When Taylor Swift closed the final track on the standard version of The Tortured Poets Department, ‘Clara Bow,’ with the line, “the future’s bright, dazzling,” she was pretty much prophesying the success of her next album, The Life Of A Showgirl. The project has all the sparkling glitz and glam that the title suggests, but also places a strong, moving focus on healing and reconciling with the past. And throughout the 12 standard songs, it examines and subverts various expectations that Taylor holds or that are placed on her.
Taylor announced her twelfth album on her now-husband and brother-in-law’s New Heights podcast, spilling all the details to Travis and Jason Kelce as they represented Swifties everywhere with their excitement. She explained that she’d fly to Sweden between show weekends to work on the record with Max Martin and Shellback, focused on capturing a time of her life that was “so exuberant and electric and vibrant” thanks to the Eras Tour, her creative streak, and falling in love.
She also emphasized that the title should be heard as the life of a showgirl, highlighting the inner world behind a superstar rather than her superstar status.
I wanted to have it, sort of, like an offstage moment as the main album cover because this album isn’t really about what happened to me on stage. It’s about what I was going through off stage… This, to me, tells more of what the actual contents, lyrically, of the album are, which is the life. The life… It’s the life beyond the show.
Taylor Swift on New Heights
Rather unexpectedly (or maybe expectedly, if you see a lot of Taylor snark online), The Life Of A Showgirl received a lot of backlash for its simpler lyrics than Taylor’s past few albums, like Midnights and The Tortured Poets Department. We think that straightforwardness is by design – not only is the concept based on the quieter life behind one of the most talked-about people on the planet, but the relationship and headspace that informs most of these songs feels so much lighter than the inspirations behind her past few projects. She no longer has to twist herself into metaphors to make sense of what situations she’s in or how she feels about certain things. And ironically enough, in that regard, it feels like she’s done putting on a show.
Sit back and enjoy our show as we go through each song on the standard version of The Life Of A Showgirl, exploring the theme of expectations and how Taylor subverts them!
The album’s grandiose opening track, ‘The Fate Of Ophelia,’ takes inspiration from Ophelia of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, making it her second song that directly references a Shakespeare character’s storyline (after 2008’s ‘Love Story,’ of course). Ophelia falls in love with the title character, Hamlet, despite her father’s dislike for him. Her father makes her stay away from him, then Hamlet kills her father, making the situation even harder on her mental state. She has a breakdown of sorts and falls into a river while picking flowers, ultimately drowning.
Knowing Ophelia’s story and hearing the first gentle, D-minor-key piano notes of the song might lead you to expect a more melancholic energy – which Taylor herself acknowledges with the dreamily-delivered line “I might have drowned in the melancholy” – but things swiftly change when the earworm synth line kicks in. It erupts into a joyful account of Taylor’s now-husband, Travis, saving her “heart from the fate of Ophelia” and ensuring she can live a life full of love like she always dreamed of.
Taylor often used water as a symbol of deep attraction and dedication through hard times on her reputation album, namely in lyrics like “ocean blue eyes looking in mine” from ‘Gorgeous’ and “I’d hold you as the water rushes in” from ‘Dancing With Our Hands Tied.’ But that same water motif came back as the relationship they described fell apart. Two examples from The Tortured Poets Department are “you swore I abandoned the ship, but I was going down with it” from ‘So Long, London’ and “I dream of… throwing my life to the wolves or the ocean rocks” on ‘Guilty As Sin?’
Conversely, fire became a sign of danger and the destruction of self that came along as a result. ‘loml’ mourns a “field of dreams engulfed in fire” and the arsonist of a man who burned her hopes for a loving future together down, and that situation makes her want to “sell [her] house and set fire to all [her] clothes” on ‘The Black Dog.’ Taylor also notably burned down the house from the ‘Lover’ music video in on-stage visuals while she performed ‘Bad Blood’ on the Eras Tour.
It’s no surprise, then, that she’d be scared of the initial sparks in a new relationship after being burned to such an extent. “As legend has it, you are quite the pyro,” she muses in the first verse of ‘Ophelia.’ “You light the match to watch it blow.” But she eventually has no choice but to follow her heart and see where those very sparks lead her. The “You wrap around me… pulling me into the fire” lyric is paired with a shot of her falling off of a pirate ship into rough waters to highlight the contrast of these two symbols and how this love has changed her perception of love itself. Neither motif shows up again in the album’s later love songs – aside from thoughts of the waterfront Portofino in the first verse of ‘Elizabeth Taylor’ and quick references to other people wanting yachts and “good surf” on ‘Wi$h Li$t’ – because of that view change.
