The Starting Line respond to Taylor Swift for namedropping them on her new album

As you may have heard, one of the many referential lyrics on Taylor Swift‘s new two-hour double album The Tortured Poets Department is a reference to emo-pop vets The Staring Line on the song “The Black Dog.” (Apparently it’s a reference to Taylor’s ex Matty Healy of The 1975 covering “The Best of Me.”) The Starting Line themselves have also heard this, and they have publicly thanked Taylor.

“Dear Taylor,” the band writes, “We heard the song, thank you for name checking our band. We feel flattered and humbled by the reverberations of love that have come back to us as a result. It’s an honor to have TSL memorialized on such a lovely song. You didn’t have to do that, but you did, and we appreciate it wholeheartedly. Respect! Love, The Starting Line.”

You can hear the Taylor Swift song in question, the Starting Line song she references, and the Matty Healy cover below.

In a retrospective list, we ranked “The Best of Me” as the best pop punk hit of 2002. You can also read our retrospective reviews of 2002’s Say It Like You Mean It (the album with “The Best of Me”), 2001’s With Hopes of Starting Over EP, and 2007’s Direction.

The Starting Line are playing Say It Like You Mean It in full at When We Were Young and they’re also playing the Lake Tahoe edition of the Is For Lovers festivals.

Last year, The Starting Line played a new song live and said new music is on the way. Their last proper release was 2016’s Will Yip-produced Anyways EP, which was their first new music since going on hiatus after Direction.

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Top photo: The Starting Line at Adjacent Fest by Dylan Long. More here.