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The Last Great American Dynasty

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Wikipedia article




{{Infobox song

| name = The Last Great American Dynasty

| artist = Taylor Swift

| album = Folklore

| released =

| studio =

* Kitty Committee Los Angeles)

* Long Pond (Hudson Valley)

| genre =

* Indie pop

* folktronica

* guitar pop

* alternative

| length = 3:51

| label = Republic

| composer =

* Aaron Dessner

| lyricist = Taylor Swift

| producer = Aaron Dessner

| misc =

}}

"'The Last Great American Dynasty'" (stylized in all lowercase) is a song recorded by American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift. It appears as the third track on her eighth studio album, 'Folklore', which was released on July 24, 2020, via Republic Records. Its lyrics were written by Swift, inspired by the life of a former owner of her Rhode Island mansionAmerican socialite Rebekah Harknessone of the wealthiest women in the United States history. Aaron Dessner composed and produced the song.

The song is an alternative, indie pop, folktronica, and guitar pop tune propelled by an uptempo arrangement of percussions, slide guitar, strings and glitchy electronic elements. Sung from a third-person perspective until a change near the end of the song to first-person perspective, "The Last Great American Dynasty" provides a satirical anecdote of Harkness, who used to reside at the house in the late 20th century and was the gossip of the town, while drawing parallels between the two women's lives.

Upon release, "The Last Great American Dynasty" became a fan-favorite and inspired memes about popular movies and television shows. The song received acclaim from music critics, who praised the song's lyricism, plot, production, and eccentric muse, calling it a standout on 'Folklore'. "The Last Great American Dynasty" entered the top-ten in Australia, Malaysia and Singapore, and number 13 in Canada, New Zealand, and the United Statesone of the five 'Billboard' Hot 100 top-20 hits from the album. Publications placed the song in many year-end best-music lists of 2020.

Background and composition



Aiming for an uptempo and enticing sound, American musician Aaron Dessner composed the instrumentals of "The Last Great American Dynasty", inspired by the electric guitars in Radiohead's album, 'In Rainbows' (2007). He sent the music sample to American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, who was isolating herself due to the COVID-19 pandemic; she liked the sound, and wrote the lyrics to the song in under the time Dessner would go out for a run and return. The lyrics were inspired by the life of American socialite Rebekah Harkness, whom Swift wanted to write about ever since she purchased the Holiday House in 2013.

('left') in Westerly, Rhode Island, the setting of "The Last Great American Dynasty".|alt=A mansion on a beach

In a 2020 'Entertainment Weekly' interview, Swift revealed that she first learned about Harkness from a real estate agent who walked her through the property. Consequently, the singer started reading a lot about Harkness's life and found her stories interesting. It led to the development of parallels between Harkness and herself, both of them "being the lady that lives in that house on the hill that everybody gets to gossip about". Swift stated she was looking for a chance to write about Harkness, and finally found it when she heard the instrumental track that Dessner sent. Swift employed a narrative device in the song's lyrics commonly found in country music, which she described as: "the first verse you sing about someone else, the second verse you sing about someone else who's even closer to you, and then in the third verse, you go, 'Surprise! It was me'. You bring it personal for the last verse".

"The Last Great American Dynasty" is an indie pop, folktronica, and guitar pop tune that embraces a glitchy, alternative production, making use of classical instruments like slide guitar, viola, violins and drums. Swift's vocal range in the song spans between E3 to B4. The song is written in the key of G major and has a moderately fast tempo of 148 beats per minute. In a 2021 exclusive for 'People', Swift further explained why Harkness inspired the song: "It can be a real pearl-clutching moment for society when a woman owns her desires and wildness, and I love the idea that the woman in question would be too joyful in her freedom to even care that she's ruffling feathers, raising eyebrows or becoming the talk of the town. The idea that she decided there were marvelous times to be had, and that was more important".

Lyrics



('pictured'), who owned Standard Oil, founded Harkness Ballet, and resided in the Holiday House.|alt=Black and white picture of a woman in a ballerina dress

"The Last Great American Dynasty" narrates the story and satirizes the vilification of American socialite and composer Rebekah Harkness, who previously inhabited the Holiday HouseSwift's mansion in Watch Hill, an affluent coastal village in Westerly, Rhode Island. Written in a townsfolk third-person narrative, it details the following: Rebekah West, a middle-class divorce from St. Louis, married William "Bill" Harkness in 1947, who was the heir to Standard Oil, an oil-refining company that was the 19th-century's first and largest multinational corporation in the world. The couple bought a seaside estate in Watch Hill, Rhode Island, and nicknamed it "Holiday House". Bill died of heart attack in 1954, for which Rebekah was blamed by the town. After her then-husband's death, Rebekah inherited his enormous wealth and became one of the wealthiest women in the US.

