Anderson Cooper struggled to hold in his laughter when he ended up doing a dramatic reading of Taylor Swift‘s viral hit ‘Wood’ on New Year’s Eve.
While co-hosting CNN’s New Year’s Eve Live, Cooper was asked to read out the song’s innuendo-laden lyrics, which he had evidently never seen before.
He struggled to make it through phrases such as “Redwood tree, his love was the key that opened my thighs,” and a mention of the “New Heights of manhood.” Cohen, clearly enjoying this, was egging him on: “Oh yeah, oh yeah, knock on wood, baby!” he joked.
“You’re probably familiar with this song, I was not,” Cooper said between fits of laughter. An amused Cohen replied: “Sweetie, yeah.”
‘Wood’ is believed to refer to Swift’s fiance Travis Kelce and was one of the most talked-about tracks from her recent album ‘The Life Of A Showgirl’, released in October. Though Swift has said she believes her mother thinks the song is about popular superstitions, NME observed in our own review that ‘Wood’ “winks at her fiancé’s prowess both in the bedroom and as a podcaster”.
Kelce responded to the lyrics on the New Heights podcast, which he hosts with his brother Jason. “It’s a great song. I love that girl… any song that she would reference me in that way…” he said.
“It’s not just you,” Jason added, suggesting that some of the lyrics were about Travis’ “manhood”: “It’s an appendage. It’s a very specific thing.” Defending himself, Travis joked: “I think you’re not understanding the song.”
Earlier this week, Swift insisted that ‘Wood’ “started out in a very innocent place”. In an interview with Jimmy Fallon breaking down the album, Swift has said that the song started when she told producers Max Martin and Shellback: “I wanna do a throwback, timeless-sounding song, and I have this idea of ‘I ain’t gotta knock on wood’, and it would be all susperstitions… it really started out in a very innocent place!”
“I don’t know what happened, man,” Swift continued. “I got in there, we started vibing and I don’t know how we got here, but I love the song so much.”
In other news, Swift has been thanked for her “generous” and “timely” donations to children’s charities in Nashville and Kansas City ahead of Christmas. The beneficiaries were the Adolescent and Young Adult Cancer Program at the Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt in Nashville and the Operation Breakthrough in Kansas City, which provides a “safe, loving and educational environment for children in poverty”