If you took AP lit in high school, you might notice that Taylor wrote certain lines with iambic pentameter in mind. English poets like Shakespeare often used this format, which uses ten-syllable lines and typically emphasizes every other syllable. Taylor doesn’t strictly stick to the ten-syllable rule, taking some creative liberty to play with melodies, but neither did Shakespeare – one example from Hamlet is the quote “to be or not to be, that is the question,” using eleven syllables. Some examples from ‘The Fate Of Ophelia’ are “I heard you calling on the megaphone” and “the eldest daughter of a nobleman.”
It kind of combines Shakespearean storytelling of this legend, of this tragic hero, Ophelia, and what happened to her, blended with this newer concept of escaping that fate and having more modern terminology used in the song, too. Like, ‘Keep it 100 on the land, the sea, the sky. Pledge allegiance to your hands, your team, your vibes.’ I just love the blending of old and new with lyrics, and that’s one of my favorite parts about this song.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
Interestingly, one of the songs on which Taylor sells the showgirl vibe the most is what she compared to “cosplay” on BBC Radio 1, which feels like a statement of its own given that The Life Of A Showgirl focuses more on the life rather than the show. ‘Elizabeth Taylor’ explores love and fame through the lens of the titular actress, playing with the image of her famous violet eyes and comparing it to how Taylor’s own eyes would look from crying if she lost her partner. It opens with a scene comparing Taylor seemingly calling him from a hotel room (compared to the famous Plaza Athénée) on tour and daydreaming about traveling or living their lives together – “that view of Portofino” is where Elizabeth Taylor got engaged to Richard Burton, who Swift also referenced on ‘…Ready For It?’ in 2017.
As they’re talking, Taylor reflects on how fame has impacted her personal relationships and the lack of support her partners have given her… until her current one surprised her: “All the right guys promised they’d stay. Under bright lights, they withered away. But you bloom.” It draws a direct contrast to the “he was a hothouse flower to my outdoorsman” lyric on ‘How Did It End?,’ which compared Taylor and a past partner to an adventurer and a flower that can’t thrive outside of a greenhouse, respectively.
The sound of the song switches up for the dramatic chorus, when sudden, striking piano chords accompany the key lyric, “If your letters ever said ‘goodbye,’ I’d cry my eyes violet.” The intimate feeling of the personal-life details in each verse make way for sweeping musings on fame and how to balance her outer world with her inner one. It’s as if a bubble bursts after the first verse when she’s reminded of the “Hollywood [that] hates [her],” but she focuses on seeing her partner as “[her] NY,” an alternate home that offers the stability and encouragement to keep pursuing her goals. “You’re only as hot as your last hit, baby,” and it doesn’t seem like Taylor will be putting out any final hit anytime soon.
[Elizabeth Taylor] was under microscopes so, so intense. She handled it with humor, and she got along with her life. She continued to make incredible art, and so this is a love song kind of through the lens of the motif of what she had to go through in her life, and sort of the parallels that I feel in my own life.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
Right from the get-go, ‘Opalite’ introduces you to some of Taylor’s past romantic errors and how she’d come to expect drama and uncertainty in relationships. She touches on missing exes (which her brother, Austin, apparently called “eating out of the trash”), feeling haunted by mistakes, and the confusion of being with someone who you aren’t sure is the one. But things switch up within seconds towards the end of the pre-chorus: “Life is a song, it ends when it ends. I was wrong.”
The exhilarating chorus frames Taylor’s musings on finding your own happiness within life as a lesson her beloved mom taught her, which is a beautiful way to honor the ups and downs of her past (career and relationship-wise) as well as one of the people who have shaped her the most. “You were dancing through the lightning strikes, sleepless in the onyx night, but now the sky is opalite,” she recounts. Opalite is a shimmering, manmade form of opal gemstones, which just so happen to be Travis Kelce’s birthstone.
