'The Life of a Showgirl' | Every Single Album: Taylor Swift

Interactive Transcript

spk_0 Hello and welcome to every single album, Taylor Swift.

spk_0 I'm Nora Prinsiotti.

spk_0 As always, I am joined by Nathan Heard to discuss the life of a showgirl, brand new Taylor

spk_0 Swift album.

spk_0 It's Christmas morning for every single album.

spk_0 Lights camera action.

spk_0 We're ready to go.

spk_0 We've talked a little bit.

spk_0 We've tried to just like a little bit because for me, this was, I actually feel great about

spk_0 it.

spk_0 This was the most like low-key feeling Taylor Swift album release since we started doing

spk_0 this pod.

spk_0 I think part of that is because there's just so much less music that's part of this than

spk_0 obviously tortured poets, but also the re-recordings particularly with the vault.

spk_0 And then folklore and ever more, we're pretty lengthy albums and same thing with the midnight

spk_0 3 a.m.

spk_0 And yada yada yada.

spk_0 For me personally, this is my first Taylor Swift album, not like deep on Twitter and just

spk_0 really into the internet of it all.

spk_0 And I have to say that it like washed over me with a really, with a lot of ease.

spk_0 How are you feeling Nathan?

spk_0 I'm confused by what you just, you, meaning you did not experience the Twitter like shitcho

spk_0 that erupts around every time somebody puts out an album you were out, you were baking

spk_0 bread basically and not scrolling as Taylor with the jokes.

spk_0 I mean, I saw like I love the memes, I love the jokes and I, I think I managed to see

spk_0 the best of the best.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 But it just felt like, and I think some of that is because of choices that I made and

spk_0 then some of that is because I think this is just a much less Easter eggy, be in the weeds,

spk_0 be like I think in some ways this is an album for the normies in all the ways that tortured

spk_0 poets was an album for the like deep, deep Swifties.

spk_0 And there is, there is something about that that I think has affected the way that I've

spk_0 consumed it over the last 36 hours or so.

spk_0 What about you?

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Well, we're going to talk more about who this album is actually for.

spk_0 I mean, the rollout weirdly took some of the air and excitement out of the balloon with

spk_0 these countdown clocks being about vinyls.

spk_0 And that's, you don't have to freak out.

spk_0 People get upset that she takes shit for this.

spk_0 And on the one hand, you're right, she gets an unusual amount of scrutiny.

spk_0 But like too bad.

spk_0 Heavy is the crown.

spk_0 She has positioned herself as a voice and a leader of the artist community.

spk_0 So yes, it matters what she does.

spk_0 She sets the bar because she is the bar.

spk_0 So get over it.

spk_0 But like it was a little bit anticlimactic when the countdown clocks went to zero and

spk_0 it wasn't this like unlocking of the puzzles that we'd had before.

spk_0 Now, because of that, because of some of that early commercialism, I think it distracted

spk_0 from some of the really cool stuff she did at the end to see the detectives in the fan

spk_0 base, right?

spk_0 Lining up the album titles to make the errors to her stage is incredible.

spk_0 And that fuels Mike.

spk_0 The lyrics in the reputation song titles.

spk_0 Yeah, the song titles, not umpties.

spk_0 Yes.

spk_0 So out of pocket, she knew how hard people would clown on that one.

spk_0 Oh my God.

spk_0 Like the capitalized hidden lyrics on Spotify and Apple, etc.

spk_0 Like the pop-up that showed the cracks that gave clues.

spk_0 Like it felt like some of the reaction was subdued because the early stuff maybe didn't

spk_0 surprise and delight and empower the fan base to begin the quest, right?

spk_0 And delight the non-vinyl heads.

spk_0 So and I know that the vinyl's like delighted the vinyl heads because she was very particular

spk_0 about them and high quality and all that stuff.

spk_0 But I think you're right that it took a little bit of the air at that balloon.

spk_0 And then then the media part of this is interesting like, hey, she's back doing media.

spk_0 Let's not forget that last time she did nothing.

spk_0 She was the media, right?

spk_0 And yet the media things that she's done so far, there's still a standby on the schedule

spk_0 that's supposed to happen later tonight.

spk_0 Yeah, we're by the way, we're recording this on Saturday morning.

spk_0 We're going to get cloned.

spk_0 We're going to get totally cloned.

spk_0 But like there's this NBC through line for Seth and Jimmy Fallon who she knows well,

spk_0 Graham Norton, she knows well.

spk_0 And then the radio shows, those are basically just hype machines that sort of tree preps

spk_0 them all.

spk_0 And it's a very controlled environment.

spk_0 It's like from that to like the Rolling Stone and Variety reviews that just read like North

spk_0 Korean media for sure.

spk_0 There was some agreement between them about what those reviews were going to be.

spk_0 It just, and I don't think it's a criticism.

spk_0 But I'm with you that like it was safe and it was a little bit subdued.

spk_0 Now I was excited.

spk_0 What are you saying was subdued?

spk_0 Are you saying the way the public reaction to the album once it was out or?

spk_0 No, I think the lead up.

spk_0 I think there was less like, oh my god, oh my god.

spk_0 Online people were having their moments.

spk_0 But like, yeah, I think it was, it just, there were other things going on in the world

spk_0 that I think distracted a little bit from the buildup here.

spk_0 And when you layer that into the fact that I think some of the normies maybe didn't get

spk_0 wrapped into the quests and the puzzles and the challenges because the early messaging

spk_0 was around vinyl that I think some people stopped paying attention.

spk_0 And so that, it just felt like a cleaner.

spk_0 I can turn on the headphones like I do every single time.

spk_0 I listen on headphones with no distractions the first time through.

spk_0 No lyrics just to feel.

spk_0 When does my heartbeat faster?

spk_0 When does the hair on my neck stand up?

spk_0 When does my mind wander?

spk_0 Because I'm bored.

spk_0 When do I get those insane chills that run from the back of my head into my lats and

spk_0 into my spine?

spk_0 Like, then I go and I read it with the lyrics and it's a very different experience for me.

spk_0 But the social piece was funny.

spk_0 There's just so much slop on there right now, Nora.

spk_0 And it's so clear that there are bots and there are, you know, whoever is trying to

spk_0 foment division, they pick these high profile American cultural moments and they come in

spk_0 and just build up a bunch of tension and fighting and conflict that isn't even real.

spk_0 So it's hard to parse through the funny shit, right?

spk_0 Like there was some funny shit.

spk_0 I mean, and some of it is like tongue in cheek criticism, right?

spk_0 But like somebody wrote, you know, this album sounds like it was announced on a sports

spk_0 podcast.

spk_0 Like somebody wrote the best Taylor Swift song this year is still how bad do you want

spk_0 me?

spk_0 Like that was funny, whether you believe it or not, but just picking that out in between

spk_0 the drama around Charlie, which we'll get into the some people who really, at least if

spk_0 you read online, don't like this record.

spk_0 Some people who just are marching to the beat of, oh my god, it's the greatest thing ever.

spk_0 And I think most of that shit that you're seeing on social media is not real.

spk_0 And so for me, I guess my point is I'm with you that it used to be that these moments on

spk_0 social were so freaking fun.

spk_0 And the slop is getting in the way of us just having this one communal moment where we love

spk_0 it.

spk_0 We hate it.

spk_0 We met it wherever you fall in that barometer.

spk_0 I know.

spk_0 You come together.

spk_0 And we do lose.

spk_0 Like you're right to point out that it used to be really fun.

spk_0 And I agree that like to some extent, it's although I think there are ways for it still

spk_0 to be fun.

spk_0 I was watching some sub stack group chats where it's just like a little bit less.

spk_0 You have a fewer, you have a smaller proportion of bad faith actors.

spk_0 And so people are getting their jokes off and like having an experience together.

spk_0 And that's really fun.

spk_0 And it doesn't have that as much.

spk_0 The thing that I want to point out is, it is just that there was something for me about

spk_0 disengaging with that that made it a really just lighthearted experience in a way that

spk_0 I'm grateful for.

spk_0 But the thing that's really funny about it is that I think it is so like these, these

spk_0 really intense reactions right because Taylor Swift right now is someone who no matter

spk_0 what she does, please.

spk_0 Lighting rod.

spk_0 Insanely strong reactions on both sides.

spk_0 And it's a funny contrast with this album, which I think is fine to pretty good.

spk_0 And it's like that deep.

spk_0 Yeah, it's not that deep.

spk_0 It's just like a fun.

spk_0 It's a fun 40 minutes of pop songs.

spk_0 Everybody needs to calm down.

spk_0 You need to calm down.

spk_0 That is exactly my reaction to this.

spk_0 And look, I don't think this is the album I'd give someone to make the case that she's

spk_0 one of the best songwriters on planet.

spk_0 In 20 years when we do the Taylor Swift panty on, we're not going to talk about a lot

spk_0 of this music.

spk_0 We're just not.

spk_0 But I had a nice time.

spk_0 Like I had a really nice time.

spk_0 And I think it succeeds at a lot of the things that it's trying to do.

spk_0 Tell me about that.

spk_0 It's just like that's such a different sort of scope than Taylor Swift is fomenting

spk_0 tradwifery for a new generation.

spk_0 Or Taylor Swift has just made the best album that's ever been in out like it's just so

spk_0 half of control.

spk_0 Yeah, I mean, it is.

spk_0 It doesn't have to be the best ever.

spk_0 This does not have to be your favorite Taylor Swift album.

spk_0 It doesn't have to melt your face off.

spk_0 Like she's done things in her career that were worthy of that.

spk_0 And I think you're probably full of shit if you tell me that that's what's happening

spk_0 to you right now.

spk_0 It's hero worship.

spk_0 It's lack of critical thinking.

spk_0 We talked about this before.

spk_0 This podcast, we started it to try to convince the world that this woman was one of the

spk_0 greatest of all time as an artist, as a songwriter, as a business person.

spk_0 That is boring at this point because it's been established.

spk_0 So like it's okay to for everything not to be up and to the right.

spk_0 Like everything doesn't get continually better until she quits or dies.

spk_0 No artist has ever been like that.

spk_0 But also it's okay to enjoy it.

spk_0 It's okay to be like, yeah, I think a lot of the production choices worked out really

spk_0 well.

spk_0 And I like some happy songs.

spk_0 And oh, there are some surprises along the way.

spk_0 And I want to dance to the fate of Ophelia, which by the way is a Bob.

spk_0 So like, I mean, that's how I feel right now.

spk_0 The record, it's great that she has something meaningful to say by album 12.

spk_0 It builds on what she's done before on a standalone basis with this album.

spk_0 No, but she's made 11 albums before that.

spk_0 And I think that's, it finds ways to be different.

spk_0 That's exactly what we were asking for.

spk_0 What if she makes 30 albums?

spk_0 Like you said, what will stand out about this one?

spk_0 Honestly, it's going to be Travis's dick.

spk_0 That's what's going to stand out about album 12.

spk_0 Yeah, no, we will be like the life of a showgirl.

spk_0 I think we will remember.

spk_0 I think we will remember going back to Max and having that turn out in a way that's

spk_0 very different from what people expected.

spk_0 But I think still was cool and we'll talk about some of the reasons why.

spk_0 And then I think people will remember that Taylor Swift was in love and definitely in

spk_0 lust.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Here's to me the underlying like main point of it.

spk_0 If you want to get philosophical about it, if you have to take it somewhat seriously,

spk_0 I don't blame you.

spk_0 Because let me just be clear, my first pass of this album, I didn't like it.

spk_0 Okay, yeah.

spk_0 But, and then I spun it a few more times and it got a lot better for me.

spk_0 And it is very reputation-esque in that way.

spk_0 But here's the key point for me.

spk_0 This is the first time since debut that Taylor Swift has shown her age.

spk_0 It is incredible that after 12 albums, she still has something to contribute.

spk_0 And she has this base of life experiences that like half the listening population doesn't.

spk_0 She has more hashtag perspective than a lot of her fans.

spk_0 She's old enough to be reflecting back on things that happened like 20 years ago.

spk_0 She's fucking baking bread instead of scrolling, right?

spk_0 She's using slang that dates her.

spk_0 And she's writing a basketball hoops in the driveway, being an imminent thing in her

spk_0 life, right?

spk_0 She's giving you life advice about the passage of time.

spk_0 And that's the essence of why this album.

spk_0 I think it's differently depending on your generation.

spk_0 Like Taylor Swift is getting older and she sees that time is not an infinite resource.

spk_0 And she spoke about it on new heights when she announced the album.

spk_0 And it's impacting how she writes for all of her obsession with Shakespeare.

spk_0 To me, this woman is a lot more akin to Hamilton in that she works and she writes

spk_0 like she's running out of time.

spk_0 The album doesn't feel rough.

