Taylor Swift and Kanye West, the most reliably combustible pair of stars in pop music, may well face off yet again on Friday.
West announced last week that his next album, apparently called “Donda: With Child,” would come out on July 24. Since then he has been teasing details of the project on social media, in between developing a chaotic campaign for president.
Then on Thursday, Swift made the surprise announcement that she was releasing her own album, “Folklore,” which she said had come together in isolation — like other performers, Swift had canceled her touring plans for this year amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“Before this year I probably would’ve overthought when to release this music at the ‘perfect’ time,” she wrote in a statement on her social media accounts, “but the times we’re living in keep reminding me that nothing is guaranteed.”
“Folklore” will come out at midnight, and Swift’s website is selling the album in a large array of physical configurations, which will all but guarantee a huge showing for “Folklore” on Billboard’s chart. The album — made up of 16 songs, with a bonus track for the deluxe editions — will come out in eight CD versions and eight vinyl LP versions. Those will be available for sale for one week, she said, with variants of artwork and edition titles like “Clandestine Meetings,” “Stolen Lullabies” and “Betty’s Garden.”