Aaron Dessner Shuts Down Claims Gracie Abrams' 'Death Wish' Is About Taylor Swift.
This fake fantasy is coming to an end thanks to Aaron Dessner. The songwriter clarified the real source of inspiration for Gracie Abrams' 2025 song "Death Wish," which some fans had assumed was Taylor Swift.
“My love, you love your time machine, your power trips and diamond rings," the song, which was featured on Abrams' just-published album Daughter From Hell, featured her singing. "The walls you built on teenage dreams, the well you dug for sinking things / Your words to kill are evergreen, so you must not feel anything at all."
However, Dessner, who co-wrote the song, stated that the lyrics are "definitely not" about Swift, with whom he has previously worked. In a July 22 interview with Billboard, he clarified that "Death Wish" was "written at a time when [Abrams] was writing about a friend’s ex, being in a bad relationship."
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"So, it was kind of about that person, I think," the 50-year-old added. "I wouldn’t even actually know who that person was."
Furthermore, Dessener never asked Swift or Abrams, who went on tour together in 2023 and 2024, to clarify their lyrics.
"You don’t want to be like, 'Well, you’re talking about this, right?'" he stated. "It’s more mysterious not to."
Additionally, Abrams has revealed the source of inspiration for "Death Wish." "This song is about a friend of mine who recently was dating a mega narcissist," the 26-year-old said to the crowd during her first performance of the song in March 2025 as part of her The Secret of Us Tour.
"A sincere friend of mine was recently dating someone who kind of sucked," at the moment, she revealed. "And I was listening to them talk about it a lot, and so this song is about that."
Fans continued to speculate even though Swift, 36, has been dating Travis Kelce for over two years.
Actually, earlier this month, when Abrams posted a picture of the dress she wore to Swift and Kelce's wedding in an Instagram carousel that also included a picture of the 14-time Grammy winner's ex-boyfriend Joe Alwyn, rumors of an alleged hatred between the singers only intensified.
"Not congratulating Taylor - but posting her ex?" one person inquired, and another said, “The screen capture of Joe Alwyn from The Favourite in the same carousel as the outfit you wore to Taylor Swift's wedding is crazyyyyy (I say this with love)."
Additionally, Abrams revealed some advice Swift gave her about making music, even though she hasn't publicly addressed rumors of a friendship breakup.
"The first thing that comes to mind when you ask that is, the encouragement to just never stop writing," she stated during the CBS Sunday Morning broadcast on July 12. "For me, any time I had a feeling where I was like, 'I would rather just cry about this for a while,' [instead], just pick it up and write it down. And it serves you every time to do that."
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