Taylor Swift’s new single Look What You Made Me Do signals she’ll be on the attack on upcoming album Reputation

It is an opportunity for former saints to engage in sneaky moves and give scorched earth speeches. Even more importantly, it is a chance for the audience to indulge in their impulses towards white-hot fury, which at times can seem exponentially more powerful than adulation.

Taylor Swift’s new single, Look What You Made Me Do, could mark her heel turn. Since her arrival in 2006, she has been positioned as one of pop’s biggest names. Her shift from country to country-pop to straight pop has been accompanied by albums full of songs that paint her as a hopeless romantic who bruises easily.

During the campaign for her previous album, 2014’s plush pop blockbuster 1989, she also positioned herself as the queen bee of a “squad” that contained as many women as she could bring into her orbit – from superfans who she welcomed into her home for a listening party to her ever-shifting inner circle of celebrity friends who popped up on her Instagram feed and at her annual Fourth of July blowout.

Taylor Swift’s new single sets records for Spotify streams and YouTube views

She was the all-American pop star with relatable lyrics, who sang of offering shoulders to cry on and being star-struck by New York.

On the other hand, Swift is a savvy businesswoman who knows which way the wind is blowing, and how simply drawn narratives can often seem more important than artists’ actual bodies of work. She’s also very aware of how the perception of her has shifted since the calendar flipped to 2016.