LET’S play a game. I’m going to describe a singer and try to guess who it is.
This singer is in her early 20s and in the last few years, has taken the music industry by storm.
She is an excellent songwriter and is famous for her ability to write songs about her personal relationships, heartbreaks and loser ex-boyfriends.
Her songs have topped the charts worldwide and she has won many accolades, even picking up a few awards at the recent Grammys where she also gave a rousing performance – which earned her a standing ovation.
So, who is it?
Is it – A: Country superstar Taylor Swift or B: British songstress Adele?
Well, the answer is both.
Taylor is 22, while Adele is 23. They both have enjoyed similar fortunes in their careers and have become famous by simply writing and singing songs about their failed relationships.
However, despite their small age gap and similar song topics, Taylor and Adele cannot look, sound or perform more different than one another.
We all know Taylor as the tall and scrawny girl who wrote songs like Teardrops On My Guitar, Fifteen, Love Story and You Belong With Me.
She has a steady stream of followers who comprise mostly of tweens, teens and lovelorn adults (who obviously hadn’t heard of Adele before pledging their loyalty).
Taylor is innocence personified. She dresses demurely, speaks softly and seems appreciative of everything around her.
There is even an Internet meme about the predictable “shocked” face she gives when she wins awards or receives a standing ovation after a performance. YouTube it – it’s cute but definitely gets annoying after a while.
The singer from Nashville, Tennessee, United States, is still kid-friendly and it’s evident in her songs which include lyrics like “Someday, I’ll be living in a big old city and all you’re ever gonna be is mean…”. The world is yet to hear her utter a curse word in her interviews or songs.
The “worst” anyone has ever heard her say was “da*n” on the song Teardrops On My Guitar, which was subsequently removed for a “clean” radio edit.
Adele, on the other hand, is a Londoner who curses like a drunken sailor, sneaks in a few cigarette breaks in her schedule and is now trying to stay sober after quitting cold turkey last May.
She has had her fair share of broken hearts and somehow, her music resonates better with young adults. Her voice is much more refined than Taylor’s and her singing range is unparallel to her current peers.
Adele is a buxom young lady with curves and big hair, and has a classic fashion sense. She dresses more often than not in black and seems wise beyond her 23 years of age.
When she gets on stage, one can’t help but pay close attention to not only her gorgeous face, but her equally gorgeous voice.
She brought the house down at the recent Grammys with her strong and cool peformance of the award-winning Rolling In The Deep, during which she hit all the notes perfectly and effortlessly.
If anyone had listened to her sing that night, they wouldn’t have guessed that the singer is still recovering from throat surgery. When she received a very deserving standing ovation for her peformance, she looked painfully shy and didn’t show an ounce of pride.
What many don’t know is that Adele gets uncomfortable on stage. She has admitted in various interviews to vomitting due to nerves before and after some of her previous performances.
For someone with a colourful personality as hers, she is very timid about perfoming in front of large crowds – a total opposite of Taylor, who revels in such attention.
Taylor is a confident performer and has played in huge arenas where all eyes were on her and her alone.
Adele, on the other hand, still sticks to smaller venues and prefers to entertain her fans in private concerts and showcases.
These young girls are so similar yet different in many aspects of their lives and careers but that doesn’t mean that we can only be a fan of one of them. They are good singers (though Adele is definitely the better vocalist) and write meaningful songs that most people could relate to.
At the end of the day, they reach out to their target audience made up mostly of broken-hearted folks with no songwriting talent of their own … and doesn’t that describe most of us?
Sharm says: Someone recently asked on Twitter what kind of songs we would get to hear if Taylor and Adele dated and then broke up? I don’t think the world is ready for such wrath …