We meet another person who’s unlucky in love in the second verse, and it’s Travis this time! He was seemingly in a relationship where he didn’t feel truly appreciated despite being “in it for real.” By the end of the verse, Taylor and Travis’ paths have converged, in terms of both their relationship together and the lessons they’ve learned that led to them falling in love: “Don’t we try to love love? We give it all we’ve got. You finally left the table and what a simple thought, you’re starving ‘til you’re not.” They may not have expected to meet each other, or been led to each other in the ways that they were, but
The gem imagery and the joy-seeking storyline on ‘Opalite’ are also interesting tie-ins to the idea of expectations and how they can fail us. These “false” opals might seem real to someone who isn’t familiar with opalite, and you might expect them to be natural opals. Similarly, leaning into the fame theme, people can make things look so natural that you don’t realize what actually went into it. It’s like Taylor said in the End Of An Era docuseries: “Everyone’s jealous of what you’ve got. No one is jealous of what you had to do to get it.”
The song itself is about choosing happiness and getting through rough times, adversity, and really choosing your own joy, and your own sort of path of joy didn’t just happen accidentally for you. Opalite is actually a manmade opal, so I kind of took that metaphor of a manmade gemstone and applied it to, you know, ‘what if you make your own happiness in life?’
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
‘Father Figure’ is a story of subverted expectations in itself – it describes an unbalanced mentor-mentee relationship that Taylor flips the scales of, seemingly drawing from her experience losing her master recordings and recording her Taylor’s Version projects to reclaim those first few albums. The song starts from the perspective of that mentor painting himself as a rescuer of sorts who helped the younger party make her dreams come true: “When I found you, you were young, wayward, lost in the cold. Pulled up to you in the Jag, turned your rags into gold.” He later muses, “You remind me of a younger me. I saw potential,” which sounds like their bond is deepening and he’s proud to help her reach her full potential.
Throughout the chorus, Taylor interpolates George Michael’s beloved track ‘Father Figure,’ which is a love song in which he vows to be a protector for the person he loves, like a father hopefully would. The line “this love is pure profit” is thrown into the chorus between promises of “I’ll be your father figure” and “I dry your tears with my sleeve,” happening so quickly that you could easily miss it as you try to keep up with the story. Just moments later, that narrator vows to “protect the family” as if he never admitted to seeing his protégé as simple profit.
On the second verse, the mentor lists out (or perhaps brags about) various ways that he’s helped out his protégé, from paying checks in a restaurant before they even land on the table to showing her how to stand out in an industry where the powers that be “don’t want [her] to reign.” And in return, insists, “All I ask for is your loyalty.” Notably, though, the protégé not being able to see the check before he paid means she doesn’t know how much he actually “provided” for her. She doesn’t get the full context of such situations or a true idea of what she may be up against as she pursues her dreams.
‘Father Figure’ completely flips on its head when the dreamy bridge kicks in, and the protégé shares her perspective on feeling betrayed by her mentor: “Your thoughtless ambition sparked the ignition on foolish decisions, which led to misguided visions that to fulfill your dreams, you had to get rid of me.” As she finds strength and self-belief, she declares, “You want a fight? You found it. I’ve got the place surrounded. You’ll be sleeping with the fishes before you know you’re drowning… I was your father figure, you pulled the wrong trigger.”
The narrative switch is even more moving now that Taylor has regained ownership of her first six albums’ masters – she wrote The Life Of A Showgirl in 2024 and announced that she bought her masters in May 2025, so it was probably finished before she got them back. She also wrote in her letter to fans announcing the purchase, “I almost stopped thinking it could ever happen, after 20 years of having the carrot dangled and then yanked away,” showing how she didn’t expect the development. “This empire belongs to me” is no longer a plea for someone to do the right thing, but a celebration that her recordings are finally in the right place.
The final moments of ‘Father Figure’ flip the mentor’s earlier words of belief and faux pride – “You know, you remind me of a younger me. I saw potential.” – into a biting statement on how he was ultimately just as naïve and unsuspecting as his protége once was, never expecting her to outsmart him.
