Hello, and welcome back to “Footnotes,” a monthly album review column hosted exclusively on The Trumpet’s website!

My name is Matty Lamp. I am the Editor-in-Chief of The Trumpet, and I LOVE listening to music and collecting CDs and vinyl records. I am always looking for something new to listen to, and I like to take the opportunity once a month to fully immerse myself in a new album and give my thoughts.

That being said, October is the month of spooks and scares. And what’s scarier than a billionaire letting us know the latest on her dark, twisted rich friends and her NFL man’s hypnotizing appendage?

That’s right, I am braving the Swiftie storm this month to review Taylor Swift’s most recent album, “The Life of a Showgirl.” 

If you have not already seen the countless TikToks and posts made online, this is possibly her most negatively received album for multiple reasons, including but not limited to, alleged racially insensitive metaphors, weak lyricism, a disconnect of imagery to sound, and general mean-girl passive-aggressive vibes.

You may think I’m being unnecessarily harsh, but you’ll be hard-pressed to hear me not give someone their flowers (you’ll know this if you’ve read any of my other reviews, which are also on The Trumpet’s website!)

To help me tackle the complexity of this review and add a bit more context, our Managing Editor, Ellie Matheny, will be helping me fill in the blanks on Taylor’s literary references through editor’s notes. I believe this is necessary because Taylor likes to lean into the “English teacher” persona quite a bit, and there is an entire song that I do not fully understand the context of because I was never forced to read Hamlet (but Ellie was.)

Without further ado, let’s listen (on a guest tab on YouTube.)

The Fate of Ophelia:

The album opens with its most listenable track, “The Fate of Ophelia.” This might have been a good marketing move on Taylor’s part, because with each song, we are on a fast track downhill. In my personal opinion, I still find it to be a little awkward and bland, like something is missing to really flesh out the production.

As slightly catchy as the chorus might be, I can’t help but to feel disappointed by the sentiment of “All that time/I sat alone in my tower/You were just honing your powers/Now I can see it all/Late one night/You dug me out of my grave and/Saved my heart from the fate of Ophelia.” Even I, who is only very slightly familiar with Hamlet and Ophelia, know that this cannot be an accurate way to describe her feelings about her fiancé. But here’s what Ellie has to say:

Ophelia is anything but being saved by a man, and is instead ruined by them. The three men in her life —her father, brother, and love interest —restrict and undermine her chance of personal agency and individuality. Her father, Polonius, instructs her on how a woman should be and forces this relationship between her and Hamlet. Laertes, her brother, constantly sexualizes Hamlet and their relationship, while also treating her like a dimwitted child. Hamlet, after being riddled with madness by the death of his father, gives to Ophelia the famous “Get thee to a nunnery” speech, where he as well sexualizes Ophelia. After the death of her father, she goes mad, where she then, after some time, drowns herself around flowers, as if she were dying with her femininity after “drowning” from the pressures she succumbed to. Overall, Ophelia’s demise can be seen as the one time Ophelia was able to do something for herself, and not based on the men’s wishes in her life. Not only that, but Ophelia’s death can symbolize the pressure of the expectations of women that men force upon them. So, Taylor Swift’s claim of a man, which we can assume is Travis Kelce, saving her from the fate of a woman who died to the madness of the men’s pressure on her, does not make sense, as a woman can only save herself from that fate, not a football player.

Anyway, I’m also turned off by the choice of words she used to describe her dedication to her fiance: “Keep it one hundred on the land, thе sea, the sky/Pledge allegiance to your hands, your team, your vibes.” I’m a Lana Del Rey fan, and that sounds like a scrapped demo from “Born to Die.” As you’ll see in the rest of this album, Taylor tries desperately to integrate slang in her lyrics to seem more current and relatable, which comes off as tacky and clunky.

Elizabeth Taylor

She starts the song with the name drop (totally not on the nose.) The chorus has a catchiness to it, but the verses feel like she is awkwardly and frantically stuffing the words in between the beats. I feel that this affects the song’s overall groovability because you almost become stressed out trying to see how it’s going to pan out. You don’t really want that in a standard pop song.

