"Lover" — at least until recently — was widely received as one of Taylor Swift's classic love songs.
When the album of the same name came out in 2019, its titular single was declared first dance song material, or even a “wedding waltz.”
Indeed, the song was used at millennial weddings — including early aughts heartthrob Jesse McCartney’s — as Swifties who grew up with the singer used her music to enter into their next phase of life.
Krista Schnur, 30, used “Lover” twice in her wedding: She walked down the aisle to an instrumental version, and then she and her newly minted husband danced to it.
She and her husband Logan knew “Lover” was “their song” the moment they heard it, she says.
“It’s understated. We’re not flashy. It just fits,” she tells TODAY.com.
Tara Bhrushundi, owner of Sweet Harmony Music, a New Jersey-based instrumental group that performs at wedding ceremonies, says "Lover" is a popular choice among couples.
"We see lots of couples requesting it for processional music, such as when the bridesmaids and groomsmen walk down the aisle. I think the song captures a modern feeling of romance, and that is exactly what today’s couples are looking for," Bhrushundi says.
In the song, Swift paints a portrait of quiet intimacy. Her wild “Red” days, of thrilling romances with highs and lows and uncertainties in between, had settled into something steadier with one person, captured by a simple chorus: “You’re my, my, my, my lover.”
But that interpretation is now in question, as Swift recasts some of her songs in a different light. Ahead of the release of “The Tortured Poets Department,” Swift released five playlists on Apple Music, sorting old songs into groups inspired by the five stages of grief, or "heartbreak."
“Lover” landed on the denial playlist.
“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,” she said in a voice memo opening the playlist.
"Lover" was the eighth song on the playlist, joined by other love-tinged tracks like "Lavender Haze," "Willow," "Style" and "Sweet Nothing."
After the voice memo dropped, people online mourned the altered interpretation of “Lover” that Swift presented, with some saying it tarnished the song’s original glow.
“Taylor tainted Lover for me so bad,” one wrote on X.
In "Lover," Swift opens with the idea of a house, signaling domestic contentment: "We could leave the Christmas lights up ‘til January / And this is our place, we make the rules," she sings.
The chorus starts with a plea to make it last: "Can I go where you go? / Can we always be this close forever and ever?"
The colorful music video, in which Swift dances around a house with dancer Christian Owens, underscores the sentiment.
Swift herself confirmed that she meant for the song to be perfect for a slow dance. She told the New York Times in 2019 that she "stumbled over to the piano" late one night to compose the song.
“I’ve been thinking for years, ‘God, it would just be so great to have a song that people who were in love would want to dance to'... In my head, I had just the last two people on a dance floor at 3 a.m., swaying," she said.
The album and single “Lover” were widely understood to have been inspired by her six-year relationship with the actor Joe Alwyn, which reportedly ended in the spring of April 2023. Swift has not publicly commented on the relationship’s end. However, she is now dating Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.
Now, people have raised the theory that the questions in “Lover” were a sign of anxiety and that the "red flags" were there all along.
“If you dig into the lyrics it reeks of anxiety and fear of abandonment; anxious attachment,” one wrote on X.
Others said it was a love song, but bittersweet when seen from the future. "Taylor just feels like she was probably in denial when she wrote it," one X user wrote.
The hubbub has shaken "Lover's'" status as a go-to wedding song. “Moment of silence to anyone who had Lover as their wedding song,” one person wrote on X.
For some, the reclassification was enough to take it off the list of a to-be wedding.
"When you’ve thought lover is gonna be your wedding song all along and now taylor says it’s denial," one person wrote on X.
Others are unfazed. Schnur says the playlist “doesn’t change” the meaning of the song for her.
“She’s looking back at the relationship. She put it in the denial playlist because she thought it would be a love that lasted and it didn’t. She’s reexamining how she felt during that time,” she says.
Erin C, who requested her last name not be used, had already picked out the song for her upcoming wedding and has no plans to change it. "It's so relatable. She gets it," Erin says of the song.
Erin says Swift "spelled out" how to listen to her music at the "Eras Tour" stop she attended.
"Her dream is that when they go into our world, they become about our life," she says. "We have to keep holding on to the fact that we're able to make these stories and songs our own."
Though, she understands why Swift might have a different view of "Lover" given her life experiences.
"If my fiancé and I ended up breaking up, I’d associate ‘Lover’ the same way. Because I haven’t associated the song with someone and have it go negatively, it helps me keep positive,” she says.
The debacle raises questions of the relationship between Swift's life, her songs and her fans' interpretations. At what point do her songs take on lives of their own?
It seems, for each fan, it's different: Some want to find out the truth of the song, others are content to apply it to their lives.
Valentina Jeannette, 29, is a singer-songwriter from Venezuela who cautioned her younger Swiftie sister, 15, against reading the songs as too autobiographical.
"I heard her say, 'I can't believe she put that song on that playlist.' I'm like, 'You don't have to think exactly what she thinks about this song," she says.
From the beginning, Swift has said she won't confirm the inspiration behind her songs.
"I never disclose who my songs are about," she told Glamour in 2012.
She reiterated this point in 2015, telling GQ that by not revealing her sources, she maintains a semblance of the upper hand when it comes to media coverage of her personal life.
"I’ve never named names, so I feel like I still have a sense of power over what people say — even if that isn’t true, and even if I don’t have any power over what people say about me," she said. "The fact that I’ve never confirmed who those songs are about makes me feel like there is still one card I’m holding."
Jeannette encourages embracing that degree of anonymity, focusing on the song over speculation regarding the story behind it.
"I feel like it takes away the enjoyment if you're only thinking of the gossip," she says. "It can still be your wedding song."