‘Father Figure’ is a song about power, a song about a protégé and their mentor, and about the idea of the tables turning and the flipping of the script. Sort of like the son versus the father, and I’ve always loved stories about that. I always wanted to create a song that really explained how those roles can shift over time, and I’m really proud of this one.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
‘Eldest Daughter’ is one of the most criminally misunderstood songs on The Life Of A Showgirl, which is especially surprising considering it’s the latest installment of Taylor’s signature Track 5 pattern that places emotional songs as the fifth track. A lot of the criticism we’ve seen has surrounded the wording of certain lines, which we think is very intentional.
Following a bittersweet series of piano notes, Taylor opens the song, “Everybody’s so punk on the internet. Everyone’s unbothered ‘til they’re not. Every joke is just trolling and memes.” She moves on fairly quickly from the “‘til they’re not” part, not acknowledging the hurt there, like the internet probably would if someone spoke up about being bothered by how others spoke about them. Unfortunately, that reminds us a lot about how people discuss Taylor’s life online and shrug off her struggles as if her fame or success cancels them out. She explained to Apple Music, “Every way in which I was speaking in this entire first verse was me trying to assimilate to the way culture tells us to be.”
She admits on the chorus, “I’m not a bad b*tch, and this isn’t savage, but I’m never gonna let you down.” Switching into a higher register for “bad b*tch” and “savage” makes it feel like the phrases are in quotation marks, which we think is especially notable when people have specifically mocked Taylor for “not being” those things. Starting the second half of the lyric with “but” feels like a moment of insecurity in which she feels like she has to defend herself and convince this person to stay with her in spite of her perceived shortcomings – it reminds us of “the rain is always gonna come if you’re standing with me, but I’m a fire and I’ll keep your brittle heart warm” from ‘peace.’
It’s really hard to be sincere publicly because that’s not really what our culture rewards. People reward you for being, like, tough, unbothered, and too busy to care. You may be that about some things, but everyone has things that matter to them, and people that matter to them. This song really gets to the heart of… when someone gets close enough to you to earn your trust, that’s when you can admit to them that you actually really do care about some things.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
As the song progresses, Taylor gets more and more comfortable opening up about difficult topics with the person she’s speaking to. She thinks back to a time when she was “about 8 or 9” and laughed without a care in the world, before the world hardened her and she turned to a mindset of “cautious discretion” instead of being overly hopeful for the future.
Speaking of hopes for the future, ‘Eldest Daughter’ lets Taylor confess how her past experiences in love removed some of her excitement for it. Marriage was a big motif on Midnights and The Tortured Poets Department, through both aversion (see “all they keep asking me is if I’m gonna be your bride” on ‘Lavender Haze’ and “I wouldn’t marry me either” on ‘You’re Losing Me’) and unstable romantic passion (see “you take my ring off my middle finger and put it on the one people put wedding rings on” on ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ and “from one kiss to getting married” on ‘loml’). It marked a big shift from songs like ‘Love Story’ and ‘Stay Stay Stay’ that celebrated the idea of eternal love. Here, she comes clean: “When I said I don’t believe in marriage, that was a lie.” Her marriage to Travis Kelce after finishing the album – he actually proposed the same day they filmed the New Heights podcast episode she announced it on – makes that statement even more beautiful!
The lyric “Every eldest daughter was the first lamb to the slaughter, so we all dressed up as wolves and we looked fire” shifts from a confession to a seeming dismissal of that very confession, like Taylor is trying to conform and seem unbothered again by the time she says “we looked fire.” She’s slowly opening up and feeling more comfortable with the person she loves, but still has an ingrained instinct to hide the deeper parts of herself.
Ultimately, though, she feels safe enough with this person to take the leap and start rewiring her more deep-seated fears and attitudes. It culminates in one of the most Taylor Swift bridges that Taylor Swift has ever written, embracing the excitement of finally finding the true love she spent her life dreaming of: “We lie back, a beautiful, beautiful time-lapse. Ferris wheels, kisses, and lilacs, and things I said were dumb. ‘Cause I thought that I’d never find that beautiful, beautiful life that shimmers that innocent light back, like when we were young.” And yes, we picture those beautiful Tayvis garden engagement photos every time we hear it. “But I’m never gonna let you down” transitions into “And I’m never gonna let you down” as she comes to accept that she may not be what others want her to be, but there’s someone out there who loves her just as she is, which becomes the main theme of ‘Cleveland!’ on the Encore deluxe album.
