Taylor Swift Has Been Called Out After She Dropped Three New Variants Of “The Tortured Poets Department” On The Same Day As Billie Eilish’s Album Release After Billie Was Accused Of Shading Her

Speaking to the publication for a sustainability-centered interview, Billie criticized how normalized it has become for artists to sell multiple variants of the same album. 

At this point, it’s important to point out that Billie herself sells multiple vinyl variants of her albums, but they all have the exact same tracklist so that fans aren’t forced to buy every version in order to hear all of her songs. She also uses 100% recycled vinyl and scraps for each variant.

“We live in this day and age where, for some reason, it's very important to some artists to make all sorts of different vinyl and packaging… which ups the sales and ups the numbers and gets them more money,” she explained in the interview. 

"I can't even express how wasteful it is. It is right in front of our faces, and people are just getting away with it left and right,” Billie went on. "I find it really frustrating as somebody who really goes out of my way to be sustainable and do the best that I can and try to involve everybody in my team in being sustainable — and then it's some of the biggest artists in the world making fucking 40 different vinyl packages that have a different unique thing just to get you to keep buying more.”

"It's so wasteful, and it's irritating to me that we're still at a point where you care that much about your numbers and you care that much about making money — and it's all your favorite artists doing that shit," she concluded.

For context, Billie’s album variants only offer fans a different vinyl color and packaging, and all of the options are announced at the same time so that fans can choose between them and order their favorite. 

Meanwhile, Taylor is renowned for the way that she releases multiple versions of the same album with different bonus tracks on each one.

Just last year, Taylor’s own fans accused her of a “shameless cash grab” when she released different colored vinyl variants for her 1989 rerelease — with each option announced one at a time and only available for a limited window.

Creating a sense of urgency and exclusivity around the blue edition, which dropped first, Taylor warned fans that it would only be available for 48 hours. Once those 48 hours were up, Taylor surprise-dropped a yellow version that was also only available for a matter of hours. The same pattern repeated for other colors.

Each vinyl was listed on Taylor’s official store for $31.89, and each also incurred its own shipping charge as orders for multiple versions could not be placed at the same time.

When the album was first announced, Taylor excitedly took to social media to show her followers that if they bought four versions of Midnights on vinyl, the backs of the jackets would create a clock.

Target also had an exclusive CD version of the album that included three bonus tracks that weren't available elsewhere. This meant that if fans wanted to hear the songs, they had to buy a physical version.

Then, six months after the album’s release, Taylor released a CD-exclusive Late Night edition of Midnights that contained more exclusive bonus tracks that weren't available on streaming sites — forcing fans to buy a second physical version in order to hear all of the tracks. 

She wrote at the time: “okay so it would be so awesome if people would stop putting words into my mouth and actually read what i said in that billboard article."

"i wasn't singling anyone out, these are industry-wide systemic issues," she added. "& when it comes to variants, so many artists release them - including ME ! which i clearly state in the article. the climate crisis is now and its about all of us being part of the problem and trying to do better."

Taylor did not publicly acknowledge any of the discourse at the time, but people believe they have now spotted some seriously shady activity from the star.

Each version includes a first draft phone memo of one of three of Taylor’s songs; either “The Black Dog,” “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” or “Cassandra.”

To hear all of the original drafts, fans must purchase all three of the newly available variants at $5.99 each.

Reacting to a Pop Base tweet about Taylor’s new variants on X, formerly Twitter, one person tweeted: “billie’s statement about artists releasing 40 vinyl packages to get people to buy more really got into her… doing this on her album release day is so nasty." 

The post quickly went viral, and has 10s of thousands of likes and retweets at the time of writing.

“oh she really hates seeing other women succeed,” another popular response reads. While somebody else wrote: “how convenient she's doing this on the day another big artist is releasing her new album.”

One more tweeted: “the same day as billie’s release……. and yall swear that taylor is a girl’s girl.” 

Many listeners struggle to hear any similarity between the two songs, and Olivia was widely defended by other artists as they expressed their discomfort at a new singer seemingly being targeted by more established stars in the business.

In fact, the post announcing the voice memo albums on Taylor’s official promo Instagram account, Taylor Nation, has been flooded with negative comments from their 9 million followers. 

Several took the opportunity to point out they were still feeling short-changed after they pre-ordered physical versions of The Tortured Poets Department when it was first announced, only to technically be left with half an album as it only includes the first 16 songs — not the additional 15 that Taylor surprise-dropped two hours after its initial release.

Neither Taylor nor Billie have publicly responded to the furor, but we will let you know if they do!