Taylor Swift - The Life of a Showgirl (October 3, 2025) • Page 66

I genuinely think my biggest issue was this is how misleading the rollout was, from the album art, the hyping of Shellback and Max Martin, and the pared down tracklist. It feels intentionally misleading, to where it was hard to not be disappointed during my first listen, but if I frame this as just who she is now, occupying the same sonic space as the last two albums, I do think it's fine. I probably will end up liking more here than TTPD and Midnights, but it's becoming more and more obvious that Folklore/Evermore were lightning in a bottle that she probably won't ever capture again.

 

Strange that she’s the target of so much hate politically yet she never addresses those in power through her music, instead she addresses all these corny beefs.

I mean I’m sure it wouldn’t make Brittany happy but it’s just seems so strange.

 

Early 2020 https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-...-tweet-deleted-pitchfork-review-a9299481.html

 

lol that is wild

 

The edited version of Father Figure says, "because my checks bigger" and honestly, I might listen to this version from now on.

 

My cynical take is “who cares what it sounds like as long as we get the hype train and marketing off the charts. The plebes will listen to ANYTHING.

the retaliatory revenge arc from the biggest pop star in the world is a bummer. The punker in me not psyched on that.

 

This is supported by the fact that anything she has done with Aaron since has also been mid.

 

It's just overwhelming fatigue for me. The Wonder Years are my favorite band in the whole world and I wait with immense anticipation for each new release, but if they put out ~96 new songs in the span of 5 years, plus another few dozen "from the vault", I would be exhausted and overwhelmed and bored.

I would've considered Swift a borderline top 5 favorite artist of mine until the last couple of records, but the amount of output has just soured me immensely. I don't think anyone, even a songwriter of her caliber has enough to say to warrant that amount of output in that time frame.

I know plenty of people disagree/would argue "just don't listen to it", and that's fine, too.

 

Perfection

 

Actually Romantic sounds like this to me lol

 

Taylor Swift Reveals She Won't Be Doing a New Tour Anytime Soon: 'I Am So Tired'

 

Same, Taylor, maybe stop releasing music.

 

My biggest question overall here, where are her signature bridges?? These bridges are really quite dull and I can't think of one that even elevates the song it's on.

 

my middle schoolers would love this

 

I think the issue for me isn’t that she’s prolific; I love a prolific artist. It’s that I only see incremental shifts from album to album since Midnights, which itself was kind of a retreat. Her first six albums, there was really clear evolution happening each time. And then folklore and evermore were totally different than anything she’d done before, too. The more I listen to this, the less I think it sounds like Midnights or TTPD, but those albums are all still cut from a similar cloth. If she was really trying to tear it up and start fresh every album, I don’t think people would be mad about the level of output she’s had since 2020.

I think of the Springsteen box set from earlier this year. Seven albums, each distinct from the last. She’s one of the few modern artists operating in the hyper-prolific mode that Bruce was, and I do think she’s got the talent to switch it up as much as he did. But for whatever reason (wealth? pop star expectations? collaborators?) it doesn’t seem like the drive is there to do that anymore. I hope she gets it back, because there are so many modes I’d still love to hear her make music in.

All that said, I have firmly landed in the positive camp on this album. Not really what I wanted it to be, but I like it a lot.

 

Alright I think I got a feel for this one. I like the first 3, I don't care for Father Figure or Eldest Daughter, Ruin the Friendship is good, Actually Romantic sucks, Wish List is boring, and the last 4 are listenable to pretty good, so like, 8/12 being fine. I'd give this a solid 6.7.

EDIT: using the "word" *legitly* really bothers me

 

And inevitably come back with a country record

 

The slide guitar coming in during Sabrina's part might be one of the best parts of this album.

 

I preface this with the fact that clearly my personal bubble isn't indicative of everyone,

but I'm really not seeing any of my friends or people/accounts I follow post about the album today, usually there's a lot on release day

 

Same. Except I was sent this

 

For some reason last night this didn’t play in Atmos format for me, but now in Atmos, this is a particularly good mix, which is not always the case.

 

I’m seeing mostly love for this from the Taylor fanatics I know, which while I’m happy they’re happy I’m a bit bummed that it seems unlikely this leads to an “I need to go back to the drawing board and make something better next time” revelation.

 

it's pretty obvious she's in a bubble or she wouldn't have released this Midnights, and Tortured Poets lol

like there are some good songs but also someone needs to tell her no once in a while lol