Some online critics of ‘Eldest Daughter’ have said the bridge is the only part they enjoyed or that felt like classic Taylor, which seems to be exactly the point. She feels secure enough not only in the relationship, but in herself, now to be herself in the purest form.
With ‘Ruin The Friendship,’ Taylor takes us back to her teenage years in Tennessee as she recounts a true friends-to-lovers situation where she and the guy she was falling for were too scared to make a move. They bond at sports games and lock eyes dancing with other people at prom (including a boy who brought her a “wilted corsage” for her wrist), but hesitate to admit their feelings for each other because of his girlfriend and an ex who might get mad, as well as fears that it’ll make classes together awkward.
After a bridge that rationalizes that hesitation in their minds, we get a second bridge or third verse that flips everything on its head and makes it clear why this story is one that Taylor wanted to reflect on. What was at one point a deceptively cutesy song with a dose of will-they-or-won’t-they yearning, has now become a tragedy that follows her to this day: “When I left school, I lost track of you. Abigail called me with the bad news. Goodbye, and we’ll never know why… I flew home anyway with so much left to say… I whispered at the grave, ‘Should’ve kissed you anyway.’” Each of the excuses they gathered throughout the song feels flimsy compared to the new knowledge that the friend she loved so deeply passed away.
It lets us in on a formative experience that has shaped how Taylor views the world and the idea of seizing the moment, which she’s touched on in her past work without revealing this much detail about why. For example, she wrote in the prologue to her 2010 Speak Now album, “I think most of us fear reaching the end of our life, and looking back regretting the moments we didn’t speak up. When we didn’t say ‘I love you.’ When we should’ve said ‘I’m sorry.’ When we didn’t stand up for ourselves or someone who needed help. These songs are made up of words I didn’t say when the moment was right in front of me.” A decade and a half later, ‘Ruin The Friendship’ is an ode to a collection of those kinds of moments with someone who was taken from this world far too soon, and the subject’s impact on her life and drive for action continues to fuel her approach to her work, love life, and more.
‘Ruin The Friendship’ is a song that kind of wistfully goes back in time to moments that you hesitated, moments that you were too scared or anxious to do something that you were really curious about. You know, the idea of if you told this person you had feelings for them, or if you kissed this person, it might ruin the friendship. And it goes back in time and explores, what really would’ve been so bad about that? So it’s really kind of a beautiful story of taking chances when they present themselves, and not letting them pass you by, not having to spend your life wondering what would’ve happened if you would’ve done it.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
When we first got a glimpse of the tracklist for The Life Of A Showgirl, a lot of people predicted that ‘Actually Romantic’ would be about how Taylor’s current partner treats her better than her past partners did. Later on, closer to the album release, a Spotify event teasing various lyrics included envelopes that said “Happy Valentine’s Day,” presumably love letters. Boy, was everyone off the mark… and it was amazing. ‘Actually Romantic’ is one of the most fun diss tracks that Taylor has ever made, and even then, we don’t think it’s as direct of a “diss track” as the internet assumes it is.
It gets off to a pretty scathing start: “I heard you call me Boring Barbie when the coke’s got your brain. High-fived my ex and then you said you’re glad he ghosted me. Wrote me a song saying it makes you sick to see my face.” Each line feels like a gut punch directed at someone very specific, but to some extent, aren’t they applicable to a whole lot of people? It feels like a new tweet calling Taylor boring or overhyped goes viral every few days. People used to celebrate her breakups and use them as ammo to berate her online. Not everyone writes songs about her, we’ll give them that, but far too many feel far too comfortable posting vile, dehumanizing things about her.
Despite all the shots thrown at her, from an unnamed nemesis or the internet, Taylor continues to thrive and do what she loves. The negativity is as intimidating to her as “a toy chihuahua barking at [her] from a tiny purse” and will never stop her from pursuing her goals. That’s especially powerful when you remember how scared she was pre-reputation that her career was ending because of extreme hate she received.
