“Paper Doll” by John Mayer
“Paper Doll” is a track that came out on 18 June 2013, being the lead single from John Mayer’s sixth-studio album, “Paradise Valley”, which is a product of Columbia Records. To note, he had what can be deemed a notable fling, i.e. relatively-short romantic relationship, with Taylor Swift from 2009 to 2010.
The reason this is pertinent to point out, as to why we’re researching this song now, is because first of all Swift more recently broke up with Joe Alwyn, after six years of dating, thus representing by far the longest she has been romantically involved with a single person.
Secondly, upon that announcement being made public, Mayer proceeded to make a number of interesting comments in relation to the content of “Paper Doll”. And third, he had confirmed earlier on that this piece is indeed about Taylor, whom he has been quite critical of since they parted ways.
Taylor loves to write Songs about Her Ex Boyfriends
As we have pointed out numerous times in the past, Swift is such that she often uses her romantic life, both the good and the bad aspects of it, as fuel for her songs. Owing to this, back in 2010 she released a track titled “Dear John” which many believe is addressed to Mayer.
Usually, when it is generally accepted that Swift dropped a song about one of her celebrity exes, if said ex proceeds to make any related comment at all it would be sort of a humble one. After all, Taylor can be considered the greatest solo musician to come out of the United States up until this point in the 21st century. Furthermore, she has been extremely popular, with a very-affectionate fanbase, pretty much since the beginning of her career.
However, Mayer wasn’t having it on a number of levels. For example, he stated that he felt “really humiliated” by “Dear John”. Furthermore, he opined that Swift dropping that song “was a really lousy thing to do” without him being forewarned and went on to describe it as “kind of cheap songwriting”.
So it is also taken that “Paper Doll”, which was written exclusively by Mayer (who also produced it with Don Was) is his response to “Dear John”.
The Lyrics of “Paper Doll”
There are certain lyrical clues which fans who are really deep into these types of theories have concluded are likely direct allusions, if you will, to Swift. But the purpose of this analysis is not to beat that dead horse. Rather, we will attempt to ascertain what John is saying about Taylor in general.
And doing so isn’t necessarily an easy task. Considering that Mayer criticized Swift’s writing skills beforehand, he couldn’t come with just average lyrics of his own, so it reads as if he may have gone out of his way to make the wording of this piece particularly poetic.
For example, it isn’t abundantly clear what the title is supposed to mean in context. What is obvious, based on its utilization in the chorus, is that the vocalist is using the term to describe the addressee.
And most generally interpreted, a paper doll is figurine that is cut out of a sheet of paper basically, thus making it a very-fickle construct. Likewise, what John seems to be implying is that when they dated Taylor Swift, euphemistically put, wasn’t at the point in her life where she was ready to settle down.
Or as he infers, she didn’t specifically know what she was looking for or “running from” at the time. But that said, he appears to be optimistic about her romantic future regardless.
“You’re like twenty-two girls in one
And none of them know what they’re running from
Was it just too far to fall
For a little paper doll”
Keep in mind that Mayer is over a decade older than Tay-Tay, and when they dated he was in early 30s, while she was in her late teens. So it is understandable, in a manner of speaking, why she may not have been as romantically stable or serious as he idealized.
But with Mayer more recently bringing this song up – in April 2023 with Taylor now being in her early 30s – and calling it ‘sarcastically bi-chy’ in the process, perhaps what he’s now trying to get at is that to this day she still hasn’t broken away from that modus operandi, i.e. being a transient lover.