Rebekah invited "big names" and her "bitch pack"a group of female city friendsto the house, and spent the new money by throwing numerous high-class events and "outrageous" parties; Watch Hill scorned her for causing the downfall of the Harkness family, calling her the maddest and the "most shameless" woman in the town's history. Pursuing her passion for arts, Rebekah founded a professional ballet company in 1964, called the Harkness Ballet. Further details in the song about Harkness' life include: how she gambled with Spanish surrealist artist Salvador Dal, "filled" her swimming pool with champagne, when in fact, she had only used champagne to clean the pool, and stole a neighbor's dog and dyed it lime green because of a feud, whereas in reality, it was a cat instead of a dog, which implies the inaccuracy of gossipsone of many lyrical motifs present in 'Folklore'. The lyric "she had a marvelous time ruining everything" refers to the hate she received from the town and tabloids, and how Rebekah is infamous for "not fitting in".

In the song's bridge, Swift reveals her purchase of the Holiday House after 50 years of its vacancy, and in the final chorus, she shifts to first-person narrative, proclaiming herself "the loudest woman" the town has ever seen, and correlates between her celebrity life and Rebekah's controversies. Swift resonates her highly criticized moves with elements of Rebekah's story, and concludes the song with an outro of "I had a marvelous time ruining everything". Mainstream media has linked several moments of Swift's unfavorable press to that of Rebekah's, including the scrutiny the singer faces because of her highly publicized romantic life, her "squad" of popular celebrities, the Fourth of July parties she threw at the Holiday House, Watch Hill residents' concerns about the attention Swift brings to the community, and the governor of Rhode Island, Gina Raimondo, suggesting a tax on secondary homes costlier than $1 million, which was famously dubbed "the Taylor Swift tax". "The Last Great American Dynasty" is thematically feminist, and thus considered to be a prequel to the twelfth 'Folklore' track, "Mad Woman".

Critical reception



Critics praised "The Last Great American Dynasty" for Swift's signature wordplay and the storytelling plot. Hannah Mylrea of 'NME' lauded the song for its brooding instrumentals, Swift's peculiar vocals, and storytelling style reminiscent of works by Mary Chapin Carpenter and Bob Dylan, and pitted it as "a contender for the best Taylor Swift song ever written". Noting its historical details, Americana imagery and "Fitzgerald-esque" lines, 'Pitchfork' writer Julian Mapes hailed the song as "the all-timer, the instant classic" that celebrates society-defying women, and stated that the lyrics "play out in your mind like a storybook", but successfully point out society's reception of assertive women. Mapes also hailed the production as "textural and tastefully majestic". Finding the song's lyricism as the most impressive storytelling from all of 'Folklore', Mikael Wood of the 'Los Angeles Times' named the song the most humorous of all tracks, ranking it the album's third best song. Wood described it "a detailed portrait of the real-life woman who owned Swift's Rhode Island mansionand evidently scandalized the town's gentrydecades before the singer did".

'PopMatters' critic Michael Sumsion labelled the song a shrewd comparison that upgrades a small-town tale into a "towering myth". Callie Ahlgrim of 'Insider' asserted the twist in the song's bridge as "poetic genius". She further compared the final chorus tuning back to the present, underlining the parallels between Rebekah and Swift, to the bridge of Swift's 2008 hit, "Love Story", where Romeo proposes. Chris Willman of 'Variety' opined that Swift has "a grand old time" identifying herself with women who lived decades before her. In congruence, Rob Sheffield of 'Rolling Stone' wrote that the song satirizes the upper-class environment of "Starlight", the fifteenth track on Swift's 2012 album 'Red', and matched the similarities between the songsthe usage of the word "marvelous" and the muses being people who lived decades before Swift's birth.

'Uproxx' writer Philip Cosores regarded "The Last Great American Dynasty" as entrenched in Swift's trademark "melodic warmth" and "vivid details", and complimented Dessner's slow-burning production. Olivia Ovenden of 'Esquire' picked the song as the album's highlight, and commended it for "seamlessly" blending indie sounds with Swift's pop prowess. Jon Caramanica of 'The New York Times' commented that the subject of the song, Harkness, is "a classic Swift heroine", who is purposeful, disruptive and misunderstood. Jonathan Keefe, writing for 'Slant', thought the song highlights how Swift's "widening worldview" has enhanced her songwriting skills. Caleb Campbell, writing for 'Under The Radar', found Swift seeing herself in the misogynistic tabloid gossip that afflicted Harkness, but shunning out the "diaristic, reputation-obsessed" semblance of her older catalogue.

Katie Moulton, writing for 'Consequence of Sound', summarized that the song is a result of Swift's imagination expanding, as she is "consciously trying to write from perspectives not her own". Nick Levine of 'The Telegraph' pondered whether Swift is only acknowledging tensions with Watch Hill locals in the song, or if she is designating herself the successor to Harkness, and picked "The Last Great American Dynasty" as an album standout for exemplifying why Swift is one of the great songwriters of her generation. 'Billboard' listed "The Last Great American Dynasty" as one of its 20 picks for 2020 Song of the Summer, and remarked that the song gives-off "a more summery vibe" despite the generally "chillier" atmosphere of 'Folklore'.