spk_0 What songs are you thinking about when you say this?

spk_0 I'm thinking about the entire project.

spk_0 Like the album doesn't feel rushed, but it feels like she was busy to me, Nora, and

spk_0 that it received part of her bandwidth when she constructed it.

spk_0 Like not all of it.

spk_0 Like the rollout, that feels like we got her full brain.

spk_0 But the songwriting to me is a reflection of what happens when you get older.

spk_0 Other things in your life start to get in the way of the passions of your youth.

spk_0 That she can still be so good as she enters this like transition to a generation at least once removed.

spk_0 It is a testament to her greatness.

spk_0 And so when you think about where she actually is in life.

spk_0 And I think you asked me what songs do I think she's communicating that?

spk_0 I think she's got a host on here where she's talking about it.

spk_0 I think Elizabeth Taylor is one.

spk_0 I think the fate of Ophelia is one.

spk_0 I think Father figure is one.

spk_0 I think eldest daughter is one.

spk_0 I think it's a through line and ruin the friendship.

spk_0 Yeah, eldest daughter really resonates with me in terms of what you're saying.

spk_0 But I'm not a bad bitch.

spk_0 And this isn't savage.

spk_0 But I'm never gonna let you down.

spk_0 But she's all of the criticisms that are being leveled at this album.

spk_0 And I think some of them are valid.

spk_0 Are coming from the place of like on debut, you couldn't really identify with this.

spk_0 If you were a 40 year old person or a 30 year old person or a 20 year old.

spk_0 This album feels like it's target demo is somebody who's 35 about to be 36.

spk_0 And that's her in Travis.

spk_0 And I think when you ask the wine moms right now, they love this record.

spk_0 And I think when you ask the 20 year olds, they're like, it's a little millennial.

spk_0 It's a little cringey.

spk_0 And that's okay.

spk_0 Taylor Swift created this massive monocultural moment

spk_0 that bound every single person together just about on the planet.

spk_0 And it was natural that the next thing that she introduced

spk_0 was not necessarily going to be everyone's unifying thing.

spk_0 Yeah, it's interesting that you received that as something where the sort of different people

spk_0 who experience it differently are based on our separated by age.

spk_0 And I totally see what you're talking about because there is.

spk_0 And you know, in some of the lyrics that some people find cringey and some people find very truthful.

spk_0 There is this kind of live laugh love, millennial slaying element to it.

spk_0 That does really like pinpoint the era of life that she's in.

spk_0 I do think that it also, to me, it reads a little bit as,

spk_0 you know, I get the sense that she's still pretty caught up in

spk_0 she had this fling with a person who she identified as a pinnacle of cool,

spk_0 of sort of like urban cool.

spk_0 And I'm talking about Maddie Healy and wound up feeling very rejected by that.

spk_0 And I think I feel like a lot of what comes through this album is the pendulum

spk_0 swinging back pretty hard in a different way that's fine.

spk_0 Reject me. I'll just move to Ohio.

spk_0 She's cheer captain and I'm on the bleachers.

spk_0 Yeah, but it's not. It's like she's she's dating the fucking captain.

spk_0 She's at CBGBs and I'm at book club maybe.

spk_0 Like there's a there's I think there's an overall point of view of I have been rejected from the

spk_0 cool city kids table.

spk_0 And I am embracing that I'm not a bad bitch.

spk_0 I am I'm like, you know, I'm I'm embracing my basicness.

spk_0 I'm and I think that that's something that like I think that's an experience that actually

spk_0 it resonates with a lot of people.

spk_0 And and I think it there's probably an equal proportion of people who are rubbed the wrong way by that.

spk_0 And at least in moments.

spk_0 I'm like as far as the album goes I'm neutral on it because I buy it.

spk_0 Like it feels very true to me.

spk_0 And so like on an album that I don't find very revealing.

spk_0 Like I don't think that's what it's.

spk_0 Well it reveals.

spk_0 He's like telling us a lot about where Taylor Swift is right now.

spk_0 Well sure it does.

spk_0 It tells us.

spk_0 Well other yeah other than the obvious.

spk_0 There's a reason that Travis Kelsey was holding up that album with this just gleeful grin on his face.

spk_0 That entire thing like this is a great.

spk_0 This is great for me.

spk_0 It's like everyone listen.

spk_0 It's exactly what Ariana did for Pete Davidson.

spk_0 And it is very funny to me that the Pinocchio reference was just like.

spk_0 You know expanding wood.

spk_0 So we will talk about the Charlie stuff but I want to just pull back because you're sort of making

spk_0 the point right now.

spk_0 I think that Taylor Swift, one of the things that she's articulated through this campaign already

spk_0 and some of these interviews was this fear that if she actually found the love that she was looking

spk_0 for that it was going to fuck up her art.

spk_0 And there is this.

spk_0 Say like as you know when you have a billion dollars and you've cleared the highest peak of

spk_0 struggle and descended into the valley of a loving relationship.

spk_0 There is the risk that something is going to creep in.

spk_0 Should we be worried about her, create about what she settles into wife,

spk_0 demon motherhood?

spk_0 Yes we should.

spk_0 Every artist like produces well from a position of struggle and suffering.

spk_0 The story of the artist is the story of Jesus like suffering for the greater good.

spk_0 And as every great artist has got older.

spk_0

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 As every great artist has gotten older and more comfortable.

spk_0 Like their output from a popular acceptance standpoint has definitely waned.

spk_0 Like there's been a few great late and career albums.

spk_0 I don't know.

spk_0 Robert Plant, Johnny Cash made a few.

spk_0 Bonnie Rate, right?

spk_0 But for the most part, like there is a drop off to me though.

spk_0 What I want to ask you is I think she

spk_0 revels and seeks out conflict, right?

spk_0 Travis on that episode of New Heights last week

spk_0 when they identified him as a Libra one of the characteristics was doesn't seek conflict.

spk_0 And they laughed, there's conflict diverse.

spk_0 And they laughed about that.

spk_0 And Travis is like well actually I don't seek out conflict.

spk_0 It seeks me.

spk_0 But that's Taylor.

spk_0 Taylor

spk_0 seems to seek it out.

spk_0 And we'll talk about this Charlie thing.

spk_0 Because if you're going to walk the, like

spk_0 she's powered by conflict in this sense of being wronged.

spk_0 It's not necessarily victimhood.

spk_0 I think that's different.

spk_0 But she feels slided.

spk_0 She feels cheated.

spk_0 She feels disrespected.

spk_0 And she uses that to fuel her.

spk_0 And the reason I want to ask you about it is it is very Tom Brady.

spk_0 Ask.

spk_0 She invents these things to stay at her best.

spk_0 It's Tiger Woods-esque.

spk_0 It's Michael Jordan-esque.

spk_0 Do you see that?

spk_0 Like I, well, I think that it's not,

spk_0 there's a lot of this that feels like she is making it

spk_0 to keep her edge.

spk_0 Yeah, I agree with that.

spk_0 I mean, I think, look, I think people,

spk_0 Taylor Swift has never once in her life won the IDGAF war.

spk_0 Which is by the way, what makes it so funny when she does a song like actually romantic.

spk_0 Or like I forgot that you existed because I love, like I'm totally on board with the

spk_0 sentiment and with the sort of performance of wanting to feel like that.

spk_0 Ma'am, you've never forgotten anything in your entire life.

spk_0 Right.

spk_0 But that's part of the fun of it.

spk_0 And we'll get to that song, but I do like to me, it was a highlight.

spk_0 It doesn't mean that I think that everything about how it came to be is entirely becoming,

spk_0 but musically and in terms of feeling like there's a vibrancy and a kick to it,

spk_0 I think it puts her in some of her strongest modes.

spk_0 I like the Travis songs.

spk_0 I think she was really smart to just be like, you know,

spk_0 this isn't really about what I'm the picture that I'm painting of this relationship.

spk_0 This is just, it's vibes based.

spk_0 Like there's that line in fate of Ophelia where she says,

spk_0 the land the sea disguise, pledge allegiance to your hands, your team, your vibes.

spk_0 And when I heard that line the first time,

spk_0 I actually usually don't cringe at the stuff that people cringe at.

spk_0 Before that line, she says, keep it 100.

spk_0 So I mean, that's yeah, I like, and I will admit that the first time I heard that,

spk_0 I kind of winced.

spk_0 Yeah, I was just like, oh God, pledge allegiance to your vibes.

spk_0 I don't know what I'm going to be able to defend about that one.

spk_0 I do have to say that I think there's something truthful about that.

spk_0 Where like if you ask me right now, what the, what the most vivid

spk_0 lyrics that Taylor Swift has put pen to paper about Travis Kelsey in her discography so far are the man she's going to marry.

spk_0 I will tell you that it is, you know how to ball.

spk_0 I know Aristotle.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And new heights of manhood.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 Like this, I mean, and if we go back through time and think about the things that she's written about people that just sort of.

spk_0 Like pierce your soul and take you into it's a different thing.

spk_0 But that's it.

spk_0 Where I think it comes through is the vibes.

spk_0 Like there's a cheerfulness to a lot of what she writes about him that I,

spk_0 that I, I feel like reflects something true.

spk_0 And yeah.

spk_0 I look at it.

spk_0 To me, this is a reminder that actual love is really dumb and it's been explored.

spk_0 Yeah, I'm really boring.

spk_0 Like, well, it is.

spk_0 I mean, from the outside in this endless quest for that feeling that she was moved to write all of these searing heart-wrenching lyrics that

spk_0 grew ever poetic over the course of 11 albums.

spk_0 Then she finds love.

spk_0 She finally breaks through and gets into that valley of heaven of a relationship that she'd long for.

spk_0 And she starts writing songs about Dick and using, you know, I'll never leave you as the key line in a chorus.

spk_0 Just the most basic stuff.

spk_0 That's okay, but it just seems like other people want stuff.

spk_0 I just want you.

spk_0 She didn't find, she didn't find any new ground to explore when she finally got there.

spk_0 It was all, it just didn't inspire her to be moved.

spk_0 And so the best lyrical moments of this album come from her tapping into either the past or the grievance.

spk_0 The line and father figure about, I pay the check before it kisses the Mahogany grain.

spk_0 She's spoken about that now.

spk_0 It is one of the most poetic and best written lines on the album.

spk_0 There isn't one line like that about love here.

spk_0 So even like, look, I think it's a mean thing to say.

spk_0 I think it is a mean song and you can feel however you feel about this.

spk_0 But I heard you call me boring Barbie when the Coke Scott you brave is a bar.

spk_0 Yes.

spk_0 And so remember that like she knows from whence the fuel comes into the engine.

spk_0 And what needs to go into that fuel tank to make it work.

spk_0 And yes, she is recycling some old things.

spk_0 She's going to be picking fights until the end of time.

spk_0 Yes, because I think what we learned most about this album is Taylor Swift is showing her

spk_0 age and that is fine.

spk_0 But also there are things that fuel her creativity and there are things that do not.

spk_0 And the happiness that she's feeling, I'm happy for her.

spk_0 I'm thrilled for her.

spk_0 But I suspect that at least in that moment of a summer in Europe in which the pie chart of

spk_0 her time had many slices of which a small one was making this album.

spk_0 She didn't exactly tap into the Shakespearean word.

spk_0 Lyrically and that is ultimately okay.

spk_0 But I do think it makes me interested as she has communicated what's going forward.

spk_0 She's not going to tour this album.

spk_0 She needs a break.

spk_0 She's going to make a block full of kids that look like Travis.

spk_0 I'm interested to see what she does with more time.

spk_0 And that's been a theme of ours as we've talked about her for the last year almost.

spk_0 It was what she's going to do.

spk_0 How is she going to, what is she going to, that's the thing for me is like I am thrilled to see

spk_0 what happens if she has more time what she does from an artistic perspective.

spk_0 Yeah, but I will say that I think there's some artistry in the music here.

spk_0 I don't feel like she's in a place where she has a ton to say right now.

spk_0 But I think it was in a stuute choice to not make this an album about spilling your guts or about

spk_0 you know, I think there were a number of ways in which the campaign ended up being kind of a set

spk_0 of red herrings or at least a little bit different from how the album came out.

spk_0 And I think one of them was that it's this like look behind the curtain.

spk_0 Doesn't feel like that does it.

spk_0 No, no, I mean, even when it ends on the life of a showgirl and she says you don't know the life

spk_0 of a showgirl and you're never ever gonna.

spk_0 It's like an interesting thing to hide. I know that's the conversation, the dialogue within the

spk_0 song. But the only person who ends up actually having any insight within that song by the end of

spk_0 it is the protege who also becomes a showgirl.

spk_0 And now I know the life of a showgirl babe, wouldn't have it any other way.