I will say that this song is probably one of the least offensive in terms of actual lyricism, but things still look bleak for Taylor’s relatability. “Be my NY when Hollywood hates me/You’re only as hot as your last hit, baby,” says Taylor, tongue-in-cheek. While I’m sure she has seen some pressure to produce number ones over the past 15 years, you can’t help but roll your eyes at her complaints of being the world’s biggest superstar yet somehow an underdog.

 “Babe, I would trade the Cartier for someone to trust… just kidding.” Let us know how you really feel. We’re all listening.

Opalite

Sonically, this is the ideal song to play in a CVS. Bubbly with a groove to it, but you can zone out and not really miss much. I’m picking up mascara, VitaminWater, and, sure, a KitKat as a little treat. That’s the only really good thing I can say about this song.

This is the song that sparked the allegations of Taylor’s racially charged shadiness. In this song, Taylor allegedly makes references to fiance Travis Kelce’s ex, sports journalist and influencer Kayla Nicole (“You couldn’t understand it/Why you felt alone/You were in it for real/She was in her phone” alluding to her.)

In the chorus, Taylor sings “you were dancing through the lightning strikes/Sleepless in the onyx night/But now the sky is opalite.” While Taylor went on the record to say on radio show Capital that she had opalite stuck in her head because opal is Travis’s birthstone, some internet users have expressed that the contract between onyx and opalite leaves a bad taste in their mouths due to the fact that Nicole is a black woman, and other lyrics on this album that leave people to speculate that Taylor feels a type of way about that. 

(The general purpose of this series is to critique the actual songs, not to gossip, but I believe that adding the behind-the-scenes context is relevant in this case. These are her lyrics, after all.)

Speaking of lyrics, “Opalite” has a bad case of vagueness. Many of the comparisons Taylor makes in this song feel half-baked (“Life is a song, it ends when it ends,” “And all the perfect couples/Said, ‘When you know, you know’/And, ‘When you don’t, you don’t,’” “Thunder like a drum/This life will beat you up.”) It feels like this is the draft and she’s waiting to think of better, more thoughtful lyrics to put in before sending it out.

Father Figure

This song interpolates the song “Father Figure” by George Michael, so it already had a running start in terms of production.

I’ll give credit where credit is due and say that “Father Figure” is a fine song. Is it my favorite Taylor song? No. Does it hold a candle to most of her other work? Still no. However, I think that her lyricism is solid in this song. Allegedly (yes, I am sick of that word), this song is about her former partnership with Scott Borchetta, who owned Big Machine Records when she was under that label and who sold her masters to manager Scooter Braun, ensuing a long legal battle.

I will say that I dislike the flow of the bridge where she says, “Your thoughtless ambition/sparked the ignition/On foolish decisions, which led to misguided visions.” The rhythm was odd and took me out, and it feels a bit Dr. Seuss to me. Other than that, the song is inoffensive.

Eldest Daughter

The first of the two ballads present on the album. On this track, Taylor sings over a slow, sad piano about how she is troubled by “trolling and memes” and trying to keep up an interesting, unbothered persona while internet discourse persists.

The first verse made me involuntarily cringe, but the second verse and bridge are reminiscent of her Folklore-style writing, which I think is when Taylor was fully in her element in terms of descriptive lyricism and creating an artist-specific atmosphere. 

Why didn’t I say that about the chorus? Because, as we talked about earlier, Taylor ruins a perfectly fine song by shoving in modern slang that really does not match the tone she wants to convey. In the chorus, she says “but I’m not a bad bitch/And this isn’t savage/But I’m never gonna let you down/I’m never gonna leave you out.” (And again, some users online expressed uneasiness around these lyrics and interpreted them as a possible jab towards black women, specifically famous black women in her circle. More context, but you can make of that what you will.)

Another set of lines she ruined with an odd slang word that doesn’t fit: “Every eldest daughter was the first lamb to the slaughter/So we all dressed up as wolves and we looked fire” in the second pre-chorus. She’ll get it next time.

Ruin the Friendship

The second ballad, but not nearly as dreary in terms of actual production and sound. There is a beat, but there’s at least a difference in her usual cadence.

This song is allegedly about her former friend who died of an overdose and how she wished that she would have kissed him back in high school, even though he had a girlfriend, and they both presumably pissed off their prom dates by spending that time looking at each other from across the room (yikes.) 

