Taylor Swift blasts Kim K after being named Time Magazine 2023 person of the year

Taylor Swift has opened up for the first time about her relationship with Travis Kelce, describing the NFL star’s attraction to her as “metal as hell”.

Swift spilt the tea on her boyfriend as Time magazine announced she was its person of the year for 2023.

In a wide-ranging interview with Time, Swift also delved into her feud with Kim Kardashian that almost led to her “career death” and revealed her intense workout regimen before the Eras tour that began six months prior to the first show.

Swift beat out competition from King Charles, Barbie and even Vladimir Putin to snag the honour.

Time has produced a series of covers of Swift, including one with her beloved cat Benjamin Button.

The magazine acknowledged choosing Swift as its person of the year might surprise some. The honour has previously gone to 14 US presidents, five Russian or Soviet leaders and three popes. Last year Ukrainian President Zelensky was awarded the accolade.

But in a year with “significant shares of darkness,” Time said Taylor Swift, “found a way to transcend borders and be a source of light”.

“No one else on the planet today can move so many people so well. Achieving this feat is something we often chalk up to the alignments of planets and fates, but giving too much credit to the stars ignores her skill and her power.”
 

It said that this year, at the age of 33, she had achieved a kind of “nuclear fusion” bringing art and commerce together with her number one albums and record breaking tour while becoming a billionaire.

Swift told Time that right now was “the proudest and happiest I’ve ever felt, and the most creatively fulfilled and free I’ve ever been”.
 

Kardashian feud

However, she delved into some of her darker days too, including a clash with Kim Kardashian that dates back to 2014 and, she said, left psychological scars.

And she spoke about famous foes Kanye West and music manager Scooter Braun, who famously bought the masters to her back catalogue against her wishes.

“Trash takes itself out every single time,” Swift said. “My response to anything that happens, good or bad, is to keep making things. Keep making art... But I’ve also learned there’s no point in actively trying to quote unquote defeat your enemies.”

When her album 1989 was released, Kanye West – then married to Kardashian – penned a song suggesting he was responsible for Swift’s fame.

Swift pushed back but Kardashian then released a phone call recording between Swift and West suggesting the musician actually approved of the song. A longer version of the call, which emerged later, showed Swift didn’t approve of all the lyrics.

“You have a fully manufactured frame job, in an illegally recorded phone call, which Kim Kardashian edited and then put out to say to everyone that I was a liar,” she told Time.

“Make no mistake — my career was taken away from me.

“That took me down psychologically to a place I’ve never been before. I moved to a foreign country. I didn’t leave a rental house for a year. I was afraid to get on phone calls. I pushed away most people in my life because I didn’t trust anyone anymore.”

In 2020, Kardashian said she didn’t edit the footage and there was no suggestion Swift approved of all of the lyrics in West’s song. She said Swift’s criticism had “forced me to defend” West.
 

Intense workout routine

With the Eras tour ongoing, Swift revealed her intense workout routine to ensure she’s in top form for fans.

On earlier tours, she said, she partied “like a frat guy”. Not anymore.

“I knew this tour was harder than anything I’d ever done before by a long shot,” she said of Eras which includes 44 songs and runs for more than three hours.

She began getting in shape for it six months before the first show.

Every day she would run on a treadmill and sing all the songs going “fast for fast songs, and a jog or a fast walk for slow songs”.
 

She also did three months of dance training with choreographer Mandy Moore, who worked previously with Emma Stone on hit musical La La Land.

“I wanted to be so over-rehearsed that I could be silly with the fans, and not lose my train of thought.”

Swift said she also stops drinking ahead of a tour.

“Doing that show with a hangover. I don’t want to know that world.”

The fans deserved it, she said, because many had paid top dollar to be there.

“They had to work really hard to get the tickets.

“I wanted to play a show that was longer than they ever thought it would be, because that makes me feel good leaving the stadium.”
 

Kelce: ‘Metal as hell’

In the interview, Swift also broke her silence on boyfriend Travis Kelce and said the two had been together for some time before everyone caught on when she was seen at a Kansas City Chiefs game.

“This all started when Travis very adorably put me on blast on his podcast, which I thought was metal as hell.

“We started hanging out right after that. So we actually had a significant amount of time that no one knew, which I’m grateful for, because we got to get to know each other.

“I think some people think that they saw our first date at that game? We would never be psychotic enough to hard launch a first date.”

Swift said the pair were in a relationship and so “we’re showing up for each other” at things the other loves – such as at football matches.

“Other people are there and we don’t care”.