Hoax (song)

"Hoax" is a song by the American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift. It is the final track of the standard edition of her eighth studio album, Folklore (2020). Swift wrote the track with its producer, Aaron Dessner. A slow-paced piano ballad, "Hoax" is about a flawed but everlasting relationship; Swift describes the details using motifs and imagery.

"Hoax" was met with mixed to positive reviews from critics, some of whom praised the lyrics while some others deemed it forgettable. The track peaked at number 71 on the United States's Billboard Hot 100 and entered the charts of Australia, Canada, and the United Kingdom. It received a gold certification from the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA). Swift featured the song on the Disney+ concert documentary Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions (2020).

Production and release[edit]

Taylor Swift began work on Folklore during the COVID-19 lockdowns in early 2020, and enlisted the first-time collaborator Aaron Dessner as a producer. "Hoax" was written alongside eight songs by Swift and Dessner, who produced all of them.^[1][2][3] Due to the lockdown, they were separated and had to create Folklore by exchanging digital files.^[4] Whereas much of the songs they worked on stemmed from Dessner's instrumental tracks, "Hoax" was written first and then produced. It was the last track penned for Folklore; Dessner thought the album was finished before Swift sent the lyrics of the song, days prior to the album's release. She told him to focus on to "try [not giving] it any other space other than what feels natural" to him before developing the production.^[5][6][7][8]

On July 24, 2020, "Hoax" was released by Republic Records as the final track on the standard edition of Folklore.^[9] It charted in the countries of Australia (43)^[10] and Canada (51);^[11] the former's Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) gave it a gold certification for reaching 35,000 units.^[12] In the United States, the song debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 and the Rolling Stone Top 100, with peaks of number 71^[13] and 13,^[14] respectively. It also entered at number 14 on Billboard's Hot Rock & Alternative Songs, where it stayed for nine weeks^[15] and appeared at number 62 on the chart's 2020 year-end.^[16] In the United Kingdom, the song peaked at number 62 on the OCC's Audio Streaming Chart.^[17] On November 25, Swift recorded a stripped-down rendition of "Hoax" for the Disney+ concert documentary Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions and its live album.^[18]

Music and lyrics[edit]

"Hoax"

A sample of "Hoax", which features Swift singing over a slow-paced piano instrumentation with guitars and muted strings.

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"Hoax" is a slow-paced piano ballad that lasts for three minutes and forty seconds.^[19][20][9] It has orchestration written by Rob Moose, and incorporates acoustic and electric guitars, OP1, synth bass, viola, violin,^[3] percussion,^[21] and muted strings.^[22] "Hoax" was recorded at Long Pond Studios in Hudson Valley. The vocals were recorded at Kitty Committee Studio in Los Angeles and the instruments were recorded at Hudson Valley and Brooklyn. The song was mixed at Long Pond and was mastered at Sterling Sound in New York City.^[3][5]

The lyrics describe a flawed but everlasting relationship.^[20] Swift details the messiness of it by motifs and imagery.^[23][7] The first verse has lyrical references that alludes to the tracks of her albums Red (2012) and Reputation (2017), ranging from "Holy Ground" ("This has frozen my ground") to "Look What You Made Me Do" ("My smoking gun")—"Hoax" was seen as a "tragic" reimagining of the former.^[7] In the bridge, she mentions New York: ("You know I left a part of me back in New York"), which indicates a sense of regret. The next line features a cinema motif, which Swift paints the relationship as a movie: ("You knew the hero died so what's the movie for?"). The motif was used in fellow tracks "Exile" and "This Is Me Trying".^[7] The strained finale reverses the song's main imagery: ("My kingdom come undone"),^[23][7] and ends Folklore on a despondent note.^[24] Spencer Kornhaber from The Atlantic interpreted the lyrics as a tribute to English actor and Swift's then-boyfriend Joe Alwyn and opined that she is "creating tension [...] by scrambling the listener's assumptions.^[25]

Critical reception[edit]

Critics gave "Hoax" mixed to positive reviews. Michael Sumsion from PopMatters lauded Swift's vocal delivery and selected the song as one of the tracks that represents the "compelling and entrancing patchwork" of the album.^[26] Business Insider's Callie Ahlgrim found much of the lyrics "beautiful and devastating", while Courtney Larocca from the same publication called the song "sneakily brilliant".^[27] Punch Liwanag from Manila Bulletin picked "Hoax" as one of Folklore's songs that has lines evoking imagery and corresponding emotion.^[22] Slate's writer Carl Wilson believed that the song is one of the closest tracks to resemble "the naked intimacy" of the singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell.^[28] Jill Gutowitz of Vulture considered it a "sweeping close", where "Swift finally [pulled] off the bridge of sanity", to the album's "brink of madness".^[29]

The Guardian writer Kitty Empire thought the song was underwhelming: "It is a shame that these searching, intelligent songs take so few real risks with form".^[30] Hannah Mylrea of NME considered it the least "memorable" on the album,^[31] and Jill Mapes from Pitchfork regarded the song as one of the tracks that Folklore "could use some selective pruning".^[32] John Wohlmacher from Beats Per Minute called the song "disappointingly clinical" and insisted that it should have been a deluxe track.^[33]

Personnel[edit]

Credits are adapted from the liner notes of Folklore.^[34]

Charts[edit]

Weekly charts[edit]

Year-end chart[edit]

Certification[edit]

References[edit]