Jack White Thinks the 'Taylor Swift Way' of Writing About 'Publicly Aired Breakups' Is Not 'Interesting at All'
Jack White Thinks the 'Taylor Swift Way' of Writing About 'Publicly Aired Breakups' Is Not 'Interesting at All'
Rachel DeSantisMon, March 9, 2026 at 8:12 PM UTC
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Jack White; Taylor SwiftCredit: Gilbert Flores/Billboard via Getty; Jeff Kravitz/FilmMagic -
Jack White said he feels like the "Taylor Swift way" of songwriting is not "interesting at all"
White said he thinks it's "boring for me to write about myself"
Confessional songwriter has served Swift well, as she's set to be inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame this year
Not everyone is keen on confessional songwriting — just ask Jack White.
The White Stripes rocker, 50, opened up on why he finds it a bit snooze-worthy to write music about himself, a pulled-from-the-diary-pages style that’s popular with pop stars like Taylor Swift, Gracie Abrams, Olivia Rodrigo, Lily Allen and more.
“Now it’s become very popular in the Taylor Swift way of pop singers writing about all of their publicly aired breakups, which I don't find interesting at all,” he told The Guardian in a March 8 interview. “I think it’s a little boring for me to write about myself.”
White, who largely keeps his personal life under wraps, said that even if he’d had a “really interesting day,” it’s something he’s already lived through, and he doesn’t feel the need to relive it every time he sings a song.
Jack White performing in Mexico City in November 2024.Credit: CARL DE SOUZA/AFP via Getty
“If it’s something really painful, I’m not going to put this important, painful thing that I went through out there for some idiot on the internet to stomp all over,” he explained. “So I put a percentage of that into what I do and then morph it into somebody else’s character. I can’t really learn about myself until I put it into somebody else’s shoes.”
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Still, that style has served artists like Swift, 36, well. She’s set to be inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame later this year, and is the best-selling female artist of all time.
She’s been open about how many of her songs are pulled right from real life, like “The Story of Us” (about running into an ex at an awards show) and her 2024 album The Tortured Poets Department, which she called a “lifeline” that helped her through a difficult personal period.
"It was really a lifeline for me — just the things that I was going through, the things that I was writing about ... it kind of reminded me why songwriting actually gets me through my life," she said. "I've never had an album that I needed songwriting more than I needed it on Tortured Poets."
Even so, Swift has also expanded her horizons when it comes to her storytelling. Her 2020 album Folklore was largely from the perspective of various characters with arcs that extended over multiple songs.
“I am open about things, but in recent years I have a different perspective and like storytelling at a little bit of a distance, so it isn’t like doing a complete autopsy of myself,” she told Graham Norton on his BBC One show while promoting her most recent album The Life of a Showgirl.
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
