0843930007073. Pre-Owned: Good condition. CD. Taylor Swift designed her 2012 album Red as her breakthrough into the pop market -- a crossover she pulled off with ease elevating her to the rarefied air of superstars who can be identified by a single name. Red may not be flawless -- it runs just a shade too long as it sprints along in its quest to be everything to everyone -- but there s an empowering fearlessness in how Swift shakes off her country bona fides. Leaving Nashville behind she rushes to collaborate with Britney Spears hitmaker Max Martin and Snow Patrol s Gary Lightbody along with mainstream rock mainstays Dan Wilson and Butch Walker. Appropriately for an album featuring so many producers Red isn t sequenced like a proper album it s a buffet offering every kind of sound or identity a Swift fan could possibly want. Taylor deftly shifts styles adapting well to the insistent pulse of Martin easing into a shimmering melancholy reminiscent of Mazzy Star ( Sad Beautiful Tragic ) and coolly riding a chilly new wave pulse ( The Lucky One ). Combined with the unabashed arena rock fanfare of State of Grace the dance-pop of We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together and the dubstep feint I Knew You Were Trouble -- not to mention the cheerfully ludicrous club-filler 22 -- Red barely winks at country and it s a better album for it. It is as all pop albums should be recognizable primarily as the work of Taylor Swift alone: her girlish persona is at its center allowing her to try on the latest fashions while always sounding like herself. Although she can still seem a little gangly in her lyrical details -- her relationship songs are too on the nose and she has an odd obsession about her perceived persecution by the cool kids -- these details hardly undermine the pristine pop confections surrounding them. If anything these ungainly awkward phrasings humanizes this mammoth pop monolith: she s constructed something so precise that its success seems preordained but underneath it all Taylor is still twitchy which makes Red not just catchy but compelling. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine Rovi