spk_0 So inherently like when that person is a fan, when they're the audience,

spk_0 they don't know. They don't know anything. And like that to me is a lot more true to this body

spk_0 of music than the sort of preamble of I'm gonna raise the curtain and show you all exactly

spk_0 what it was like and tell you things you didn't know.

spk_0 Yeah, I also think that that theme, I agree with you on that. I think it's a reflection of the

spk_0 production choice that she made too. I mean, we begged her to not work with Jack and Aaron for

spk_0 once because we wanted something different. And I think this is this album is a reflection of

spk_0 that creative process of Max versus Jack and Aaron. Max is formulaic and he is mathematical.

spk_0 And she is decidedly not anymore. And there were places on this album where they talk over each

spk_0 other a bit. The second verse of eldest daughter is not a Max Martin song. That's the trampoline

spk_0 bit where she says, I must have been eight or nine and I broke my arm.

spk_0 And like the word sort of like all, there's like a 40 car crash on an interstate and a fog on

spk_0 that verse. As they try to sort of turn it from her, even the Spotify background video is just her

spk_0 in an empty theater playing piano. That's much more suited for a Jack or Aaron treatment than it

spk_0 is a Max song, right? And I think there are moments on this album where

spk_0 they're slightly out of sync in terms of the way that she creates and the way that he creates.

spk_0 But this is what we asked for. We asked for her to be edited, to be concise, and to work with

spk_0 somebody different. And we kind of asked for her to go straight pop. And she took her swing. And

spk_0 so I am fascinated to hear Nora what you think of these songs because when we came into it, we

spk_0 maybe we did this wrong. And I think that was the point of your intro. Like we set a pretty high bar

spk_0 because from my perspective, all that was left for her to do musically was to do what she did in

spk_0 live performance, which was to create this massive monocultural hit that spans across generations.

spk_0 And I think by any measure right now, and by the way, the Spotify numbers are going to be awesome

spk_0 on all this stuff. But don't lose sight. There is a bunch of slop and bullshit on social media.

spk_0 Not everybody loves this album. There are people who just haven't gotten there. And I'm sure your

spk_0 DMs reflect my DMs, which is that there's some people who love it. And there's some people who don't.

spk_0 I think there is not a generational transcending forever, all-timer on this record. Do you agree?

spk_0 I do when you put it that way. What I will say, and I want to address what you were saying about

spk_0 Max too, and these will sort of stand in for our hit conversation and our collaborator conversations here.

spk_0 But in terms of the hit potential, I do think that the fate of Ophelia was the right single.

spk_0 I think it's really catchy. I know that it's funny. That the land, the sea, the skies has been so stuck in my head.

spk_0 I know that I'm not in the sea, the sky, but you'll just see your hands, your feet, your five.

spk_0 It's not my favorite song. I don't think it's the best song, but I think it was the absolute right choice

spk_0 for this single. I think it's... You do. I think it's going to... I think people are going to listen to

spk_0 it a lot. I think it just goes down so easily. And I think if you're someone who actually, like,

spk_0 isn't deep in the lore, it's a really nice song. It's a really nice song for the normies.

spk_0 And that's a lot of people. So I think that she's going to have a pretty big hit with that.

spk_0 I don't think that it's going to be, again, like... Is it anti-hero?

spk_0 It's... It's at least anti-hero. It's not the whole summer? Yes. Yes. No, I think it's... I think it's...

spk_0 I think it is as effective as a single. I think that anti-hero has a lot more to say,

spk_0 but I think for the masses, it's a step catcher.

spk_0 Really. I disagree. I think that it is behind both anti-hero and Fortnite. And look, there is a lot

spk_0 of summertime sadness. There's a lot of summertime sadness in this chorus, right?

spk_0 I think that the debate is whether this melody in the chorus really kicks us. I mean,

spk_0 the coolest part of this for me, by the way, and I think this is expressly intentional.

spk_0 This song starts like it's track 32 on tortured poets with the piano.

spk_0 And the end of the manuscript has these sort of octaves on piano.

spk_0 And this starts with this very similar vibe. And then, but it clicks in and straight into the Max

spk_0 pop beat. I love the way that you are brought into the pop world immediately.

spk_0 And it's exactly... I don't think that people really saw the overall kind of 70s vibe of this

spk_0 album coming, but where it does feel very grounded in the music that she's made with Max Martin

spk_0 and Chellback before is the percussion. Is those just like picture-to-feel talky stick, right?

spk_0 Like it's those kits over and over again. Yeah, there are more acoustic instruments on this album

spk_0 than I expected. But look, on Ophelia in particular, first of all, the fate of Ophelia. Now we know

spk_0 why she called it the fate of Ophelia instead of Ophelia. It's because it has to be the stage in

spk_0 the ears to her drawing when you center all of these song titles. But there are a lot of minor chords

spk_0 here that she's working around. And that's the thing for me why I think for some people,

spk_0 it's not going to totally grab. Why didn't she try... I don't know, why didn't she start with Opalite?

spk_0 I'm surprised that you think this one... I mean, I get it. Oh, interesting.

spk_0 And I like... Look, the music video is fun. She's directing it.

spk_0 It feels fan-targeted in its own way. I get it. I'm just going to be interested to see if this

spk_0 ultimately in three years is streamed in the same way that Fortnite and that anti-hero are streamed.

spk_0 I mean, look, right now Fortnite is still today her eighth most streamed song on a daily basis.

spk_0 Baddie. You'll never get me that with that song.

spk_0 Well, anti-hero lessso. Anti-hero's got anti-hero has more all time.

spk_0 We have a little bit of a different perspective on because I think for people who really,

spk_0 really care, there was something really meaningful about its me high I'm the problem it's me.

spk_0 That was such a moment in terms of her kind of self-conception and it was really powerful because of that.

spk_0 If that's not something that matters to you, which when we're talking about the hits,

spk_0 you know, the mainstream CVS parentheses complimentary soundtrack hits, I think that stuff is less important.

spk_0 Like, you know, I used to wonder if I was romantically cursed and then now you saved me. Yeah,

spk_0 like, if you're someone who's like, gosh, Taylor Swift teaches me about the world and about her soul,

spk_0 yeah, it probably recalibrates the experience of this song. If you just want to have a nice time,

spk_0 it's a bop, not a banger, but it's the one that's been the clearest earworm to me. So I think it was

spk_0 the right call. Okay. I mean, I just will say anti hero is her fourth most stream song ever.

spk_0 Sure. So that's the that's the that's the class that you're putting the fate of Ophelia in if you say

spk_0 that it's going to that it's going to get there, but but I think I honestly don't think that some

spk_0 of those metrics are that valuable just because she is so big right now and they get playlisted

spk_0 so ubiquitously that like, you know, we're like, there are so cruel summer is the biggest to cruel

spk_0 summer is the biggest.

spk_0 It's blue.

spk_0 A blank space is second.

spk_0 And then what's number three? You're not going to believe it.

spk_0 Uh, Zane who is reuniting with Louis Tomlinson.

spk_0 Oh, right. Of course. It's I don't want to live forever.

spk_0 Yeah.

spk_0 And then it's anti hero now in terms of like what people are streaming on a daily basis.

spk_0 It's it's cruel summer. It's cardigan August blank space dress style lover fortnight on down

spk_0 on down. But number eight is fortnight. But for instance, like style.

spk_0 And then we go crashing down. We come back every time.

spk_0 Style is yeah style is a hit or six. And it was right. But style is a song that made an impact

spk_0 in its popularity right in a way that some of these like that anti hero.

spk_0 That's why I think you look at the daily streams. Yeah. Instead of instead of all time streams.

spk_0 Yeah. Because of course, like fearless, which came out when there were CDs and not streaming.

spk_0 Like that's when a ton of the listening happened. So I think looking at the daily streams

spk_0 gives you a better sense for where these things sit on the sort of rank order all time stuff.

spk_0 But on the rank order all time that puts right now. And again, I think there's a

spk_0 recency bias in in tortured poet stuff. But fortnight is eighth. Yeah.

spk_0 And anti hero then is only 20. Yeah. That's where that makes more sense to me.

spk_0 Not in terms of where I believe it deserves to fall. I think that's an amazing song. But I just

spk_0 like, I don't hear anti hero all the time out in the world. I don't think that it has had

spk_0 that type of life. And I wouldn't, you know, if if fave of ovelia ends up

spk_0 12 or something and again, like it's still tied to the ways that people consume music.

spk_0 Yeah. Do you hear the summertime sadness in the course?

spk_0 Yeah. Okay. And because the craziest part about the announcement on George Michael States,

spk_0 you know, page saying, hey, we so appreciate that Taylor has done this for us. And, you know,

spk_0 there was all love between the two. And of course, I got just irrationally excited because

spk_0 faith is one of my all time favorite albums. And then you would never know that father figure

spk_0 isn't this. You have no fucking idea. I've no fucking clue. And then at the same time.

spk_0 12 other times on this album where you're like, well, she's definitely giving royalties to

spk_0 the pixies or the jacks and five. The jacks in a state.

spk_0 The Jonas Brothers. Surely they are paying no George Michael.

spk_0 George Michael royalties for like a really subtle rhythm that no one would pick out.

spk_0 That's the thing. I mean, there's so much on this record where you're like, did she pay post

spk_0 Malone for circles? Because the start of opalite sounds a lot like circles.

spk_0 Did she pay, you know, the Ronettes for the OOO on opalite? Because that sounds a lot like it was

spk_0 from Be My Baby.

spk_0 Did she pay the Thompson twins for the start of that chorus on opalite? Because, well,

spk_0 it's not quite. But we can talk about that. But like, I, there's so, did she pay herself for I can see

spk_0 you on opalite? There's lots of places where you'd be like, hey, what is this?

spk_0 And I did think that George Michael thing, like, it gives you a sense for how she thinks about

spk_0 the value in songwriting and that knowing that the concept was inspired by that song and that,

spk_0 yes, she was flipping the power dynamics, but that it was rooted in the story of that song.

spk_0 She says, well, therefore, I should read it.

spk_0 I think it was rooted in the story of a sort of questionable age gap relationship.

spk_0 Well, yeah, because I think she shreds Scott Borshet on on father figure. And I think, you know,

spk_0 in hindsight, after going through this entire saga to buy back her masters, that's exactly what she

spk_0 feels. She feels like the age gap and the protege stuff and that all of that was, was manipulation.

spk_0 But, but man, you know, there are a lot of opportunities here where she could have paid just

spk_0 musically, but it is an indication of why when Olivia Rodrigo's record came out, it did not have

spk_0 the tributes to Taylor. And then when she publicly talked about Taylor being an inspiration for some

spk_0 of these songs, suddenly up popped a writing credit to Taylor. That, if you really are paying attention,

spk_0 tells you how Taylor thinks about where the value of influence in songs comes from. And maybe

spk_0 it's less about, hey, that rift that sounds a little bit like ABC from the Jackson.

spk_0 But I want you back. And more like because she is first and foremost a writer. Now, whether she's

spk_0 writing about, you know, knocking on wood or writing about, you know, the far corners of Emily

spk_0 Dickinson, she is a writer. And it is the inspiration for that that I think she holds apparently most

spk_0 dear based on at least as we know and as we understand publicly, the places where she

spk_0 brought in other ins, other writers on this record, it only happened once.

spk_0 I'm not wishing for Joe Jonas Taylor Swift litigation. I actually hope that doesn't happen. I

spk_0 don't think it will. I'm just saying that it would be an interesting twist. Well, let's make

spk_0 clear the life of a show girl really sounds like cool by the Jonas Brothers. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

spk_0 It does. And there's just no denying it. And there are people who are, you know, I mean, yes, the

spk_0 chorus of Opalite sounds like Thompson Twins hold me now.

spk_0 But it doesn't really like Opalite goes G to E minor to A minor and then resolves like D7 to D.

spk_0 Hold me now would be the equivalent of going to the F major instead of the A minor. So it goes

spk_0 part of the way there. I think mostly that chorus is just Abba shit. It's just Abba. Like this thing

spk_0 was remembered. It was by the way, like let's not, you know, Max. It was in Sweden where this whole

spk_0 thing was made. So there, but there are a lot of those like hat tip to other other songs in here.

spk_0 Do you think there's a chance that any other song can be bigger? I mean, I, I get why they didn't

spk_0 run with wood. But like I mean, I don't think you can show that music video in theaters.

