The couple that writes together, stays together. Taylor Swift‘s longtime boyfriend Joe Alwyn has once again collaborated with the pop star, this time for Swift’s new album, Midnights, out Friday (Oct. 21).
The Conversation With Friends actor appears under the pseudonym William Bowery — a nod to his late great-grandfather — on the album’s credits.
In an interview with GQ Hype, Alwyn revealed he chose to use a pseudonym when writing with his girlfriend as he doesn’t want their relationship to distract from the music. “The idea was that people would just listen to the music rather than focus on the fact that we wrote it together,” he said.
According to the credits for Midnights unveiled on Apple Music, Alwyn co-wrote the track “Sweet Nothings” for Swift’s new album
Swifties will likely already know that Alwyn previously appeared under his pseudonym on the pop star’s 2020 albums Folklore and Evermore, on the tracks “exile,” “betty” and “champagne problems.”
Joining the “Blank Space” singer’s beau on Midnights is her frequent collaborator and Bleachers frontman Jack Antonoff, as well as singer Lana Del Rey, who Swift performs a duet with on “Snow on the Beach.” Actress Zoë Kravitz appears as a co-writer on two songs: “Karma” and “Lavender Haze”.
In October, Swift explained she “happened upon” the phrase “lavender haze” while watching an episode of the wildly popular series Mad Men. She thought it “sounded cool,” and later learned the phrase was used in the past to describe the feeling of being in love.
“Like, if you were in the ‘Lavender Haze,’ that meant you were in that all-encompassing love glow, and I thought that was really beautiful. And I guess theoretically when you’re in the ‘Lavender Haze,’ you’ll do anything to stay there and not let people bring you down off of that cloud. And I think a lot of people have to deal with this now… because we live in the era of social media and if the world finds out that you’re in love with somebody, they’re gonna weigh in on it,” Swift shared via Instagram.
“My relationship for six years, we’ve had to dodge weird rumors, tabloid stuff, and we just ignore it. And so this song is sort of about the act of ignoring that stuff to protect the real stuff,” she continued.