Taylor Swift wins historic album of the year at the Grammys and announces new album

With her 13th Grammy in hand, Swift said her 11th album "The Tortured Poets Department" will be released on April 19

By Nardos Haile

Staff Writer

Published February 5, 2024 12:10AM (EST)

Taylor Swift arrives for the 66th Annual Grammy Awards at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on February 4, 2024. (ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images)
Taylor Swift arrives for the 66th Annual Grammy Awards at the Crypto.com Arena in Los Angeles on February 4, 2024. (ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images)

Taylor Swift glided into the Grammys late and in style, ready to snag the coveted album of the year award while sitting on a secret ready to be revealed to her hungry fans and the audience: her newest studio album is coming.

On stage to give her acceptance speech for winning best pop vocal album for "Midnights," Swift gleefully said, "This is my 13th Grammy, which is my lucky number." She continued, "So I want to say thank you to the fans by telling you a secret that I have been keeping from you for the last two years, which is that my brand-new album comes out April 19th. It’s called 'The Tortured Poets Department.'"

Swift said excitedly, "I’m going to go and post the cover right now backstage," and within minutes Swift's X account posted the album announcement.

"All’s fair in love and poetry. . . New album 'The Tortured Poets Department.' Out April 19," the account tweeted.

As if that wasn't exciting enough, Swift became the first person in Grammy history to win album of the year four times with "Midnights," quivering with joy in her acceptance speech, saying, “All I want to do is keep being able to do this. It makes me so happy. All I want to do is keeping doing this. Mind blown. Thank you so much.”

Swift has won album of the year for her albums "Fearless," "1989" and "Folklore."

Before the surprise announcement and the album of the year win, at the beginning of the 66th Grammys, host Trevor Noah announced to the audience at Crypto.com stadium on Sunday evening that the pop star would be one of the celebrities to look forward to that night. And right on cue, Swift breezed into the crowd, making her way to her table with her crew in tow. The pop star waved to the audience with all eyes on her as soon as the night started.

As one of the most nominated women of the night and culture's most talked about celebrities, Swift's NFL appearances were a hot topic at the award show. She laughed along with Noah's joke about angry NFL fans being upset at her being shown at games too often.

Swift is no stranger to being the center of attention, whether she wants to be or not. Last month at the Golden Globes, the singer and friend Selena Gomez were caught on camera talking and fans all over the internet were lipreading their conversation. This time around, the singer used her black lacey fan to cover up her face so she could talk to friend and frequent collaborator, Jack Antonoff, without fans making PowerPoint presentations about what she could have been saying.  

The show's performances ranged from "Fast Car" sung by Tracy Chapman and Luke Combs, "Vampire" by Olivia Rodrigo and "Flowers" by Miley Cyrus and Swift happily sang along to each performance — so a normal awards night for the singer. She even held up her drink and screamed in solidarity with Cyrus as she said that she won her first Grammy during her "Flowers" performance.

Even as SZA won R&B song of the year, the tearful singer saw Swift in the crowd and said "Hi Taylor, I love you." Swift laughed at the endearing shoutout.

At the end of the night, Swift came out the Grammys with the top award and a new album ready to share with the rest of the world and most importantly, her fans.


By Nardos Haile

Nardos Haile is a staff writer at Salon covering culture. She’s previously covered all things entertainment, music, fashion and celebrity culture at The Associated Press. She resides in Brooklyn, NY.

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Aggregate Album Of The Year Grammys Miley Cyrus Music Sza Taylor Swift The Tortured Poets Department