spk_0 It's fucking awesome. I just look, let's let her have fun. It's fine. I think it's more of a

spk_0 it's more of a Wolfbeck song than a Jackson 5 song, but it is. I mean, there's two things. One is

spk_0 the melody and the post chorus forgive me. It sounds cocky is right out of blank space. Boys only

spk_0 want love when it's torture. Yeah. Yeah. Forgive me. It sounds cocky. This song to me is the most

spk_0 reminiscent of 1989 and and is shake it off-esque in which you're like out of the gates. You're like,

spk_0 I've definitely heard this before. It's a little out of place. It's not what I expected from her,

spk_0 but fuck it's catchy. It's so catchy and it's so like the the goofiness of it just I think

spk_0 I think she should be encouraged and commended for going as often as she can into those specific feelings

spk_0 because there's some amount of like horniness. Okay. Because like songs like

spk_0 Theta Vofelia are painting with a very broad brush and you know what? Would it's a lot more narrow. You

spk_0 know exactly what's going on. Sure. Like did I ever expect to hear the word dichmatized? I mean,

spk_0 I guess like she doesn't really say it, but you know what she means. Anantaylor Swift's song. No,

spk_0 I didn't and I love to be surprised. This would be a fun one live. I'm sure my god someday, but this is

spk_0 a fun ass song and I think it's big. I do. Part of the fun. Do you think this song, do you think that

spk_0 we would have this song without the influence of Sabrina Carpenter? Well, that's a good question.

spk_0 One of the criticisms that got sort of leveled here at this record is that she's trying to do Sabrina

spk_0 Carpenter, but it doesn't quite work. And when I think people say she's trying to do Sabrina

spk_0 Carpenter, what they mean is do the smart, horny, clever, coy play. And Taylor has a little bit too much

spk_0 poetry for that in some cases. I don't think she's trying to do Sabrina Carpenter. I mean,

spk_0 look, I don't think she's trying to do Sabrina Carpenter. I do think that Sabrina might have

spk_0 given her a permission structure that maybe Taylor, who can be a little, you know, it took her a

spk_0 long time to start swearing. But remember, feel a little bit more comfortable doing this.

spk_0 So the 2024 summer of pop girl happened in stages. And don't forget that Sabrina's album came out

spk_0 in late August. And so if she was running around Europe, recording this record, had she heard it

spk_0 from Sabrina for sure she had, but it wasn't out until late August. Brat was out.

spk_0 Chapel Rhone was out. So there were a lot of those pop girls that were busting through. And

spk_0 certainly were on her iPhone as she was listening to music with whatever sliver of time she had to do

spk_0 that in between everything. But do I think that she's copying Sabrina Carpenter? My answer is no.

spk_0 Do I think that Sabrina is squarely on team Taylor if there is a new sort of bad blood

spk_0 alignment around the other way? I don't think it's like a copying situation. I just think it's close.

spk_0 But Sabrina is also the has embraced the most old Hollywood visuals, tributes to the elder kind

spk_0 of thing that would make her the new showgirl. So that makes sense to me. And by the way,

spk_0 she opened for Taylor on the airs tour. And that's the last thing that we hear on life of a showgirl

spk_0 on the outro is actual audio from Taylor signing off in Vancouver.

spk_0 Right. Right. Right. Right.

spk_0 Let's I want to know your other favorite songs.

spk_0 Well, wood is definitely. Would you number one? No.

spk_0 I love wishlist.

spk_0 I know it's simple. But I just love the I love the melody. First of all, there's a very

spk_0 brief bev sighting coming out of the bridge on wishlist.

spk_0 I hope I get what I want.

spk_0 Cause I know what I want.

spk_0 It's very faint and in the background, but bev shows up briefly.

spk_0 It's sweet. I look unexpected for me. This is an unexpected take.

spk_0 Just I think that this song is the manifestation of all the good energy that people felt about her

spk_0 engagement. You know, she kind of could have had anything in the world, but this is what she wanted.

spk_0 And so they'll like leave us the fuck alone and they do like I think she's getting tired of

spk_0 being a public figure. And I think she's going to disappear for a bit. I'm just tired.

spk_0 Yeah, there's a little bit of glitch in this song.

spk_0 Yeah, that's true.

spk_0 Opened in Midnight's here. And as I was sort of doing some of my listening, I bounced back to

spk_0 Midnight's and oh my god, is that a great record? Like, oh my god is Midnight so good.

spk_0 And this album has a lot in common with Midnight's. Yeah.

spk_0 In some ways, it's like the album that people thought she was going to make when she made Midnight's

spk_0 with all of the kind of 70s aesthetic promo. Yeah. Yeah. But look, I have a very strong bias

spk_0 that I will tell the story as briefly as I possibly can. My favorite song on this album is

spk_0 Roon the Friendship.

spk_0 And I know that for a lot of people, this is the one that doesn't quite fit. But

spk_0 first of all, it is like so Taylor Swift to be in the heat of a relationship that's going to

spk_0 ultimately lead to her wedding. And she writes a song about a guy that she wishes she'd kiss

spk_0 to died from high school. Yes. It is just like exactly what Taylor Swift would do. But I think the

spk_0 building of it was not an invitation should have kissed you anyway. Yeah.

spk_0 Particularly the back part, the outro. I think it's the best groove. I think it's the best melody.

spk_0 It's the one thing that choked me up on this album. And it taps her into my bias is my first

spk_0 love in high school. She moved away and we had one of those awful goodbye while we're still dating.

spk_0 And she's just stuck with me forever. As somebody does, you give somebody in every relationship.

spk_0 And that's a thing that Taylor sort of alludes to across this record is in every relationship,

spk_0 you give somebody a part of you and a part of that is time because that's a thing that you can't

spk_0 make more of. And so it's a very valuable gift. You give somebody something. And so they stay

spk_0 with you forever. And that is part of what this is about. But I reconnected with this

spk_0 woman maybe 10-ish years ago. And then very briefly, and then it popped up in my feed that she

spk_0 had taken her own life. And it always haunts you because you're not the main character in that.

spk_0 You're not connected to them, but you were. And it makes you feel like, man, if I could I have

spk_0 been the butterfly wings that started the hurricane that made that happen? Or could I have been

spk_0 if I had acted differently, could I have changed the course of that person's life in a different way?

spk_0 So my own personal bias is what drew me to the content of the song. But just like musically,

spk_0 before I even really dove in, first of all, insane plot twist in the song. Like you do not see it

spk_0 coming. It's just like holy shit. Wait, what?

spk_0 But there is like bringing Abigail in, bringing all of it, just sort of like for me rooted me back in,

spk_0 yes, it's Taylor, she's still got it. That is even though the verses sound like Lenny Kravitz's

spk_0 it ain't over till it's over.

spk_0 Yeah, no, I mean, first of all, thank you for saying that. But also, it does feel,

spk_0 it feels like storytelling with her fast ball. And I agree with you that that was that was the one

spk_0 that choked me up. Probably for obvious reasons. I mean, it's the most emotionally wrenching

spk_0 thing that happens on the album. And I think it's a really beautiful song. I also, you know,

spk_0 it has those sort of, it's not pure country Taylor, but you know that the background is there

spk_0 with kind of how that melody glides and a little bit in the vocal. I think the singing on that song

spk_0 is also really, really beautiful. So I love that song as well. I love that that and would are

spk_0 your favorite. I really like. I really enjoy. I just do. It's just fun. It's easy. There's

spk_0 something about the bridge or the chorus that and the way that it resolves you sort of expect it.

spk_0 But it's incredibly fun. Where are you? I mean, I'm hearing all across the board on people's

spk_0 different favorite songs. It feels tortured poets in that way. I mean, there are a lot of people

spk_0 who feel like, who feel like actually romantic is their favorite. There's a lot of, I don't know,

spk_0 where are you? Yeah. I also love. I think that I'm not going to say honey, although I think a lot

spk_0 of people really like honey. One thing on opalite is that I think the almost like

spk_0 saccharine cheesiness of it is on purpose. And I think that's a fun thing to do. You think it's

spk_0 a little tongue in cheek? Yeah, I think it's a little tongue in cheek. I think the

spk_0 Ronets, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, like I think she knows that that's almost a musical trope of

spk_0 I'm singing about my love. And it's it's levy, dubby and cutesy. My favorites, I've got three favorites.

spk_0 Okay. First of all, I think Elizabeth Taylor's great. Yeah.

spk_0 It's and that's the one that's reputation, Max. You think so? Yeah, I mean, it's close. It's a cousin.

spk_0 Yeah, I mean, there's like, it's it's a very,

spk_0 there's like the chords are like all along the watchtower.

spk_0 There's like a bit of a darkness. So yeah, it goes, it goes very hard, but like,

spk_0 and I can just see her kind of stomping down a stage in boots. And it has an energy that

spk_0 some of the songs and actually in an odd way, some of the songs that I think are lyrically

spk_0 strongest, like I love father figure. And I want to talk about this with you. I think that's in

spk_0 like the writing of that song is really powerful to me. And the idea that she's embracing

spk_0 her stature and basically being like, no, I am the big swinging dick at this table is one of my

spk_0 favorite modes that I wish that she would do more. I think the writing is is some of the strongest

spk_0 writing that's on this album. And I think them, I think the melody is good. My one, the one

spk_0 thing that is stopping that from being one of my favorite songs is that I don't feel like there's

spk_0 any energy in the singing. Yeah. Like she sounds a little asleep. And it's this like powerful,

spk_0 powerful song. And I'm it, it, there's a dissonance, there's like a cognitive dissonance in the

spk_0 delivery of it where it, that's what's stopping it from fully connecting to me. But those lyrics,

spk_0 I think are incredible. So that would be my fourth favorite if it if it weren't for that. But

spk_0 it doesn't have the like who's afraid of little old me like scaryness in it, right? I mean,

spk_0 I mean, there's a shock. No, you feel her like growling or threatening.

spk_0 You should be right at the we've got to keep you at the end of that song. She's

spk_0 you'll be sleeping with the fishes. You'll be sleeping with the fishes before you know you drown it.

spk_0 Yeah. But she sounds like she's like she sounds like she's putting in her takeout order.

spk_0 I find this to be a cousin to the man from lover. And because I am the man. Yeah, she is. And it's

spk_0 it's a very like, and it follows the same pattern of a lot of her other songs. I think about

spk_0 a last great American dynasty. And then it was bought by me where she inserts herself very clearly

spk_0 into the story in the last verse, right, where this is, this is about Scott Borschetta. And this is a

spk_0 summation of how she views the path that she went on to reacquire her own masters. And the,

spk_0 the strategy of it all. And I mean, it is still through this entire campaign, the only thing that

spk_0 she gets choked up over talking about, right? Yeah. And the whole song sort of pivots on that phrase,

spk_0 leave it with me. And it is of course her catalog. Like, it's mine. I protect the family. That,

spk_0 that if you remember, she laid out all those albums in the picture and said, you know, they're

spk_0 mine now. And like, all of her children basically, right? So there's a very sort of mama bear fighter

spk_0 component to that song that is that is interesting. And it has her favorite lyric. Like, she was focused

spk_0 on this one. And I think it's because she very clearly wanted it wasn't just a feeling song.

spk_0 She was delivering a specific message. And again, tapping into that chip on her shoulder, I want to

spk_0 take you back really quickly before we hear your favorites to Elizabeth Taylor. Because I just,

spk_0 I want to ask you just one of my favorites. She said, um, role models are hard to come by.

spk_0 But she is absolutely one of mine. Taylor said that in regards to Elizabeth Taylor.

spk_0 Elizabeth Taylor had eight husbands and married one of them twice. Is this who Taylor thinks she

spk_0 is right after she gets engaged? It would be pretty consistent with the things that she's

spk_0 said about sort of her self-conception and, um, romantic anxieties, which I, I think you can find

spk_0 the love of your life and the most stable, wonderful, healthy relationship. It's not going to turn you

spk_0 into a person who doesn't have worries. That's not how she expresses those words. Holly would be

spk_0 me. Right. And that's part of why I like the song. That's part of why you're only as hot. Yeah.

spk_0 You're only as hot as your last hit, baby. To me is another, like one of the most important lines

spk_0 on this album. Holly would hate me when it's hot as your last hit, baby. And why I asked you at the

spk_0 beginning, what you think the, uh, fate of a failure is going to do. Is it going to be that hit?

spk_0 Is it going to transcend? Yeah. I think, I think you're right. All of those, all those anxieties are

spk_0 expressed here in this song was a bit ill. I just found it hilarious that she talked about as a

spk_0 role model, you know, pre-marriage. That's somebody. Well, I think she likes to cast herself in the

spk_0 guys of these troubled famous women of history, right? Yeah. The other thing that I absolutely love,

spk_0 one of my favorite lyrical moments, moments period on this entire album is when she says I would trade

spk_0 the Cartier for someone I could trust. And then there's the little backing vocal that goes just

spk_0 kidding. That's really funny. I know. There are a few fourth wall breaks here that are, that are super

spk_0 fun. But wait, okay. So we like, uh, father figure, we like Elizabeth Taylor. What is your favorite

spk_0 song in this album? So I, I have three. There's the three that really got me.

