These aren’t obscure soundalikes—they are several of the most famous songs already ever made, now recreated in the genre of “Taylor Swift song.” Whatever vision Martin and Shellback set out to realize here is not really serving her strengths and, intentionally or not, appears to signal a disinterest in evolution. “Father Figure” has some of the album’s strongest writing, with the signature Swiftian heel turn at the bridge, and I could not be less excited about how the production sounds, which is unremarkable compared to its inspiration, the 1987 George Michael song that’s still so hot you remember it from Babygirl. It’s not worth being mad about “CANCELLED!,” a swagless “Look What You Made Me Do,” even when Swift hits us with, “Did you girlboss too close to the sun?”
I can sort of recommend “Opalite,” a better-days-ahead anthem for gemstone lovers that sounds like a stage adaptation of Post Malone’s “Circles,” or maybe it’s Maroon 5’s “Sugar”? “Honey” is quite sweet—a simple hip-hop beat flecked with bass, clarinet, and banjo, it finds room in the spotlight for the extensive live instrumentation that’s sometimes overshadowed on other songs. The same is true of Swift’s charming detour back to country-pop alongside Sabrina Carpenter on the closing title track, which ties a bow on the theme of A-list drama and glamour with lines like, “They ripped me off like false lashes” and a Swedish guy playing pedal steel guitar. (He’s Anders Pettersson and he also appears on “The Fate of Ophelia,” far and away the most convincing song overall, and normie dream house “Wi$h Li$t,” in which Swift imagines a future where, apparently, everyone looks just like Travis Kelce.)
“The Life of a Showgirl” is a little schmaltzy, but it’s proactive about introducing an independent personality with a story to tell, and Carpenter is a real asset. It’s one of the moments when, musically, The Life of a Showgirl brushes up against a much better idea—a big, glorious pageant that inspires organic passion and camaraderie; a concept album with the ambition to do something familiar like it’s never been seen before. The rest of the time, Showgirl sounds like much of the pop music you have heard over the past 10 years and throughout your lifetime; it asks that this time, you listen more closely, because this is Taylor Swift, with the enormity of commercial power and cultural significance and algorithmic rank that implies. “In my industry, attention is affection,” Swift says in her video commentary introducing “Actually Romantic.” That’s the showgirl’s job: making you pay attention. It’s working, and if this is the only pop album you hear this year, maybe it’s good enough.
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