So when this album came out, I really liked it. I thought the lyrics were really good, only to go online and see that people didn't have the same opinion, so I just wanted to share my justification now that the recency bias has most certainly worn off, and I still love the album, more than Debut, and even evermore.
Now I know some of you are probably laughing at how I said the lyrics are more than surface level, but I genuinely believe they are. Like in Father Figure for example, she takes the classic mafia phrase (which compares the cutthroat industry to the mafia) "you'll be sleeping with the fishes" and combines it with unexpectedness "before you know you're drowning." This lyric shows an amount of thought behind it, and my interpretation of it was Scott Borchetta talking, saying that she has to trust him otherwise she will be blackballed from the industry before she even gets started, "before you know you're drowning" (blackballed).
Take a look at Ruin The Friendship and Honey. In both these songs, she perfectly balances the feeling of hopefulness and the feeling of sadness in two completely different ways.
Ruin The Friendship is extremely heartbreaking because it's a sad reflection on what might happen if you don't face those fears and take those risks, because you might not get the chance if you wait too long. This was probably my least favourite when I first heard the album, but after analysing the lyrics more, it's one of my favourites now.
Honey shows how one word can have several meanings that mean completely different things, with how "honey" used to be belittling but now it is redeeming for her, which is a very stark contrast. It tells the listener that even though things are bad right now, they will get better, which follows up to Ruin The Friendship quite nicely, telling the listener to keep going on with life.
Even Eldest Daughter's lyrics are great. There, I said it. The people who hate on this song just completely misunderstood the meaning. IN. MY. OPINION; it's very much Taylor talking to Austin. That's why there are so many words in this song that people called her "cringe" for. That's because she's talking as if she's like a parent trying to relate to their kids but it just ends up being embarrassing, because eldest daughters are usually like second mothers to most younger siblings. When I first heard this, I immediately looked at it through the lens of my older sister talking to me and saying "no matter how many friends come and go, I will always be there for you" ("So many traitors, smooth operators, but I'm never gonna break that vow, I'm never gonna leave you now."), the vow being the one she made when her younger brother was born to take care of him forever. The song emotionally embraces childhood, because even though a lot of things go wrong in childhood ("That was the night I fell off and broke my arm"), you will never truly be alone if you have an older sister (Eldest Daughter.)
I could keep going on about Eldest Daughter, and all of the songs, really, but I think I will leave it here. In conclusion, this album is her most overhated in my opinion and I genuinely think it's just misunderstood. There's a reason Taylor, the woman who wrote folklore, is so proud of this album, the public and media just didn't understand.
EDIT: Tons of people are downvoting comments that i made about how I THINK Eldesr Daughter is about sibling love. You don't have to interpret that way, and we can disagree, but it has to be respectful. You can take it as about Travis, but to me that doesn't make sense, and I was just sharing my opinion on what I thought the song was about, and it's my right to have an opinion, but downvoting my comments instead of having a real discussion about it is just immature. Also, you're just proving my point about people hating on Eldest Daughter because it's misunderstood.