spk_0 Our Elizabeth Taylor, actually romantic and wood. And those are my three favorites. Yes.

spk_0 They have the most like energy to me. Wood. Wood. Now what is going to win? What is great? Now what

spk_0 is the consensus? What is the every single album consensus favorite song on the life of a showgirl?

spk_0 And it is entirely about Travis Kelsey's penis. And that's just something that you and I are going

spk_0 to have to live with. Well, I don't want to talk about that anymore. I want to talk about actually

spk_0 romantic because wow, she went for it. Didn't she? Yeah. It's actually romantic. I really got to

spk_0 hit it. Yeah. I mean, this is a nasty song. Like this is a mean, mean song. The first time I

spk_0 listened to this, I was like, is this her will Smith moment? Like, is this such a disproportionate

spk_0 response where she missed the point so much? You tell me what you think. I think context matters

spk_0 here in this battle. Like, it's clear that there was more than this song and that, you know, Taylor

spk_0 has received some intel from people close to the situation that it has not been all just confusion

spk_0 and intimidation at the enormity of Taylor's stature that there's been words and high-fiving and

spk_0 dissing, right? I mean, I think you have to believe that to not believe this was a disproportionate

spk_0 response to sympathy is a knife by Charlie X. Yeah, but you know what? Like, people don't fight

spk_0 fair. Like, I agree with that. Clearly, like, the song starts and it, of course, mentions you

spk_0 wrote a song about me. But the first thing you hear is I've heard that you're talking about me

spk_0 with you fucking co-head, you know, yeah, you fucking co-head. Which I'm sure that Charlie X

spk_0 X is shaking in her boots that someone called her a cocaine user. I don't, but I think that it's

spk_0 like, it's gloriously petty. It's, like, it's, it's also, you know, there's the whole thing about the,

spk_0 um, like a chihuahua barking from a purse. Right. Toi chihuahua. A toy chihuahua.

spk_0 Okay, that's, that's in some ways a fair way to sort of stack up their relative stature as

spk_0 a mainstream musical artists. It's also beneath her. It's not. Well, but it's the flip side of that

spk_0 is like, okay, you guys were both nominated for the same album of the year. You were like,

spk_0 but I don't think that the, the logic of like, is this fair? Is this nice? That's, I don't,

spk_0 I frankly don't care. Like, I don't, I think Charlie X X is just fine. Um, I don't really think

spk_0 that this is going to bother her. I don't think that Taylor has never said anything nasty about

spk_0 her own partners or partners friends X's. Right. Like, we're not all perfect saints and angels

spk_0 and the honesty of that and the, like, this is not an album with a super wide emotional spectrum.

spk_0 Like, there's a lot of this that is, I'm happy I have a fiance. And that's fine, but it's pretty

spk_0 narrow. And this going to, I wake up in the morning and I'm so pissed that I'm just going to be

spk_0 an absolute, you know what? And bully Charlie X X because it kind of turns me on is,

spk_0 that's a little bit of a more vibrant state of mind in some ways. So I really dig it.

spk_0 Does it bother you that this song is in the same key and sounds a lot like the pixies? Where is my mind?

spk_0 No, no, I, but none of that stuff bothers me on this album. I do think that it's like an

spk_0 interesting, it's interesting in light of the George Michael thing and how out of her way she went

spk_0 to make that homage clear, credited and publicized and then that in relationship with some

spk_0 of the other stuff. The other thing that's funny about, like, I hear the pixies come.

spk_0 This sounds quite a lot like an Olivia Rodrigo song. I don't mean a specific one, but just

spk_0 what do you think? Do you think for sure Charlie is the subject of this? I mean, the, the, the,

spk_0 the reasons this is Charlie is because Charlie has a song called Everything is Romantic. This song

spk_0 is Romantic. Oh, which again, under the father figure structure, it's possible that she ought to be

spk_0 paying royalties. She talks about hyfiving her ex who we know that she hyfives her ex all the time

spk_0 just for the, who posted her, who, which is something that she's already said about Maddie.

spk_0 The cocaine, all these, so it lines up pretty clearly. Is there a chance that there's more than

spk_0 Charlie? Look, I, so there's like two ways to, to kind of think about the parentage of the

spk_0 song inspirations, right? There's like, what is it? What is it actually?

spk_0 And what does it sound like it is? Like, I, her, the way that, you know, she is a performer,

spk_0 she is a writer. The dominant way in which her art is going to be received is in, in a lot of ways,

spk_0 I think, a lot more important than like what it's actually about because that's why people put

spk_0 art out into the world is to have that dialogue with the audience. I don't think there is any chance

spk_0 that Taylor Swift in her right mind could not understand that almost everyone was going to take

spk_0 this as a clear rejoinder to Charlie XX. Two sympathy is a knife, two, you know, the brat pack

spk_0 galavanting around Europe and Maddie being part of that and. But that's where it is, isn't it?

spk_0 Because sympathy of, sympathy is a knife is not a diss track.

spk_0 Sympathy is a knife is a compliment. It's a compliment. It is, it is a very new one.

spk_0 Because you are so successful and you do something that I feel like I could never do. And now that we've

spk_0 been thrust into the same environment, it is tapping all of these insecurities. And it's a

spk_0 vulnerable and nuanced articulation of how hard it is to be, to be the life of a showgirl,

spk_0 which Taylor seems to understand well in an industry in which in a lot of ways,

spk_0 these women in particular get pitted against each other and how that just eats at somebody who

spk_0 isn't sure of their place in the pecking order in the room. So the song itself, as you just said,

spk_0 was a tribute and a compliment, not a diss track. So then you got to step back and say, well,

spk_0 where is this coming from? And I think you've identified it. I mean, first of all, Charlie did

spk_0 open for Taylor Swift. And so the difference between a song. Quite a long time ago, but yeah.

spk_0 But still, the difference on this album between a song that Diss is Charlie XCX, who was once part

spk_0 of the family tree. Father figure says, I protect the family. And then Sabrina Carpenter,

spk_0 absolutely part of the family who opened up for Taylor, but is now celebrated and lifted up on

spk_0 this album. Those are two very different things. So you step back and go to your point is,

spk_0 she picked Team Maddie. And if we learn one thing from Tortured Poets, it's that the pain from the

spk_0 Maddie Healy situation was so great that it drowned out any writing about the demise of a

spk_0 six year relationship to Joe Allwynn, saved for so long London and maybe a few little other things

spk_0 here and there. So it is that resentment. And I just ask again, knowing that this is a creator

spk_0 who taps into resentment and taps into, she places chips on her shoulder and then pretends to be

spk_0 surprised that they're there to use them as fuel to she pretends that somebody else put them there.

spk_0 Is this an authentic clapback or is this her needing material?

spk_0 Like do I think that she invented this? Is she really hurt by all of these things that Charlie did?

spk_0 And there must be more behind the scenes, right? She's getting into there's video of Lord at a

spk_0 little bit of a battle tailed who know Lord by the way got smacked in the mouth by Charlie on

spk_0 brat and instead of clapping back. Well, but also not really did the remix. Yeah, but I don't

spk_0 think she didn't get I mean, if you call if you call the airing of a of a personal situation

spk_0 in a pretty nuanced way, a smack in the mouth and she got smacked in the mouth, I wouldn't really

spk_0 I guess would say look, I would have understood Lord having a harder time getting the nuance and

spk_0 vulnerability of what was being communicated. I don't actually think Charlie was smack. I think

spk_0 Lord got the point, understood the assignment and turned it into one of the songs of the year.

spk_0 Honestly, I was speechless when I woke up to your voice. No, it told me how you've been feeling.

spk_0 Let's look it out on the pre-made. And a sold out tour and all that like she used it as a vector

spk_0 to reintroduce herself and re-inject herself into the conversation. Taylor took a different approach.

spk_0 Again, this is why I just think context matters here. There's more to it than sympathy is a nice

spk_0 is sympathy isn't it? Yes, yeah, in that sense, I agree. I don't I think that in some ways it's

spk_0 probably you could say it's more about Maddie than it is about Charlie in a way where to me, I clearly

spk_0 that this feeling of yes, it's the romantic rejection of from Maddie in at the end of their

spk_0 relationship, but it's also the symbolism of it. I think does matter to Taylor and does seem

spk_0 too great on Taylor. I think she craves acceptance from that kind of cool kid it girl crowd.

spk_0 And I think she feels right now like she really doesn't have it. And I think that explains so much to

spk_0 me about the and you know, I think this is something that a lot of people have pulled out of this

spk_0 album too is that okay, a couple years ago we were writing in Lavender Hayes no deal that 1950s

spk_0 shit they want for me. And I think that you know, everyone is entitled to feel excited about their

spk_0 own love story. And if that for her is to you know, marry a guy and be in this quasi suburban

spk_0 wag group. I think that's popular athletes in America. He's a like it's not like she married an

spk_0 insurance adjuster. Yeah, but it's but it's the it's the I want to have I want to have a bunch of

spk_0 kids and a basketball hoop and you know, make the whole block look like you is of course it's a

spk_0 reference to wanting to have a bunch of kids who have Travis Kelsey's DNA. It also does

spk_0 you can read that line as I want to live in a homogenous place. I want to live an unchallenged kind of

spk_0 basic life. And I think she's entitled to want that. I also think that it does seem like a boomerringing

spk_0 of being just not feeling accepted in a slightly more cosmopolitan worldly.

spk_0 She's Taylor fucking Swift. I'm sorry, but that's a purely psychological.

spk_0 It's a I don't know if it's a crutch or it's a thing she's got to work on in therapy. If

spk_0 I couldn't agree more than it's all that it's a psychological thing and that Taylor Swift is a

spk_0 very no, I actually that's where like I don't look like I'm getting married to like to a man. It's not

spk_0 we can't have it be a wholesale indictment of her feminism that she's getting married, right?

spk_0 Like that that can't be it. I just got married. Maddie's getting married. It's about in association

spk_0 with people and I think it's about perpetually putting herself in a position where she feels that

spk_0 there's some thing to aspire to that she's not good enough to have. And that's a theme that

spk_0 just rolls through almost everything she's ever written. Yeah. Well, and I do think that

spk_0 that like there are some moments on this album where I it's not that I'm like, oh, because I think

spk_0 some people have have had a criticism of this album that it's like she's sort of doing, you know,

spk_0 Tradwife propaganda. I find that ridiculous. She's like one of the most successful

spk_0 business women in entertainment. But that's what the punching down feels weird. Well,

spk_0 and I think that she has stopped acknowledging the fact that she is a sophisticated cosmopolitan

spk_0 person. Right. Like I don't and that's part of why I like Elizabeth Taylor actually because it

spk_0 just seems to understand that. And then sometimes sometimes she set she sort of and maybe it's because

spk_0 she has this fantasy of this quiet simple life, which is actually kind of very difficult to attain

spk_0 for her because she is this worldly person. I do like sometimes I chave at her not

spk_0 embodying that, but I think in this case, I read it as a response to that feeling of rejection,

spk_0 which I totally agree with you is not real vis-a-vis the world. But I can see like I think her

spk_0 songs suggest that it is real in her psyche. She's been hanging out with a lot of athletes and a

spk_0 lot of wags. And that's a different crowd than the runway models and cool indie rockers that she

spk_0 you know, the comedians and Julia Fox, like all yeah, it's a different vibe.

spk_0 I don't think any of that is unattainable for her and that I think is a little bit of the

spk_0 disconnect for some of the listeners on this album is that you have a billionaire who is self-refest

spk_0 in a wonderfully happy place. Like things are pretty good for her right now. And so the sort of

spk_0 the punching down is interesting. But again, that's why I say I think the context matters and it

spk_0 feels like this is about more than sympathy is a knife. And to me, it feels like this is about more

spk_0 than I wish I was with you guys. And I'm jealous of the not with you guys, but you know,

spk_0 figuratively speaking, I wish I was in the cool crowd. I think that there is more behind the

spk_0 scenes stuff that there's some overlap in the camps and that there's people who have some loyalty

spk_0 to Taylor who reported back that this was more than just the messaging that came out in sympathy

spk_0 as a knife and that, you know, basically they've been shit talking her and calling her fucking

spk_0 boring Barbie. Well, and that there's more than that, right? And that to me feels like the

spk_0 fuels that the Scott Borschetta stuff was real. Like that was a real experience that fueled that

spk_0 level of anger. I'm not sure that she just sort of mustered up faux anger in thin air. But

spk_0 you know, we're never going to know. And I think the fact that we don't have that public context is

spk_0 leading to some of the criticism that she's punching down in this song. My pushback on that is,

spk_0 you just don't know. My pushback is that it's fine that she's punching down. It's not

spk_0 necessarily fine in terms of it making her seem like a, you know, universally at every single turn of

spk_0 life, a nice, generous person, but very few people are like the, this is going to be an issue that

spk_0 affects this album and the way it's received because Charlie is perceived to be part of that younger

spk_0 generation of pop stars that's behind her. She is lumped in with Sabrina with Olivia with,

spk_0 you know, the rest of the chapel on and on and on. And the generation that has

spk_0 gravitated to those young pop stars is feeling defensive of Charlie XCX, not sympathetic to Taylor Swift.