She also says they disconnected after graduation but her friend called her to tell her the news, saying in the third chorus, “It was not an invitation/But I flew home anyway/With so much left to say/It was not convenient, no/But I whispered at the grave/”Should’ve kissed you anyway.” She then advises everyone to “ruin the friendship” so they don’t regret what might have been.

I’m not trying to say that art should be about omitting the truth to paint yourself in the best light (how many club songs are there about cheating?) However, unless this was a vault track, I would feel a bit odd singing this as a 35-year-old about to get married. At least to me, if I were in the situation of that person’s former girlfriend, friend, etc., and I heard this song, I might feel a certain type of way about it. But what do I know?

Actually Romantic

I am going to absolutely try my best not to view this song parasocially through the lens of someone reacting to celebrity beef, but I find this song to be particularly grating. 

Taylor Swift writes a Teenage Dirtbag-esque diss track ALLEGEDLY towards artist Charli xcx in response to her song “Sympathy is a Knife” off of her album “Brat.” In fact, I don’t even know if I have to say “allegedly” at this point because the signs are all there (the title being so close to Charli xcx’s “Everything is Romantic,” and lyrics such as “I heard you call me “Boring Barbie”/ when the coke’s got you brave/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.”)

As a quick aside, for anyone reading this who has never listened to “Sympathy is a Knife,” I highly encourage you to examine the lyrics. This is a song about Charli’s struggle of comparing herself to another woman in the industry who is very successful and feeling insecure and anxious about how people in her circle perceive her. While the song isn’t entirely positive towards this other woman, IN MY OPINION, it is barely even about her. Rather, it reads like an examination of Charli’s feelings towards herself.

(But of course, we don’t know what goes on behind closed doors. I’m just presenting the lyrics as they are.)

Anyway, back to this song, “Actually Romantic” doesn’t do Taylor any favors in the “girl’s girl” department. In fact, this song has a misogynistic undertone that makes my skin crawl a bit. For example, in the second verse, she says, “And I know you think it/comes off vicious/But it’s precious, adorable/Like a toy chihuahua barking at me from a tiny purse/That’s how much it hurts/How many times has your boyfriend said/Why are we always talking ’bout her?”

(In “Sympathy is a Knife, “one voice tells me that they laugh/George says I’m just paranoid,” with George being Charli’s now-husband and the drummer of the 1975, the band that Taylor’s ex, Matty Healy, who allegedly ghosted her, is in.)

And here’s another point: a friend (who I will keep anonymous) mentioned to me that Taylor’s comparison of this woman’s behavior towards Taylor to flirting not only makes Taylor sound self-obsessed, but the song also made her feel uncomfortable and disgusted as a woman who dates other woman because Taylor doesn’t know the struggles that queer people go through and this comparison should not be normalized.

I’m inclined to believe my friend because of the reasons she listed. But also, who wouldn’t be disgusted by “it sounded nasty, but it feels like you’re flirting with me…it’s kind of making me wet”? Eww.

Wi$h Li$t

I know the Swiftie moms are eating this up.

Another inoffensive beat that could be in a rom-com (and probably will be, come next year).

In this song, Taylor talks about how everyone she knows wants luxury goods, spring break trips, the “complex female character” (yet another on-the-nose literary analogy), and sparkling accolades, but she just wants to settle down with her fiancé and start a family.

 While I don’t care about critiquing a celebrity’s personal goals and aspirations because that’s not my business, I do not need to hear about how she wants to “have a couple kids, got the whole block lookin’ like you.” If you have enough kids to fill up the whole block, I’m moving out of the Taylor colony with my one cat that I call my kid.

Also, maybe she’s managing her expectations, but I also don’t know anyone who is “dreaming about a driveway with a basketball hoop.” I feel like that’s pretty common in my small town in the middle of nowhere. Maybe billionaires don’t have basketball hoops?

Wood

I don’t even know where to start with this one.

First off, this song is very different from the others in terms of instrumentation. It’s almost like a 70s Motown-inspired romp (with some equating it to a Jackson 5 knock-off).

This song feels like Taylor is trying to dip into Sabrina Carpenter’s style that capitalizes on her cheeky, euphemistic lyricism, but it really does not work in my opinion. Taylor built up this brand for years of being a poignant songwriter that wants to make good hits, but also wants to be taken seriously by her peers. She has other songs where she talks about sex in a mature, understated way that fits her vibe, so this one feels horribly cheap compared to the others.

