Taylor Swift dropped her 12th studio album, The Life of a Showgirl, on Friday, October 3. Immediately, the album polarized fans and media alike. Some note the album as “flat” with surface-level lyrics, while others exclaim you have to really dissect the album to get it.
Max Martin, Shellback and Taylor Swift teamed up again to deliver an album full of theatrics, direct messages, and a whole lot of “love” for Travis Kelce.
Regardless, here’s my thoughts on the album.
We open with a relatively new sound from Taylor in “The Fate of Ophelia,” something that is kind of reminiscent of reputation. I was not expecting this to be one of my favorite songs from the album, but yes, it most certainly is.
“The Fate of Ophelia” is a love song about someone who saved her from “drowning.” This is a much more mature sound and sets the darker tone for the rest of the album. When we hit the chorus, the song gets even better.
We then slow down for a little bit in “Elizabeth Taylor,” a song that definitely feels like it could’ve been in reputation. This song is about when stardom gets exhausting and needing someone to run to. When you finally have that, there are definitely some doubts. You care more about the love than the materialistic things.
In my opinion, we’re introduced to the showgirl aesthetic here. Overall this is a beautiful song with graceful lyrics that tell a story. Please pay attention to the ad libs in this song.
“Opalite” is a kind of quiet resilience and calm of finding the right person or right situation after hardships. We get another new sound in this album with its dreamy opening and subtle similarities to Katy Perry’s “International Smile.”
This is pure pop at its core and is one of the better songs on the album. You’re gonna catch me saying “Now the sky is opalite” when something goes well again in my life.
Taylor’s next song, “Father Figure” is a sassy, mafia-style song where she’s both singing from the perspective of protecting something from someone who won’t handle it properly, and then singing from a more powerful perspective of getting that thing back that you were protecting. The lyrics are definitely interesting but I think they just paint a very blatantly obvious picture. If you’re a fan of Taylor, you’ll probably connect this to her getting her masters back.
If I had one note about this song, I just think she could’ve done without a key change. I never find key changes to be good enough for a change-up in the final chorus. However, stylistically yes it makes sense.
With “Eldest Daughter” being next, we’re introduced to our Track 5 sad song/ballad. This song references how eldest daughters have the best intentions but fall in situations where they’re taken advantage of. This song has the perspective of “life didn’t make me heartless and cold, I’m going to continue loving anyway.”
Lyrically, it’s probably not the strongest song but the message and the idea is there. I definitely cried listening to this and it’s diabolical to make this sad song four minutes long.
Do you think we get happier after this? Well, think again. “Ruin the Friendship” is not about her drama with Blake Lively for a while, it’s about regret over not pursuing a former friend romantically. It’s a groovy, lighthearted song where we get the same dreamy vibes as we did earlier with “Opalite.”
This is absolutely one of Taylor’s stronger songs in the album, the lyrics tell such a happy story until it hits you in the second half of the song.
“Actually Romantic” is another sassy, sarcastic song by Taylor. This song is flat out about romanticizing someone who consistently hates you. It’s giving “Gives You Hell” by All-American Rejects, which can open a discussion about Taylor’s inspirations for this album.
This is just all-around a fun song if you’re not one of the two people involved in this diss, and fun music coming back is unfortunately a recession indicator. BTW, this is Taylor’s most sexually explicit song – and probably the most sexually explicit diss song – and it’s about a girl.
“Wi$h Li$t” is an ode to how normal people want glamour and fame, and famous people crave normalcy. This song really leans into the showgirl vibe again. What’s great about this song is it is genuinely so real and relatable to her life and where she is right now.
This song is for anyone who doesn’t care about materialistic things, they just want love. The lyrics are very reminiscent of some of her love songs between 2015-2019.
Oh god, then the next song, “Wood,” which very heavily leans into Jackson 5 style in the opening (and Taylor really needs to lean into funk sounds more). When I was reviewing this song in real-time, I was just like “oh, this is a fun song” with great vibes and great beat. Then when you get to actually listen to the lyrics, you’ll learn what the song is about.
Despite that, this is an awesome song. It’s so fun and I don’t get why people hate this album or find it weaker when Taylor is really just making fun pop songs like in 1989.
The next song, “CANCELLED!” is dubbed as “I Did Something Bad’s” older sister (or eldest daughter, if you will.) The song is basically a “dog eat dog world” type song. People are going to hate you or cancel you for dumb reasons, so you should embrace your life anyway.
This is another one of her darker songs in the album and I love this for her. The lyrics are pretty surface-level, but I think it works for this song. This song could definitely have been in reputation.
The next song is a real breath of fresh air. “Honey” is a long song to someone who finally makes her feel seen, heard and loved. This is probably my favorite song lyrically. The essence of a good song, in my opinion, is a song that elicits an emotion from you. That’s exactly what I got from this song.
Later in the song there’s a little jazz break moment paying homage to her overarching showgirl vibe. This is a song for you if you have someone in your life you can always run to for comfort and warmth.
We end with the title track, “The Life of a Showgirl” featuring Sabrina Carpenter. Basically this song is straightforward with “nothing is what it seems.” Truthfully, I love Sabrina more in this song than Taylor, but their sound together is great. Two key changes in this song, though. I’ll just leave it at that.
If any song in the album had to lean into the showgirl aesthetic the most, it would be this one. I love the theatric nods in this song so much. She ends the song and album with an audio recording from the last night of her Eras tour when she said goodbye to the crowd.
Overall this album is a real new direction that Taylor Swift is going in and it’s absolutely working for her. Each song tells a different story with lyrical genius paired with great instrumentals. This album feels like reputation is a sister album, but from the more mature perspective. There is an undertone of darkness in each of her songs and I think it’s a big risk that had a big reward.
First & Jenn 
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