spk_0 Yeah. I mean, that's fine. I think that to work with, to meet like, because to,

spk_0 I just care, I care about the song. And when she gets to that bridge and she is sneering,

spk_0 the like, stop talking dirty to me, it's nasty. Like that's, that's rude.

spk_0 It's not a nice, like she's not being a nice girl. And I think it has, there's, it's a live. Like it's,

spk_0 it's real and it's complicated and it's kind of dirty. And she's in the mud. And like, that is so

spk_0 potent to me in a way that some of this lacks a certain potency. I, I won't like, I don't really give a

spk_0 shit. I like this song. Do you know who else I think likes this song? You know who else I think

spk_0 likes this song? I think hearing the line, it's kind of making me wet. And then no man has ever

spk_0 loved me like you do. I think every galer out there is like, we are back, baby. We're so back.

spk_0 Yeah, although there is like, I, you know, I think they're, again, clearly it's one of my favorite

spk_0 songs. This is not like deeply bothering me. And I don't, I, I don't care if Taylor Swift's songs

spk_0 make her seem like a nice person. There is a little bit of like one of my friends, which I thought

spk_0 was so funny, brought up that she is a little bit doing the Regina George. I couldn't invite her to

spk_0 my party because she was a lesbian. I couldn't have a lesbian in my party where it is a little bit like,

spk_0 I hate you so you're gay. Right. And I will acknowledge the unfortunateness of that. But I, I,

spk_0 I think it really works. I think this song really works and I'm into it. And I love this sort of,

spk_0 like, yeah, it's Olivia Rodrigo or it's a Pixie's or it's like weezer, those like,

spk_0 chugging guitars. I'm just totally, I'm, I'm totally into it. It's one of my favorites.

spk_0 Well, there's a few that we didn't talk about. And I guess, um, do we go to what we'd cut to,

spk_0 to flush out the list? Yeah. I mean, can I say actually sorry before we do? Can I say one more

spk_0 thing on Max just as a collaborator and she'll back. I think they did a really, again, I think so

spk_0 much of this album roll out like it just, it's set expectations in ways that I don't think we're

spk_0 quite right. And that probably has something to do with why some people felt thrown when they

spk_0 listened to that album. But I do think that it was really nice to hear her voice in general a

spk_0 little less swaddled. And I'm not a jack hater. I'm not an airing hater. But I do think that one of

spk_0 the qualities that had made that music start to feel a bit repetitive is there tends to be

spk_0 a lot around her in both of there, but especially Jack's arrangements. And Max, I think like this,

spk_0 this team, they all did it together. I think they edited her in terms of song length or the track

spk_0 number of songs. Yeah. But I think they edited the production where you don't, most of these songs

spk_0 don't sound like classic classic 1989 reputation Taylor Swift and Max Martin songs for all of the

spk_0 reasons. Yeah, there's more space. But there is more space around her than we have heard in a while.

spk_0 And I thought that it made room to notice some really good singing. We've talked a lot about

spk_0 the place that her voice is in. I think especially on that tour, that was a thing that really worked

spk_0 for me. And it just felt different. Like it felt different from what we've been hearing.

spk_0 And so that I thought was really successful. I agree with you. I do think that some of the production

spk_0 didn't capture the delicateness of her voice that we'd gotten used to since folklore. And she

spk_0 has worked extraordinarily hard to get her voice to that place. And it may just be the nature of

spk_0 straight ahead pop songs that her voice doesn't stand out in its specialness. It comes across on

spk_0 eldest daughter. And why don't we talk track five before we talk about what we've cut? Because I

spk_0 think that is the one song that that allows for that intimacy and the capture of the nuance

spk_0 that she's worked so hard to to bring to the center. I think her voice is great across the record.

spk_0 It just if there is a place where it shines, I think it's probably on eldest daughter. And

spk_0 you know, for someone who keeps saying she doesn't scroll and bakes instead. Like she has a lot

spk_0 of comments on the internet doesn't she? She has a lot of thoughts. Every joke's just trolling and memes

spk_0 sad as it seems. I'm going to say something. I know you're sitting down for this. Yeah. Sometimes

spk_0 she lied about not believing in marriage on this song.

spk_0 Right. I like it. It's not one of my favorite track fives. But I think it really makes it actually

spk_0 makes sense. Even though it's in that pocket in the middle of the album where I think people

spk_0 felt a little bit like, oh, this sort of goes in a different direction. I don't understand why some

spk_0 of these songs belong in this album that we were told was Banger's Topped Bottom. Yes. But to me,

spk_0 this is really a song about that feeling of like, so much of the currency of cool.

spk_0 Does it like tinged by this sense of apathy or like, oh, I don't care. I'm just going to make a joke

spk_0 about it and being a little bit of a troll, being unaffected. And this feeling of, she is a

spk_0 marnie. She is earnest to perhaps to a fault, but also to the creation of her career and the

spk_0 sort of world built out from that that resonates with so many of her fans. It's like,

spk_0 she wears her heart on her sleeve and she is just trying. She is always trying and it's sort of

spk_0 not cool to try. But there she is. And I agree with you that the singing is beautiful.

spk_0 It's not a song that musically resonated with me deeply. But I could be on the handle of the

spk_0 song where I sort of wondered if the idea of love was more interesting for her to explore than

spk_0 the actual experience of it. Not that it's boring for her, but that it's just been done because some

spk_0 of her communication on here feels just like innocent and simple and cliche. And I'm so happy that

spk_0 she feels this way, even if it didn't driver to say something new. How do you feel about some of

spk_0 the lyrical writing here, like the so we all dressed up as wolves and we looked fire?

spk_0 Yeah, fire, that to me is an example of where that is like one of the most millennial lines on

spk_0 this album. Yeah. It just is. And it's where, you know, there's just a collision between the

spk_0 Mac structure and math and the way that she writes. And it didn't totally, you can see the seams.

spk_0 Yeah. I don't mind. I'm not a bad bitch. And this isn't savage. I do think we looked fire.

spk_0 Like hits me strangely. Doesn't tell me let me tell you what for me is the redeeming part of the

spk_0 song and why I would not cut it. I think it's a worthy track five. Me too. We've heard the bridge on

spk_0 Ellis daughter before. There's a moment when she goes into the We Lie Back. We lie back a beautiful,

spk_0 beautiful time left. That is right where you left me.

spk_0 I'm still sitting in a corner right hand. And in right where you left me the chords are like a D,

spk_0 E minor, C, G. Or that's in those are the chords in eldest daughter. Right where you left me is F,

spk_0 G minor, E flat, B flat. Like it is the same progression just transposed down two steps. And

spk_0 I love that part of right where you left me. And I'm happy for it to have its rightful place on

spk_0 a track five because I think it was supposed to on ever more. I think it is the most overlooked song

spk_0 on her most overlooked album. And so for me that is the redeeming part, not redeeming. I like eldest

spk_0 daughter. But the reason I love Elvis, Elvis daughter is because I think she just borrowed the chorus

spk_0 from right where you left me and put it in a bridge. Yeah. I like it. It's in the middle. If I

spk_0 ranked my favorite songs, it would be in the middle for me. But I agree with you that it's a worthy

spk_0 track five. Well, so Opalite did not hit for you then. No, I like Opalite. Opalite again is

spk_0 it's in that next tier. Okay, so I gave you Elizabeth Taylor, actually romantic and would

spk_0 as my three favorites. Yeah. Okay, what comes next? It's probably it's the fate of Opelia.

spk_0 It's fate of Opelia, father figure, Opalite in some order. I don't want to go too far because I need

spk_0 to we need to do cuts. Let's talk about cuts then, right? Because you want to go first?

spk_0 There's a couple of songs that sit on this album that we that we haven't talked about. And

spk_0 I'm going to tell you why I don't think any of these songs should be cut later in my conspiracy

spk_0 corner. Oh, boy. But why they can't be cut. You had a very strong reaction to me talking about

spk_0 wish lists. So I'll give you an opportunity to push back on that. But the songs that we haven't

spk_0 actually talked about that then are on your list are canceled, honey, and life of a showgirl. I have

spk_0 a sense that you're not going to cut life of a showgirl. Correct. You're softer than a kitten,

spk_0 so you don't know the life of a showgirl babe, and you're never going to want to.

spk_0 I mean, these are pretty well. Both of these are predictable at this point because we did talk

spk_0 about wish list a little bit. And because I think I have made no bones in the past about the fact that

spk_0 while in almost every area, I think the idea that just because someone is rich and famous,

spk_0 they can't have problems or they can't feel is really silly. I do have a personal very strong

spk_0 bug of a of celebrities whining about cancel culture, which is just like, I think a Fox News

spk_0 barstual sports bucket of absolute lameness that I'm really bummed sheep, sheep,

spk_0 partuckin on this. And that's canceled. Yeah. The British spelling. I will never listen to it again.

spk_0 At least you know exactly your friends.

spk_0 So let's unpack that because it starts with. By the way, I don't think it's musically

spk_0 anything special either. Well, but I'm just so annoyed that she went there that like it's

spk_0 the most obvious cut to me. Well, let's start with music because in the aggregate,

spk_0 to me, it feels a lot like Yellow Flickrbeat by Lord.

spk_0 Good thing I like my friends. Can't stop. I like them. Good thing. Good thing. And it's

spk_0 can't stop. We look at the stars. The colors disappear. And I love watching stars.

spk_0 There's so much down here. From the Hunger Games mocking J Soundtrack, like really heavily

spk_0 inspired there. In terms of reputation, it has a lot of I did something bad in it.

spk_0 And it starts to me with some Nirvana heart shape box.

spk_0 It's easy to love you when you're poor. You're

spk_0 So there is something musically that is familiar from reputation as to me is the subject matter.

spk_0 It then like becomes a really familiar Lord song with a little Nirvana woven in. But the

spk_0 the underlying question, and this is really the thing that you and I texted the most about

spk_0 is who is this about? And your strong opinion when we were texting right out of the gate was,

spk_0 this has got to be Brittany Mahomes. That's not really true. That's what I texted you is.

spk_0 I struggle to come up with a different option. I got to say I don't, I for the record,

spk_0 I actually don't really care who it's about. Candace Owens, it turns out.

spk_0 Candace Owens in a podcast said that Blake and Taylor had girlbossed too close to the sun.

spk_0 And that is a line from cancelled. And so what I want to challenge you on, I don't think this

spk_0 has to be about one person. I think this could be a compilation. I also, by the way,

spk_0 I think it could have been about Maddie and didn't get me during that point and then got sort of

spk_0 repurposed and let's change some of the details. Well, there's just one read. It depends on what

spk_0 the meaning of the phrase I like. Because if it's good thing, I like my friends cancelled. Meaning,

spk_0 I, my friends that I'm with, you know, are cancelled. That's who I huddle with. The alternative

spk_0 reading is I like to see my friends who's betrayed, who have betrayed me cancelled. I like to see

spk_0 the scandal go to them. And that to me, you know, I like my whiskey sour. Like I want to see them.

spk_0 So depending on how you read these lyrics, you could go to, I'm going to huddle up with people

spk_0 who have been, you know, rejected and shunned by society just like me, or you could go to,

spk_0 I am enjoying watching you. Hold on, sorry. I'm just, this is like it grinds me

spk_0 gears so much. Taylor Swift hasn't been rejected and shunned by society. Like we have to keep some,

spk_0 there's like, I got it. You made the case on the, on the Charlie song, on actually romantic,

spk_0 that that's a feeling that she has. Sure. But what like, that's not society.

spk_0 She talks a lot about the parts of her life that are constantly on a microscope, under a

spk_0 microscope. And I think if I feel empathy for this case that she makes, it's that when the world

spk_0 and sections of the world are constantly throwing daggers, even if it's small sections of the world,

spk_0 depending on how you receive those, i.e. her social media feed that she doesn't look at anymore

spk_0 and begs bread maybe, or maybe does look at while she's baking bread. Like it would be impossible

spk_0 for Taylor Swift to not feel like the world is against her. In some capacity. It would be impossible

spk_0 for Taylor Swift, parts of the world, who just went on the largest tour around the world known to man,

spk_0 to not feel like the world is against her. I don't really, I don't think that.