Accolades

In her list ranking all 161 songs by Swift yet, Hannah Mylrea of 'NME' placed the song at number two, only behind "All Too Well" (2012). She was impressed at how "The Last Great American Dynasty" manages to communicate a huge portion of Harkness's life in under few minutes, topping it off with a "banging" chorus. 'NME' placed the song at number eight on its list of 50 best songs of 2020, stating "Swift engaged masterful storytelling techniques over Dessner's glitchy, cantering production, vividly spinning the tale of Harkness' life while drawing parallels between the sexist criticism both women have received [...] It's an astonishing song: one that fuses witty lyricism with megawatt hooks, and a reminder that Taylor Swift is an artist who should never be underestimated." 'Uproxx' listed the track as the 15th best song of 2020, with Caitlin White dubbing it a "quintessential Swiftian creation". 'Pitchfork' named it the 32nd best song of 2020 on its list ranking the year's 100 best songs. 'Billboard' ranked it as the 39th best song of 2020, while 'American Songwriter' listed it amongst its 20 best songs of the year. In 2021, Rob Sheffield placed "The Last Great American Dynasty" at number 17 on his ranking of Swift's 199 songs, while 'Clash' critics named it one of the 15 best songs in her discography.

Commercial performance



Upon release of 'Folklore', "The Last Great American Dynasty" reached the top 20 in many countries worldwide. In the US, all of the album's sixteen tracks debuted on the 'Billboard' Hot 100 simultaneously, with "The Last Great American Dynasty" at number 13the fourth highest-peaking song from the album, behind "Cardigan" (number one), "The 1" (number four) and "Exile" (number six), and one of its five top-20 hits. The song further debuted at number 42 on the 'Billboard' Digital Song Sales chart. The song peaked at number 13 on both of the Canadian Hot 100 and New Zealand Top 40 Singles charts.

In Australia, the song debuted at number seven on the ARIA Singles Chart; along with four other tracks from 'Folklore' that landed in the top-10, giving the album five top-10 hits in the country. The album spawned five top-ten debuts in Malaysia as well, where "The Last Great American Dynasty" peaked at number 10 on the RIM Singles chart. On the Singapore Top 30 Digital Streaming chart, "The Last Great American Dynasty" peaked at number nine, marking the fourth top-10 hit from 'Folklore' in the country. The song further arrived at numbers 56, 81 and 89 on 3 Austria Top 40, Portugal's AFP Top 200 Singles and Sweden's Sverigetopplistan, respectively.

In popular culture



"The Last Great American Dynasty" became a fan-favorite. Upon release, the song ignited a phenomenon of viral memes on the internet, with the phrase "there goes the last great American dynasty" applied to several fictional families or friends that appear in films and television shows, such as 'The Twilight Saga', 'High School Musical', 'Succession', 'Gilmore Girls', 'Schitt's Creek', 'This Is Us' and 'Jersey Shore,' Disney Channel releases like 'Hannah Montana', 'Wizards of Waverly Place', and 'Camp Rock', food chains like Taco Bell and California Pizza Kitchen, and video game arcade Blockbuster.

On September 8, 2020, a Twitter user proposed the idea for a film inspired by "The Last Great American Dynasty", with a cast featuring Blake Lively as Rebekah, Ryan Reynolds as Bill and Jesse Tyler Ferguson as the neighbor, to which the three actors responded affirmatively. Swift extended her support to the idea, along with Gigi Hadid.

Cover versions

In December 2020, British musician Steven Wilson of English progressive rock band Porcupine Tree performed a cover version of "The Last Great American Dynasty" as part of the musical sessions promoting his sixth studio album, 'The Future Bites' (2021). Swiss singer-songwriter Marcos Cabanas, along with American musician Jake Thistle, released a cover of "The Last Great American Dynasty" as part of Cabanas' third album 'From The Town of Lincoln, Nebraska' (2020).

Credits and personnel



Credits adapted from the liner notes of 'Folklore'.

* Taylor Swift vocals, songwriting

* Aaron Dessner production, songwriting, recording, drum programming, keyboards, percussion, piano, synthesizer, bass guitar, electric guitar, slide guitar

* Bryce Dessner - orchestration

* Rob Moose orchestration, violin, viola

* J.T. Bates drums

* Jonathan Low mixing, recording

* Laura Sisk vocal engineering

* Randy Merrill mastering

Charts



Certifications



See also



* List of top 10 singles in 2020 (Australia)

* Samuel Goldwyn Estate

References



Category:2020 songs

Category:Taylor Swift songs

Category:Songs written by Taylor Swift

Category:Songs written by Aaron Dessner

Category:Song recordings produced by Aaron Dessner

Category:Indie pop songs

Category:American alternative rock songs

Category:Folktronica songs

Category:Satirical songs

Category:American folk songs

Category:Songs about beaches

Category:Songs about marriage

Category:Songs about Rhode Island

Category:Songs based on American history

Category:Songs with feminist themes

Category:Harkness family

Category:Songs about socialites

Category:Internet memes introduced in 2020

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