’Actually Romantic’ is a song about realizing that someone else has kind of had a one-sided adversarial relationship with you that you didn’t know about. And all of a sudden they start, like, doing too much and they start letting you know that, actually, you’ve been living in their head rent-free and you had no idea. It’s presenting itself as them sort of resenting you, or having a problem with you, but taking that and you just accepting it as love, and you accepting it as attention, and affection, and how flattering that somebody has made you such a big part of their reality when you didn’t even think about this.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
From the dollar signs in the title, you might guess that ‘Wi$h Li$t’ is Taylor cheekily embracing her wealth and success, but it actually homes in on the simplicity of what she truly wants in life. It returns to the playful romantic ease of ‘Paper Rings’ and calls back to her plea on ‘The Prophecy,’ “don’t need money, just someone who wants my company,” without dismissing the more luxurious options of what someone else might want in life. She bridges her professional and personal lives and comes to terms with the fact that they can co-exist: “boss up, settle down, got a wish list, I just want you.”
The theme ties into one of the key lyrics on ‘Elizabeth Taylor,’ in which she wonders, “What could you possibly get for the girl who has everything and nothing all at once?” Between her massive success, the record-breaking Eras Tour, and now owning all of her masters, Taylor has gotten almost everything she’s ever wanted by her own hand. Wanting access to a quieter life with her partner and a family doesn’t take away from her achievements or independence – it actually serves as a testament to her dedication to pursuing her dreams, no matter the field.
Speaking of her dreams, ‘Wi$h Li$t’ also sees Taylor realizing that she truly can have both her fame and a subdued family life. 2017’s ‘Dancing With Our Hands Tied’ showed her questioning whether someone would want to stay with her knowing how much chaos orbits her life in the spotlight, and the relationship she described on reputation through The Tortured Poets Department was largely hidden away from the world, seemingly because Taylor was exploring her relationship with fame and due to her and her partner’s preferences at the time. ‘Paris’ romanticizes that privacy and remarks, “Privacy sign on the door, on my page, and on the whole world. Romance is not dead if you keep it just yours.” She now recognizes her agency in such situations: “We tell the world to leave us the f*ck alone, and they do, wow.”
Not only do we witness a bridging between Taylor Swift, the person, and Taylor Swift, the music superstar, on The Life Of A Showgirl, but so does Taylor herself.
Finding her agency and owning her power is also a key theme on ‘Wood,’ despite its cheeky double meanings leading a lot of minds elsewhere. Throughout her career, Taylor has embraced fate as a driving force in her love life – see songs like ‘State Of Grace,’ ‘All Of The Girls You Loved Before,’ and ‘invisible string.’ She leaned toward a more hands-on view of love on ‘Mastermind’ before expressing a loss of hope in fate with ‘The Prophecy.’ The first verse of ‘Wood’ touches on some of her “cursed” experiences in past relationships: “I took him back, then stepped on a crack, and the black cat laughed.”
But now, she proclaims, “You and me, we make our own luck. A bad sign is all good, I ain’t gotta knock on wood.” She trusts in herself and her partner to make the best of any negative situations that pop up in their lives together instead of seeing them as an indicator that something is going wrong.
And let’s be real while we’re analyzing the way the Showgirl album subverts expectations: did anyone expect Taylor to ever say half of these innuendos on a song… ever?
‘Wood’ is a love story about, you know, kind of using as a plot device, superstitions. Popular superstitions, good luck charms, bad luck charms, all these different ways that we have decided they’re good luck or bad luck. Knocking on wood and seeing a black cat, and that is kind of the way that I’ve decided to explore this very, very sentimental love song.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
You may not expect a Taylor Swift song with the word “girlboss” in it to be one of the least-acknowledged moments of brilliance on her album, but here we are with ‘CANCELLED!’ We thought that between the capital letters and exclamation point, this would be a cathartic, angry reflection on the hate Taylor has received, maybe referencing the famously lowercase reputation album and era. Instead, she embodies the “villain” role that’s placed on her so often to provide comfort and reassurance to someone who feels alone in their own criticism.
We’re thrust right into the middle of a story in which someone Taylor knows is going through public backlash, which we later learn is probably an overreaction. The person expects that things will get better, but Taylor draws her own conclusion based on what she’s faced: “You thought that it would be okay at first, the situation could be saved, of course. But they’d already picked out your grave and hearse.”
She warns, “Beware the wrath of masked crusaders.” Not only does “masked” reference how easy it is to be anonymous online, but you could also hear this line as “mass crusaders,” highlighting how many skeptics or trolls jump in on conversations of mounting negativity.