spk_0 I think when the president of the United States and the death threats that she gets and the hate

spk_0 that is, it is so easy to block out the sun. It's hard to be in that position and open your eyes

spk_0 in ears and not push it back and suppress it and just say no, the 60,000 people who are in front

spk_0 of me each night are proof. That's the samples. That's the representative sample set.

spk_0 I don't disagree with that. I don't disagree with that. And I very much agree that

spk_0 being in the spotlight to that degree must be disorienting and really scary in a lot of ways.

spk_0 It's not going to be in a bubble. I think that the particular invocation of the idea of cancel

spk_0 culture is something that, for instance, Tom Brady, who's, by the way, it's not just the

spk_0 comedians who's going to go take part with a group of people from the NFL in a flag football thing

spk_0 in Saudi Arabia to make a regime that cuts people up with bone saws seem more palatable.

spk_0 Really like to invoke as a rejoinder to people criticizing them for their actions.

spk_0 A way to disassociate from accountability for your behavior. It's a way to disassociate from

spk_0 accountability. And to me, again, it's very specific to the banner of cancel culture.

spk_0 Is I think a concept that has become a political tool to, as you very eloquently just said,

spk_0 disassociate from accountability. And I hope I'm making incredibly clear that this is a,

spk_0 I know that this is a pretty deeply held personal bugaboo. I think a lot of people feel that way,

spk_0 but I do know that this is one that really, really, really grinds my gears.

spk_0 But I think that that is, I think that there are ways, and she has done this, to write

spk_0 articulately and in ways that don't feel so messy in this way about the experience of living life

spk_0 under a microscope and the ways in which there can be unfairly levied criticism. But for instance,

spk_0 again, like I think that, you know, there's the actual intent and then there's how people are

spk_0 most likely to receive it. If we're talking about a song that I think a lot of people are going to

spk_0 pretty quickly go, okay, you know, Britney Mahomes sure wears a lot of Gucci and she's a friend of

spk_0 Taylor's who's been in the spotlight and has been criticized for her politics, which I think are

spk_0 pretty fair to criticize, to write a song that's going to be pretty widely interpreted as,

spk_0 well, good thing all of that happened because that just, you know, like they hate to see us winning,

spk_0 is just, I just don't want, I don't want anything to do with it. And that's fine because I don't

spk_0 think I'm ever going to listen to it. I think she might be spiking the football on Blake

spk_0 lively. That's all I'm going to say about this. I think it might be. And the funny thing about Blake

spk_0 is like, Blake has been, like Blake has, you could argue that there's a more legitimate

spk_0 argument argument that Blake has, you know, suffered real professional setbacks. Yes.

spk_0 For something where it doesn't seem like she was a, for a set of scandals in which at least to me,

spk_0 it seems like her crime was being a pretty bad hang and difficult. Yeah. And somebody else's crime

spk_0 might have been like a much more legitimate crime. And yet it seems like that's falling back more

spk_0 on her. So like, yeah, that could be interesting. I just like truly, when someone, it doesn't even

spk_0 have to be this deep. When someone like Taylor Swift starts talking about cancel culture, I shut down.

spk_0 I'm like, I don't, I don't like where your head is. I don't like the people that seem to be around,

spk_0 like I'm just out. Well, I don't know. You convinced me this might be about the president. And I got

spk_0 excited. And it wasn't. That's, that's the thing that I'm disappointed in is that, hey, if we're

spk_0 going to punch back at Charlie, then why don't you take a swing at the guy who's tweeting,

spk_0 essentially the leader of the free world who's tweeting, I hate Taylor Swift. That, that's the part

spk_0 that was slightly disappointing on this song. I will say that like the girl boss stuff,

spk_0 the keep it up 100, they clearly now reference things. Like if the girl boss is a reference

spk_0 to the Candace Owens thing, keep it 100 is obviously the numerology 87 plus 13. But in the aggregate,

spk_0 there is some stuff that's pretty millennial on this album. And it whips sometimes between cringe

spk_0 and stuff that's just outdated that nobody says anymore. And look, she is almost 36. She's not talking

spk_0 like the kids anymore. But the ram of the downstream ramification of that is why I think we've heard a

spk_0 little bit from some of the late teen early 20s that don't feel as connected to the subject here.

spk_0 And that is okay. It is an inevitability with an artist who's not going to maintain

spk_0 monocultural reverence forever. But that was one of the big questions coming into this album was

spk_0 could Taylor Swift get bigger? And if not, could she, is there an apex where inevitably at some point,

spk_0 there will be a lowering of the altitude of her stardom. I can't help but wonder if this album,

spk_0 because it is the first time since debut that she has shown her age. If it begins the next phase of

spk_0 her career, just as she starts the next phase of her life. Yeah. Next phase of her stardom,

spk_0 not so much her career. Her career is uncontestable, but just the next phase of her stardom.

spk_0 So cancel is the one that you shoot off. Cancel is the one that I would shoot off, but I also don't

spk_0 like wish list. What about honey? I like honey.

spk_0 Why do you not like wish list? Is it because you're mad that she's marrying Travis Kelsey?

spk_0 No, I just don't think that it like it, what is that song about?

spk_0 Other people want other stuff. I don't even care about the like the random real dread.

spk_0 Like that's sort of funny to me. It's the here's all this stuff that other people want. And I just want you.

spk_0 Yeah, I do like look. I do what she wants. This is the thing she's been looking for in albums

spk_0 one through 11. I know. Like bullshit. Absolute bullshit. She wants, she's a full human being.

spk_0 She cannot be self-actualized in her entirety by a guy in a basketball hoop. It's not,

spk_0 it's that's that's not what she has just about everything else Nora.

spk_0 The list of even she can't even she can't worry about cancel culture because she has everything.

spk_0 And I agree with you. No, it's pretty good. But this has been a thing.

spk_0 I think that she can't worry about cancel culture because she has everything. It's because I've

spk_0 there is a difference between legitimate criticism for an action that deserves it. And for

spk_0 just like an internet mob being an internet mob. And I don't feel like that song succeeds in

spk_0 hitting the nuances of that. And but that isn't she's lying in wish list.

spk_0 I think that she is I think that she is taking a piece of the pie of how she feels about life right

spk_0 now and focusing on a narrow sliver or maybe even not a narrow sliver. Maybe it's a big sliver,

spk_0 but it's a sliver. I don't think that like the list of grievances along the track list of this

spk_0 album or the just the list of things that she's clearly able to feel deeply about.

spk_0 I don't believe that it's contained within a couple kids and a driveway and a basketball hoop.

spk_0 And I do think that they're like I don't think that's what she's saying. But I think that in this

spk_0 moment, that's what she what is she saying? Like this is my this is the reason I don't like this

spk_0 song. What is she saying? I think Taylor Swift is telling you she's going to disappear for a bit

spk_0 and that she's moving into the next phase of her life. And she has just that I agree with.

spk_0 She is absolutely agree with. I think this is the next album appetizer.

spk_0 Oh, it's so funny because mine is mine is to the exact same point, but it's a different song.

spk_0 I think the fact no, it's the fact that the life of the showgirl ends with a goodbye.

spk_0 This album goes out on a curtain call and I think that's for a reason.

spk_0 Well, we'll come back to that. I think it's wish list because I think that's what she wants.

spk_0 I think it's the thing in her life that she does not have. And I think she at her current age

spk_0 is right in the smack dab in the target of when you would start that next phase. And she's ready

spk_0 to do it. And she has told us she's not playing the Super Bowl. She is not going to tour in

spk_0 next summer. This is her husband's last year in her her fiance's last year in professional football.

spk_0 And this is the part of being on the road and being the showgirl that she hasn't had. She hasn't

spk_0 had that level of normalcy. That's why she wants everyone to leave them the fuck alone. And they

spk_0 probably won't. Yeah. I'm not sure she's going to get this. I don't think I'm unattainable.

spk_0 Here is a thing that I remain conflicted about because on the one hand, again, like she's entitled

spk_0 to have a best friend who's hot. A best friend who she thinks is hot and a happy, simple, you know,

spk_0 heteronormative bliss. Like Taylor Swift is absolutely entitled to that. And in a lot of ways,

spk_0 like, you know, can I claim that my life is any more transgressive or whatever? Like probably not.

spk_0 I do think that the transition from, you know, that 1950s shit they want from me to

spk_0 I want to drive away in a basketball hoop and a couple of kids with my husband on our block

spk_0 where everybody looks the same is not my favorite messaging.

spk_0 She told you she lied when she said she didn't believe in marriage. Look, you said it the

spk_0 outset. There's a difference between marriage and the crash is always greener. She's been in this

spk_0 like whirlwind life. And the one thing that is not attainable is that I've conflicted about it.

spk_0 That's why I tell you that. Of the thousands of people who were in front of her every night,

spk_0 who got to go home to their houses that they live in on the reg who, and their significant

spk_0 others are their spouses who they love and the family unit that they've built up. Right? Meanwhile,

spk_0 she is quite literally in a small family business. She told the story of her brother and her mother

spk_0 going to help regain. She we know, regain her rights. We know the involvement of her dad. You

spk_0 still sort of frozen in the parent child construct that now you can imagine it must look wonderful

spk_0 to think about actually having that for herself. It's in her face every night. I totally get that

spk_0 and I and again, that's why I'm telling you I feel a little conflicted about this. I do,

spk_0 I cannot help but feel a little bit like and I don't mean to be like think of the children. But

spk_0 she is, she is this, this symbol of a type of femininity. She's one of the most famous women in the world.

spk_0 And I guess I think there has to be something that can encapsulate a deeply filling relationship,

spk_0 safety, comfort, happiness, a more simple life than she's been leading. And that isn't what like

spk_0 Taylor Swift is. What do you want from this woman? I don't know. I know I'm really thinking about that.

spk_0 I'm really thinking about that. I guess I just do some of some of this comes off a little to

spk_0 you know what would be more meaningful than all that I've already accomplished in my life is a

spk_0 white picket fence. What's wrong with that? I think that's exactly what somebody in her position.

spk_0 Because it's a depiction of life that is the plot of Hannah Montana for fuck's sake.

spk_0 Well, yeah. And yeah, I think she loved that show. I think Taylor Swift at 35 years old can handle

spk_0 a little bit more nuance and complexity than that. I'm not I'm I think she has a lot of nuance and

spk_0 complexity. We have not seen her at a chiefs game this fall. And it isn't you know, let's see. But I

spk_0 I think the behind the scenes part of being the biggest star in the world being that is the life

spk_0 of a showgirl. And that the behind the scenes part of this that we don't get full access to here

spk_0 is really fucking hard. And it comes with toe adjusters or toe separators and it comes with death

spk_0 threats. And it comes with an in sit like just an insipient loneliness that eats at her.

spk_0 Because even in this relationship as she was recording this album running around Europe, it was

spk_0 in a fair where he was having to surprise her in Dublin and come to Australia. And yeah, maybe

spk_0 jet lag is a choice, but it's still a thing. And just longing for what is so antithetical to

spk_0 this Hamilton S. Quay in which she works. Longing for rest. I want to give her the rest. I want to

spk_0 give her the rest. It's yeah. And a home. A rest in a home. But that's not that's not what this

spk_0 song is about. At least to me, that's not what this communicates. You just want the kids to look

spk_0 like Taylor, not Travis. Honey, you have no problem with that's not it. That's not it. That's not it.

spk_0 That's not it. You have no problem with honey. I like honey. I think it's I think it's sweet.

spk_0 I think it sort of validates the endearing language of Travis Kelsey. I think it's I think it's

spk_0 so much. Yeah, I think that's and that's a really cute way to think about it. I think I think

spk_0 that's what it is. It's it's it's a bit of an homage to the one on folklore with the piano stuff.

spk_0 You can call me honey if you want because I'm the one you want.

spk_0 Yeah. And I think, you know, it's sort of like all those things that sort of bother you and other

spk_0 people do it and then you love someone and they do something that's objectively the same and

spk_0 suddenly you love it. Like I think that's I'm I think it's really sweet and I think it's a pretty

spk_0 song. I think it's sweet too. It's the one that I would have cut because I don't think you need it

spk_0 on this album to sort of go all the way through and understand where her mind is in this moment.

spk_0 I think she's articulated that sentiment on Opalite and a few other songs. But I wouldn't cut any

spk_0 of them. And that probably gets me to tell you what my Easter egg conspiracy corner thing is.

spk_0 Wait, hold on. Can I say one nice thing about wishlist? Please do. What I do like is when she says

spk_0 tell them to leave us the fuck alone and they do. And then the little background. Wow.

