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The Tiniest Clue! Taylor Swift’s Clock Choker Set to Midnight During the 2024 Grammys
Are you ready for it? Taylor Swift and her fondness for Easter eggs is no secret, and the “Midnights” singer didn’t hold back with the clues in her 2024 Grammys red carpet look.
Taylor, 34, and her good friend Lana Del Rey were walking through a crowd of people on the red carpet at the awards show on Sunday, February 4, according to a video shared by People. At one point, Taylor stopped and asked her stylist to adjust the clock choker around her neck so that it would be set to midnight.
The “Anti-Hero” singer paired the choker with a white, strapless Schiaparelli dress, long black gloves and 300 carats of diamonds draped around her neck. Plus, Taylor opted for wavy hair and a bold red lip. Fans were convinced that her outfit was hinting at an announcement for the release of Reputation (Taylor’s Version).
Swifties have been theorizing for weeks that the Grammy winner was going to announce the release date of Reputation (Taylor’s Version) at the awards show. Earlier in the day on Sunday, February 4, Taylor’s website seemingly went down, but fans quickly began to suspect something was awry. Instead, users were met with an error message that read, “Error 321 Backend fetch failed.”
It didn’t take long for someone to figure out that the error message wasn’t typical. The error given was one that was typically seen on fax machines when one was met with a poor telephone connection. Fans quickly put together that the first song released from Reputation was “Look What You Made Me Do,” and one part of the song features Taylor saying, “I’m sorry, the old Taylor can’t come to the phone right now.” Combine that with the “Midnight Rain” singer’s Reputation-coded look on the red carpet, and everyone believed that Reputation (Taylor’s Version) was inevitably on its way.
However, another Swiftie noticed a peculiar string of letters on the “downed” website – “hneriergrd.” Someone unscrambled the letters and discovered they spell out “red herring,” and that was the clue fans needed to truly pay attention to.
Taylor managed to pull a fast one and instead, announced the release of an entirely new album titled The Tortured Poets Department during her Pop Vocal Album of the Year acceptance speech instead.
“OK. This is my 13th grammy. Which is my lucky number, I don’t know if I’ve ever told you that,” Taylor said to the audience. “I wanna say thank you to the fans by telling you a secret that I’ve been keeping from you for the last two years, which is that my brand new album comes out April 19. It’s called The Tortured Poets Department. I’m gonna go and post the cover right now backstage. Thank you, I love you, thank you.”