The infamous “Did you girlboss too close to the sun?” lyric plays on a quote from a Candace Owens video that (for legal reasons, allegedly) turned Taylor’s last long-term relationship ending and Blake Lively’s legal case about harassment on a movie set into reasons to dislike or discredit them. This line and others (like “Did you make a joke only a man could?”) prove that despite what some said online after Showgirl came out, Taylor is not talking about people who are “cancelled” and called out for actual problematic behavior, but for things that aren’t major problems in the grand scheme of things.
As we head into the bridge, Taylor shows appreciation and empathy for those who supported her through her own chapter of being ‘CANCELLED!,’ even if they have their own public slip-ups or misconceptions. Then, in true delightfully-theater-kid fashion, she flips into the villain again and the production swells while she satirizes the way some people think she is: “If you can’t be good, then just be better at it. Everyone’s got bodies of the attic or took somebody’s man. I’ll take you by the hand, and then you’ll learn the art of never getting caught.”
The song ends with Taylor musing on what she learned from her own times of intense public scrutiny: “Now they’ve broken you like they’ve broken me, but a shattered glass is a lot more sharp, and now you know exactly who your friends are.” From the sharp ‘CANCELLED!’ to lighter tracks like ‘thanK you aIMee,’ we’re so proud of Taylor for managing to turn something that was very traumatic for her into a reminder to show gratitude for the people who truly support her!
The song ‘CANCELLED!’ is sort of about having had my own experiences with mass judgment, and being at the center of many dramatic, kind of scandalous moments in my career where people were all weighing in at once, or at least it felt like that. Having had those experiences, it makes me move through the world a little bit differently, and when other people go through it, you kind of find yourself thinking about how they’re probably gonna get smarter because of this. If they can get through it, if they can be tough enough, they can actually learn some things through this process.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
Much like on ‘Opalite’ and ‘Elizabeth Taylor,’ but with more specifics, the fan-favorite song ‘Honey’ sweetly breaks down how Taylor’s relationship with Travis has helped her feel much more secure in love and allows her to process her negative past experiences. It opens with a confident “You can call me ‘honey’ if you want, because I’m the one you want” before diving into past situations where nicknames like “honey” or “sweetheart” were used sarcastically.
The chorus gives us one of Taylor’s most romantic lyrics of all time: “But you touch my face. Redefine all of those blues when you say ‘honey.’” As we touched on in the intro of this article, Taylor doesn’t need major metaphors this time around when Travis’ sincerity is so clear to her. One single word from him can convey that level of care, so why should the world be entitled to more complicated ways of describing her feelings?
We also love how the final lyric of the song – “…But you can call me ‘honey’ if you want.” – feels a little coy, as if she spontaneously opened up mid-conversation about the way words have brought her so much pain and how much he means to her, before getting shy and cutting herself off.
‘Honey’ is a song about how words that have been meant to hurt you in the past can be repurposed by someone who loves you in a way that feels totally different. If the only time you were called ‘honey’ was when someone was like, ‘that look is not working for you, honey,’ that is very different than when somebody calls you ‘honey’ in a sweet way, in a sincere way, in a lovely way. It’s kind of about the idea of healing these old wounds that were caused by certain words that now feel totally lovely and sweet.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
From the opening lines, the album’s title track, ‘The Life Of A Showgirl,’ plays with your expectations: “Her name was Kitty. Made her money being pretty and witty. They gave her the keys to this city. Then they said she didn’t do it legitly.” You hear a quick rundown of a showgirl named Kitty’s rise and fall before the speaker, a then-aspiring star voiced by Taylor, goes to one of her shows, showing that maybe the “fall” wasn’t really a fall at all in the end. She meets Kitty and shares her excitement about being a showgirl herself one day, but rather than encouraging her, Kitty tries to steer her away from pursuing the spotlight.
It is the story of a fictional showgirl named Kitty and how my character in the song goes to see her perform and is completely inspired by her. But rather than responding with fakeness, she tells it like it is and she kind of warns me off of this lifestyle because it’s much more than just the glitter and the glamour. There’s a lot else that comes with it, so it’s kind of an ode to show business and the women who move through those pitfalls and obstacle courses.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
Sabrina’s verse describes her own character’s ambitions and desire for “a taste of a magnificent life,” but notably doesn’t mention Kitty or anyone else warning her of what would be in store. It leads you to wonder if Kitty is still successful or if she’s been torn down and replaced by someone else in the meantime, which reminds us of ‘Clara Bow’ and its commentary on how women are treated in the entertainment industry. It’s also possible that she found her own mentors (maybe even Taylor herself) later on.
