What happened when the girl became a god?
That that’s the question looming over Taylor Swift’s latest album release seems all too fitting with the record’s mythology-heavy themes.
“The Life of a Showgirl”, Swift’s 12th original studio album, landed with uncharacteristic controversy earlier this month.
The follow-up to last year’s “Tortured Poets Department”, “Showgirl” is Swift’s swiftest follow-up to an album since 2020’s companion records “Folklore” and “Evermore” dropped within five months of each other.
And it certainly makes for an interesting sister piece to “Poets.”
Where that record felt grand and cinematic, “Showgirl” feels startlingly short and sharp.
As others have noted, this is the most pop album Swift has put out since 2017’s “Reputation.”
And that’s likely much of the reason why this album has Swifties and non-Swifties alike, as the kids say, properly shook.
Swift comes out swinging on this album, and where much of her past work often laments the games women have to play in their love lives, “Showgirl” seems to see Swift saying that, yes, there is a game, and she’s winning.
The titular showgirl, a performer named Kitty, is spotlit in the album’s closing track as Swift and guest artist Sabrina Carpenter sing of a woman having both achieved and been trapped by fame.
All the headshots on the walls
of the dance hall are of the b—-s
who wish I’d hurry up and die.
But I’m immortal now, baby dolls;
I couldn’t if I tried.
And it’s that perch on Olympus that has drawn much of the controversy around the album.
Where Swift album releases typically draw perennial praise and sell like gangbusters, “Showgirl” instead seemed to hit like sparks to kindling as commentators noted how disconnected the once-homegirl singer now feels singing about the pains of starhood.
It’s a familiar critique for Swift. One can only see her date bigger and bigger stars and earn more and more money before hearing her sing of wearing t-shirts and sneakers on the bleachers starts to ring a bit hollow.
But I think that might be in large part exactly what Swift is trying to say.
Is Kitty not allowed to take the money people toss at her?
Is Swift not allowed to vent over the troubles of a life few can relate to?
That’s the Catch-22 that has snared countless artists and celebrities — from MJ to Britney — for time eternal.
And I tried to go into this album with an open mind hoping for the best.
But while I’ve long defended such troubles for Swift, the music itself also has to hold up.
I think the two hit singles off the album — “The Fate of Ophelia” and “Opalite” — are solid Swift standards destined to soundtrack countless Instagram reels.
But where I praised “Poets” for its heart-touching wordplay, many of the tracks off this album come off more as message than muse.
To me, much of the album feels like a collection of frustrations Swift had in her head on the day of recording, quickly put down to rhymes and rhythms.
The album’s 10th track, “CANCELLED!”, feels like one of the worst cases of this as Swift offers luke-warm critiques not so much of the modern ‘cancel culture’ referenced in the song’s title, but of celebrity drama in general.
It’s easy to love you when you’re popular.
The optics click, everyone prospers;
But one single drop, you’re off the roster.
And while I still firmly believe Swift has a poet’s pen for songwriting, bars like that sound like a 14-year-old’s diary and not in the good “Fearless” way.
And even the instrumentals and production on the album end up feeling painfully bland.
That being said, this sounds like an album that Swift had fun recording. There’s winks a’plenty to the camera and you can practically hear the “what if I said this?” batted around the studio.
And there’s nothing wrong with that. Every great musician has their playful vanity records.
But I agree with many of the voices out there that “Showgirl” will likely fall low on future lists of best Swift albums and I hope she takes more than a few years to enjoy herself and get out of the studio before hopping back on the mic.
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