The entire context of the song feels a little odd and confusing. Like she is superstitious (of what, I don’t know) and her fiance reassures her of her anxiety, but then she also talks about being “d**k-matised” (huh?) by her fiance’s “redwood tree” and “magic wand” (DO NOT NEED TO KNOW) and his love being “the key that opened my thighs” (oh brother.) Again, I do not have an aversion to people singing about sex, but this song is just so corny and off-putting.

There’s also no doubt as to who this song is about: Taylor even name drops Travis Kelce’s podcast when talking about his member (“New Heights of manhood.”) I need to scrub my brain rigorously after this.

CANCELLED!

Taylor wants us to know she is a dark force to be reckoned with. That’s why she put the title of this song in all caps with a big exclamation point to further sell it.

In this song, Taylor warns us of “masked crusaders” that are coming after us after seeing us make a tone-deaf joke, have an alleged affair with someone taken, and/or “having too much fun” (what kinds of fun? We may not know.) We also see another cringy hip and cool lyric in the pre-chorus that she definitely did not just rip off of Twitter (X): “did you girlboss too close to the sun?”

This is a song that a 12-year-old with unlimited access to Tumblr.com would make to showcase their villain OCs (ask me how I know.) Taylor REALLY leans into this fantasy imagery in the chorus to say she prefers her friends “cloaked in Gucci and in scandal.” She also reiterates themes of being cartoonishly evil: “Like my whiskey sour,/and poison thorny flowers/Welcome to my underworld where it gets quite dark/At least you know exactly who your friends are/They’re the ones with matching scars.” 

I feel that it’s important to mention that, once again, Taylor is facing backlash online. With the implication that she is talking about her own friends, people are speculating that Taylor could be referring to actress Blake Lively (who got into controversy during the rollout for her movie “It Ends With Us,” a movie about domestic violence and an abusive relationship, for her tone-deaf promotion) or Brittany Mahomes (who was publicly praised by President Trump.) Regardless of whether it was about one, the other, both, or neither, Taylor has a LOT of explaining to do releasing this song in this cultural climate.

Honey

There’s not much to talk about on this song. I forgot it was even in the track list, I’m not even going to lie.

In this song, Taylor tells her partner (presumably still “killatrav,” as almost this entire album is about him) about how she’ll let him call her “honey” and other pet names because she didn’t have good experiences with other people calling her pet names. For instance she talks about “the bitch” (a chihuahua still, or maybe something different, like a mastiff? I guess she’s had bad luck with dogs recently) who told her to back off because her man was ogling Taylor at the bar, and the girls in the bathroom that told Taylor that her skirt doesn’t fit her and she cried about it on the way home.

She repeats this verse, which I don’t think was necessary. The song is boring and feels unfinished to me. Okay, moving on.

The Life of a Showgirl

When I saw the title of this song, I was imagining a jazzy, carefree instrumental with a fun little swing cadence and a hearty helping of Sabrina’s cheerful runs. Instead, we got a song that felt like the opposite of what a showgirl would dance to. 

We get yet another uninspired instrumental with some stomp-claps and a simple, droning synth. It’s not very danceable, which is disappointing. The only time we had a dance break was in the bridge, which feels like an awkward musical moment

She tells the story of a girl named Kitty, who is witty, has the keys to the city, but didn’t do it legitly. Again, Dr. Suess. 

As for the inclusion of Sabrina on this track, it kind of feels like you could substitute her with several other people, and it would not change anything. I LOVE Sabrina, but the feature felt forgettable.

Overall, this song felt like a “The Lucky One” part two, but lazier.

And with that, that’s my review of “Life of a Showgirl.” I really don’t have anything else to say that wouldn’t be a repeat, but I will leave with this: if you make an album so bad that some of your most devoted fans have to step back and reconsider how they feel towards your art and intentions, you should probably take a break and regroup.

And to Swifties who were disappointed with this album: I encourage you to hold your faves accountable and demand better. You spend your hard-earned cash, time, and energy on someone’s art, and you deserve to see a better, more thoughtful product.

That’s all for now! If you have any suggestions for which album I should review next, email us at [email protected].

Thank you for reading, and I’ll see you next month!