Who Sabrina does mention, though, is a club promoter, which suggests more of a behind-the-scenes, business-informed rise to stardom… that has its own pitfalls. In real life, she got discovered after entering an industry-backed singing competition hosted through Miley Cyrus’ MileyWorld site, placing in third. The grand prize was a recording contract to make their very own album, but winner Amy Maggio has accused the label backing the competition of being dishonest, blocking her from pursuing other opportunities, and only letting her record three songs, which never got released. Meanwhile, Taylor famously watched VH1’s Behind The Music docuseries to learn from the careers and missteps of people she looked up to and performed at the Bluebird Café (which led to her signing her first record deal) because Faith Hill played there, which may tie into why her verse is about learning from showgirls who came before you.
The song’s pacing tightens up and gets more intense during the bridge, on which Taylor and Sabrina’s dedication and true showgirl grit shine through. Where you’d expect Kitty’s warning to steer them away from the spotlight, Taylor recounts: “I took her pearls of wisdom, hung them from my neck, I paid my dues with every bruise, I knew what to expect.”
One of the lyrics Sabrina sings on the bridge plays into a long-running theme or fear in Taylor’s work: “They ripped me off like false lashes and then threw me away.” Someone who “rips off” someone else is copying them, and Taylor has been open about feeling like the music industry pushed people to copy her. She shared in a 2023 TIME Magazine interview, “I realized every record label was actively working to try to replace me. I thought instead, I’d replace myself first with a new me. It’s harder to hit a moving target.” The cyclical nature of ‘Clara Bow,’ which some people think ends with a verse referencing Sabrina, also hints at this. Sabrina has a few vocal layers underneath the main vocals singing the same line, pointing at how many women have experienced this and how they’ve been buried or subdued over time.
The final lines of the bridge feel like Taylor is taking a slow, indulgent bow at the end of a performance: “All the headshots on the wall of the dance hall are of the b*tches who wish I’d hurry up and die. But I’m immortal now, babydolls. I couldn’t if I tried.” She’s fully embodied the showgirl role and the music curls into a cinematic moment with strings and piano notes to match.
And she never forgot Kitty or what she learned from her along the way! Where the earlier choruses echoed Kitty’s advice, the last chorus triumphantly embraces the highs and lows of being a superstar, acknowledging the hard parts while also celebrating how fulfilling it’s been. “Pain hidden by the lipstick and lace,” Taylor admits. “Sequins are forever and now I know the life of a showgirl, babe. Wouldn’t have it any other way!”
As a whole, ‘The Life Of A Showgirl’ feels like Taylor passing what she’s learned onto Sabrina and welcoming her onto the massive stage that she’s built. The final moments of the song take that quite literally, merging a recording of her and Sabrina onstage at the Eras Tour with audio from the crowd at the final show. In the end, despite the various downfalls of fame that the album explores in both clear and more subtle ways, what matters most is the fans and the fact that they get to do what they love.
We actually ended the song with actual crowd noise from my last Eras Tour show in Vancouver, so that always chokes me up because it always transports me right back to that actual memory of standing on that stage for the last time, on that tour that was so important to me, and the tour that really inspired this album.
Taylor Swift on the Spotify track-by-track album
And so the showgirl takes her final bow… Or does she?
We spent the first year of Showgirl being out in the world studying these songs, how they work, and how they work together through the lens of expectations to shape the stories Taylor is telling. And then she defied our expectations (and herself on New Heights when she said there would only be 12 songs) by dropping a deluxe version of The Life Of A Showgirl, dubbed The Encore. Somewhat unfortunate for this essay, but we’ll never complain about getting new Taylor music! We’ll be sitting with ‘Patient Zero,’ ‘Cleveland!,’ ‘Pink Clouding,’ and ‘Babylon’ some more to give them the thought and appreciation they deserve.
Which song on The Life Of A Showgirl do you love most? Do you agree with our analysis? Let us know in the comments below or hit us up on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter! You can also buzz on over to our Reddit community to chat with us.
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