to Cry? Songs. Here are some of the tracks:

• “The Great War”
• “This is Me Trying”
• “Peace”
• “The Archer”
• “Cornelia Street”

Swift explains, “This playlist takes you through the songs that I’ve written when I was in the bargaining stage, times when you’re trying to make deals with yourself or someone that you care about, you’re trying to make things better, you’re oftentimes feeling really desperate, because oftentimes we have a gut intuition that tells us things are not going to go the way that we hope, which makes us more desperate, which makes us bargain more.”

Fourth is depression: Old Habits Die Screaming Songs. Here are some of the tracks:

• “Bigger Than The Whole Sky”
• “Dear Reader”
• “Maroon”
• “Champagne Problems”
• “You’re Losing Me”

The Eras Tour star says: “We’re going to be exploring the feelings of depression that often lace their way through my songs. In times like these, I’ll write a song because I feel lonely or hopeless. And writing a song feels like the only way to process that intensity of an emotion. And while these things are really, really hard to go through, I often feel like when I’m either listening to songs or writing songs that deal with this intensity of loss and hopelessness, usually that’s in the phase where I’m close to getting past that feeling.”

And finally, acceptance, which is titled after one of the tracks: I Can Do It With a Broken Heart Songs. Here are some of the songs:

• “You’re On Your Own, Kid”
• “Midnight Rain”
• “Labyrinth”
• “The 1”
• “August”

Swift says: “Here we finally find acceptance and can start moving forward from loss or heartbreak. These songs represent making room for more good in your life, making that choice because a lot of time when we lose things, we gain things too.”