I was going to write about the song mean song from “The Life of a Showgirl” but I have to write this first. I’m going to start out with a music analogy. In physics there are resonate frequencies. It is the natural frequency when a system vibrates with the highest amplitude. Basically the frequency will excite the system and make it even bigger in movement. I think Taylor has hit this resonate frequency for several albums. They have come out at the right time and hit the mark and resonated with the audience and been so impactful. Think of folklore when everyone was hiding in their homes for months on end. She released an album everyone could relate to all about that the inner peace of being in isolation. Her song “Epiphany” touched on the agony of the COVID pandemic by comparing it to her Grandfathers suffering in WWII. It was relatable. The album hit all the right notes. This is not the same for “The Life of a Showgirl.” It misses the mark and causes a dissonant frequency, when two frequencies are close but not close enough and the sound is unstable.
As I’ve stewed over the album the last few days I have to ask why? Why is this album so dissonant? I agree with some that have said this should not be called “The Life of a Showgirl” but the “The Life of a Capitalist”. 1st exhibit the many, many variants of this every album. First the album was revealed and a preorder was made available with tape and vinyl. Then there were some deluxe boxes available. That should have been it. But no it was one like every other day. I know this is marketing, but this is stupid. Vinyls are not good for the environment and if someone collects them all shipping 10 different variants separately is not good for the environment.
Here are all the variants:
August 13:
-“The Life of a Showgirl” CD, Tape Cassette, and Vinyl
August 13:
-The Life of a Showgirl: “It’s Frightening” Deluxe CD
-The Life of a Showgirl: “It’s Rapturous” Deluxe CD
-The Life of a Showgirl: “It’s Beautiful” Deluxe CD
-The Life of a Showgirl: “Sweat and Vanilla Perfume” Deluxe CD
August 18:
-The Life of a Showgirl: The Shiny Bug
Vinyl Collection available in two colors
August 21:
-The Life of a Showgirl: Baby, That’s Show Business
Vinyl Collection available in two colors
August 25:
-The Life of a Showgirl: Tiny Bubbles in Champagne Vinyl Collection available in two colors
September 9th
-3 Different Target exclusive cds with poster
September 10th
-The Life of a Showgirl + “A Look Behind the Curtain” Vinyl
September 24
-The Life of a Showgirl: The Crowd is Your King Target Limited Press
September 26
-4 versions of signed CDs
October 4th
-Life Is A Song Acoustic Version with “Opalite (Life Is A Song Acoustic Version)” and “Ruin the Friendship (My Advice Version)” Bonus Tracks CD
-Dressing Room Rehearsal Version with “Wi$h Li$t (Settled Down Acoustic Version)” and “The Life of a Showgirl (Dressing Room Rehearsal Acoustic Version)” Bonus Tracks CD
-Alone In My Tower Acoustic Version with “The Fate of Ophelia (Alone In My Tower Acoustic Version)” and “Eldest Daughter (Now You’re Home Acoustic Version)” Bonus Tracks CD
-So Glamorous Cabaret Version with “Elizabeth Taylor (So Glamorous Cabaret Version)” and Elizabeth Taylor (Original Songwriting Voice Memo) Bonus Tracks CD
All the environmental effects aside the other problem with having so many variants is the US is in the middle of a hostile government takeover with people realizing it has been fueled and encouraged by billionaires, of which she is one. People are starting to see through the tricks the billionaires are using to cash grab money. This is a blatant cash grab and everyone knows.
Now let’s talk about the songs. The content of the songs have nothing to do with being a showgirl. The poem that people could only read if they got all the variants and which I have here is about the life a showgirl. This would have been a great song, but none of the contents of this song was captured in the album.
The album contains lyrics about her wanting to settle down and have a house with a basketball hoop. There are lyrics about how big her fiancés body part is, how hot he is. It is a super inappropriate song. She has talked about sex before but in a much more sophisticated manner. It sounded like Travis wrote that song TBH. There are lyrics about having babies and living in a neighborhood that looks like them. I don’t know how that one slipped by in writing sessions. There are literally people being kidnapped from their neighborhood because they don’t look like the rest of the neighborhood. She has lyrics about how Travis’s life with former girlfriends, who were black were “onyx nights” but with Taylor it’s “opalite” which is blue, referencing her blue eyes. She writes about wanting her friends to be dripping with Gucci and wears a Gucci shirt in her behind the scenes video for her music video. There are bad optics when people need to pay as much for groceries right now as her t shirt and can’t. The closest the album comes to bringing up the corporate machine is in “Father Figure” when she says Scott Borchetta was just using her for money. Go off on that Taylor. Talk about the industry is soooo bad for women, how people get taken advantage of every day just for greed. Talk about how your fans get taken advantage of by these billionaires.
The other thing that bothered me the most was the incessant marketing for Target. Does she not know a majority of her fan base are boycotting Target right now? And by her trying to normalize Target with selling Target exclusive variants it’s coming across as super insensitive to women, people of color and those with disabilities? There is no excuse for promoting a brand that not respect DEI. And don’t even get me started on Travis’s collab with American Eagle.
Another thing that bothered me was her not talking about what went wrong with the Eras tour. A girl died, she had to cancel a show due to a threat, and the tickets ended up being sooo much money and unobtainable to most fans. Ticketmaster broke their promise when they said that fans that had Lover Fest tickets and bought merch on her website had first priority. They had last. I also think that Ticketmaster is in cahoots with resale sites like Stubhub. There were tickets released and immediately available there on StubHub. I wonder if the artists get a cut at the resale? She could have written about any of these things, but she didn’t even acknowledge them.
The most blaring omission from the release of “The Life of a Showgirl” is the absence of any commentary about the current political environment. If she was not releasing an album the silence might be okay. But she is speaking to people every day and says nothing. The album celebrates capitalism by her selling so many variants. She either does this for vanity numbers or to get more money which in this environment both have bad optics. She sings about being rich and her rich problems. Every famous singer gets here writing a self reflecting song or album about rich and famous. It always comes across as self serving, but in this age calling herself immortal and rich doesn’t sit well.
What could she have done better? Not write the song wood for one or leave out gross innuendo. She could have talked more about the issues she touched on in her poem. She could talk about how she knows her fans have a hard time. Instead she complains about them in her poem, “the crowd is your king, who has ruled over you for centuries, benevolently for the most part. Perhaps someday they despise you again” She’s calling the crowd a king derogatorily. She is bound by this crowd under orders and sometimes they are fickle leaders and in the end will despise her. But I digress. She could have talked about all these things but instead she made a record talking about how Travis saved her from drowning because he fell in love with her. This is so against anything found in the song, “The Man”.
Taylor we know as a fandom you can do better. We are not going to despise you but we need you to come back from the billionaire cloud see what is happening and start making music that resonates again because this is not it.
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