Taylor Swift has taken aim at anti-gay protesters in her new single You Need to Calm Down, urging them to get out of the "dark ages".
The 29-year-old singer celebrates the LGBTQ community in the new record, which is the perfect anthem for America's Pride Month this June.
In the tune, Taylor turns her attention to different groups of people who need to "calm down", with lyrics including: "Why are you mad when you could be GLAAD?” The line references the organisation that "rewrites the script for LGBTQ acceptance".
Later in the track, Taylor speaks directly to anti-gay protesters as she sings: "Sunshine on the street at the parade, But you would rather be in the dark ages, Makin’ that sign must’ve taken all night.
"And control your urges to scream about the people you hate, ‘Cause shade never made anybody less gay."
The song is the second taken from Taylor's upcoming album Lover, following the release of ME! earlier this year. And while fans are now desperate to see the video for You Need to Calm Down, the singer explained she had purposefully only dropped a lyric video for the track for the time being.
"I wanted you to hear the song first, then see the video,” she said during a live discussion with fans. “Because the video is very worth the wait. There’s a lot going on in the video so I wanted that to be a separate discovery.”
The video is due to drop on 17 June, with the 18-track album following on 23 August.
Of the record itself, Taylor told her fans: "That’s more songs than I’ve ever had before. And this album in tone is very romantic - and not just simply thematically, like it’s all love songs or something because I think that the idea of being romantic, it doesn’t have to be a happy song.
“I think you can find romance in loneliness or sadness or going through conflict or dealing with things in your life. I think it just looks at these things with a very romantic gaze.”