spk_0 Like I do think that that really communicates like how how

spk_0 unimaginable it is to her that anyone would leave for the fuck alone. And I think that's a

spk_0 great little detail. I still would would blast the song into the sun. But I just want to say one

spk_0 nice thing. Well, you can't. And the reason that you can't is because there are 12 songs on this

spk_0 album. And she has made 12 albums. And just like she aligned the song title of each of the songs

spk_0 on this album to fit into the stage on the air is tour. Each of these songs represents an

spk_0 era. And you can go through both in the way that they reference a previous era or a song

spk_0 from a previous album and assign them from debut all the way through tortured poets and then

spk_0 yes to life of a showgirl. Okay, wait till let's do it. Yes, I will. So tortured poets to me is

spk_0 the fate of Ophelia because it literally starts like the end of an Aaron song. And there's a

spk_0 part where she uses the word sanity. It really the voices and the there's sort of some spooky

spk_0 reverb stuff that goes back to the who's afraid of little old me vocal.

spk_0 Because the break of little old me.

spk_0 So I think you I think you have to tuck that there. I think you have to give eldest daughter to

spk_0 evermore because of the right where you left me. Peace that gets lifted. I put father figure in

spk_0 with lover because it's the reincarnation of the man. But I know that you think that's rep.

spk_0 I just have a hard time not putting cancel. No, no, I should Elizabeth Taylor.

spk_0 And cancel does sound like you can't say sounds like chat GPT did reputation. Right.

spk_0 That's right. But there it is. I think would you have to put in 1989 because it's basically

spk_0 shake it off. But it also has the melody from blank space. I put ruin the friendship in debut.

spk_0 And that's why ruin the friendship is on this album. She needed something that went back to that

spk_0 time. Yeah. So that leaves you. What do you do with fearless speak now red folklore? I

spk_0 I put wish list on midnight's because it's super glitchy. Yeah. I think for me I put Elizabeth

spk_0 Taylor in folklore only because I think Elizabeth Taylor is Rebecca Harkness from the screener.

spk_0 It's the same. Yeah.

spk_0 So then you've got to figure out what you're going to do with Opalite, what you're going to do

spk_0 with actually romantic, what you're going to do with honey. And because I think life of the show girl

spk_0 is life of the show girl. Yeah. I put I put actually romantic is kind of I know we've used

spk_0 reputation, but actually romantic is a little bit. This is why we can't have nice things. It is,

spk_0 but it's also a little bit of a Haley Williams kind of want to be rocker. And so I put it in speak

spk_0 now because like you could see her like that was that era of right fallout. She did the fallout

spk_0 boy song. She did all that stuff like she was really trying to rock. And that's what this is.

spk_0 So that left me. Right. Yes. The speak now song of Charlie XC X is talking about me behind my back

spk_0 and it's making me wet. Listen, you have to bend a few things. If you can play this game at home if

spk_0 you want and work it through, but like it is here. So I ended up with fearless. I

spk_0 know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No. Yeah. There's something to that.

spk_0 That's why I went there. So then I have to decide between honey and opalite,

spk_0 fearless and red. And I put opalite on red because it is there's so much that it sort of straddles

spk_0 a couple of genres. And it is a sort of quintessential Mac song. And I put honey on fearless because

spk_0 it's honey is yellow. And that's the color I think about fearless. But there's a sweetness to it.

spk_0 And actually, yeah. I mean, because like, yeah, there's a little bit of you could see a

spk_0 stripped down version ending up on fearless. Anyway, that's my conspiracy theory is that not only

spk_0 are you supposed to arrange these things in order to make the era stage, but that each one of these

spk_0 songs in its own way has a callback to an album and an era. And that they are therefore,

spk_0 you cannot cut one because this is not just the era's tour by visual, but by music.

spk_0 I love it. I love it. I mean, I wonder if that is an explicit thing. But definitively, some of the

spk_0 slight all over the placeness of this album, all the way, I think that I think there are threads

spk_0 where it feels cohesive enough to me. Yeah. It comes from doing this wall on a tour that

spk_0 weaves through all of her eras. She was surrounded by her entire catalog as she's creating that.

spk_0 And it seeps into a bunch of different corners and a bunch of different ways. So I think that totally

spk_0 makes sense. Can I give you some conspiracy corners that have now definitively been proven not right?

spk_0 Yes. I just want to keep like for those of us who have permanent clown noses of

spk_0 fixed our face. I want to keep her running. Dali, sourdough 47.

spk_0 Not doing the Super Bowl. No. No. The orange door had nothing to do with karma, the alleged

spk_0 lost album. We're just heading to the showgirl era. Yeah. Do you think orange being the blending

spk_0 of red and yellow, which are the chiefs colors? Is it possibility? I guess so. I honestly think

spk_0 that she is running out of colors. This is honestly, I think it's a little bit about, because I think

spk_0 a lot of people were a little bit like, oh, I like the album, but what was all the showgirl?

spk_0 Like, what were all these Bob Mackie costumes for? It doesn't really, you know what?

spk_0 Because she kind of liked the way she looked in the photo shoot. She was like, I'm engaged and I

spk_0 can take some really hot photos. And that's awesome. That's what I think too. You go girl.

spk_0 The other thing that I think is that like a lover aesthetic would probably make the most

spk_0 sense for a lot of this, you know, pink skies and fluffy romance. And she's done that already.

spk_0 Oh, right. Exactly. Now the sky is oblite. Like a lover sky could easily in a different

spk_0 world have been an oblite sky. And that just wasn't available. So I think that's a little like

spk_0 some of these things are not. She has a mastermind, but sometimes practicality does just sneak

spk_0 in there. All the countdowns just ended, you know, vinyl's merch, whatever we talked about that.

spk_0 The song titles in order centered on the page does look like the era stage, but like, that's just

spk_0 a fun coincidence. Although you have the conspiracy corner that it's telling you that it's she's

spk_0 she did. She did. It's not a fun coincidence. She said it took them a while to figure that out,

spk_0 but that was one of the easter eggs. No, I know. I just mean that it's not it. Right. I don't mean

spk_0 that it was unintentional. I just mean that it's got it got it got it. You know, it doesn't really

spk_0 I've taken a step way further down the tin hat rather. I know. I love that. I love that.

spk_0 Normally your job has happened with reputation. No. Yes. I will. I do feel like we have to say we

spk_0 are recording this before the standby on the on the top. Yeah. We know it's not going to be

spk_0 Taylor in Austin city limits with Sabrina. So do we know this? You know this. We know this.

spk_0 It could be SNL. That seems to be the NBC media thing that she's done. So it seems like she's

spk_0 doing Fallon. She's doing Seth Myers. When you say SNL because SNL is coming back

spk_0 tonight with bad money and doja cat. Bad Boone. So she would do a cameo. Maybe they

spk_0 reprise Domingo with one of her songs. Yeah. Or she intros. She intros doja or she does something.

spk_0 She just stands as she's ladies and gentlemen doja cat. Something like that.

spk_0 Interesting. A funny sketch is probably more likely. That's what I would. I think I hope they do

spk_0 a new Domingo. Bad Bunny has had a Domingo cameo before and they add Taylor to the mix of that.

spk_0 I think that would be really fun. But the time people are listening to this they'll probably

spk_0 know what happens. The whole reputation re-record is out including the vault and we're doing

spk_0 absolutely. Can I tell you? I was so I was not clowning at all. I was being so good. And then she

spk_0 did the the capitalization games and she changed the Apple Music logo to have those purple glitter

spk_0 cracks in it. And you go back to the letter and about the masters and she says that she you know

spk_0 doesn't think the reputation can be improved on but she loves she does love the vault and that

spk_0 there will be a time for those to hatch right and those cracks looked so much like a cracking egg.

spk_0 I started to get pulled in. I started to get pulled in. Can I tell you something? I bought a ticket

spk_0 to go to the movie. Yeah. I wasn't going to go and then I bought a ticket and it was like

spk_0 the back right seat in the theater and it was one seat and then it was for two o'clock on Friday

spk_0 and then all the people who went early started posting videos to social media. And so I felt like

spk_0 A, I got all the content B. In all those videos people are screaming like they're watching a horror

spk_0 movie. There was a lot of audience participation that I wasn't prepared for. Which she encouraged,

spk_0 which I like. And so then I was like do I want to be the weirdo one dude in the back right part

spk_0 of the theater? I'm so nervous about this. No. And so I didn't go. I paid the $15 to AMC. You're

spk_0 welcome. You know, it seemed like it was a fun party and the people who went ahead of good time.

spk_0 The price was not outrageous at all. I wish I had my $15 back but I'll be okay. And you know,

spk_0 I think at the end of the day that was a good time thing. Actually, that's really wonderful. I think

spk_0 and like for all of my somewhere between apathy and criticism of all the countdowns being

spk_0 opportunities to buy, buy, buy and the plastic cardigan and yada yada yada. I think doing something

spk_0 that takes people out away from their screens and puts them in a real environment together to

spk_0 appreciate something together. I think that's lovely. I think that's great. Yeah. In a sanctioned way,

spk_0 two thumbs up for that concept. Good job by them. But I just will remind everybody like we know this,

spk_0 there is a there is footage from that whole summer somewhere. And whether we're going to get

spk_0 that Thanksgiving or her birthday or sometime next year or tonight for the standby, I would that

spk_0 would surprise me because she's trying to drive people into theaters. But so that the movie that she

spk_0 directs gets gets put on as many screens as possible. Did she's such a great business? Did you hear

spk_0 on I guess it was Graham Norton or something where she was like, you know, we didn't know they were

spk_0 going to do these friendship bracelets. Otherwise, I would have invested in beads like she always

spk_0 seconded. She's probably so mad about that. That probably actually.

spk_0 She's there up at night. Dad, why didn't we invest in beads?

spk_0 We should have seen this coming. She's the best. I love it. Peak Taylor.

spk_0 Okay. I have a few. One, the short description of this album that you could make of, I might move

spk_0 to Ohio, but first I have a list of grievances that I would like to share. That's incredibly Taylor

spk_0 slipped to me. Okay. No offense to Ohio. Some offense to Ohio. Two, the total red herring of a rollout

spk_0 is becoming a little bit of a tradition. Yeah. Yeah, it is. Yes. And so the, you know, we talked

spk_0 about it. The the show girl themes. I do. I think it was just an opportunity to take some great

spk_0 photos and more power to her. Yes. And they are great photos. So, but I think that that has

spk_0 become such a Taylor tradition. What about you? I think one of the funniest parts of the album is on

spk_0 actually romantic where she says it's actually lovely. And it's honestly lovely. She uses those words.

spk_0 And then later on honey, she says when anyone called me lovely, they were finding ways not to praise me.

spk_0 So she she tells you exactly what she was thinking. Yeah. Yeah. Peak Taylor writing Easter egging all of it

spk_0 wrapped up into one. That's great. That's a great Easter egg. So we talked a little bit about you

spk_0 said that next album appetizer was kind of wish list. Yep. I think the same thing about the

spk_0 goodbye at the end of the life of a show girl. Like do you think that do you think that she is

spk_0 basically saying like I need to take a break. I'm going to go away for a bit. Yes.

spk_0 I think she's ready for the driveway and the kids who look like some combination for her in Travis.

spk_0 Yeah, I do too. I do too. Now look, I think her life has been pretty

spk_0 breakneck for a long time. I do think that it's an open ended question of what happens

spk_0 when she does chill out. Oh, she's not capable of it. Yeah. Like a month into that. It might be like

spk_0 entirely different. But I'm thrilled if she gets to a place where she doesn't have to be on tour

spk_0 flying around the world. And she's not planning the wedding. And she's not spending a bunch of time

spk_0 trying to figure out whether there's somebody for her in the world. And she has just space and time.

spk_0 And there's a guitar lying on the floor. And there's a piano right there. And she actually has space

spk_0 to be bored and focused on the craft of songwriting in that moment to communicate

spk_0 something with a little bit more depth than wood. And I really like wood. Thank you for wood.

spk_0 It's great. Thank you for wood, Taylor. It's, yeah, way to go guys. But as you said on the

spk_0 ringer, congrats on the sex. Bravo. But I think it is then this human being has to work. She is

spk_0 driven in that way. She has to create. It's it's it's like let's let her get bored and find that

spk_0 out. You know, I just want her to get there. I think it's been a while since that happened.

spk_0 The next time that she creates, I want it to be the thing, not a thing that she's doing with

spk_0 her spare time. And that's what I think she probably recognizes and is telling us in the next

spk_0 album, appetizer. Well, also, by the way, like, again, the reception of Taylor's lift positive

spk_0 negative, it tends to be so high stakes in the tenor with which people tend to talk about her.

spk_0 Let's remember that this in the grand scheme of things assuming that she eventually does

spk_0 continue to create and put out music and and make another album. This is going to be the album

spk_0 before TS 13. Right. Which one can only assume will be a very special thing to her. And this,

spk_0 you know, does that make this sort of a transitional album? Does it make it a little bit of a palette

spk_0 cleanser? Like, I don't know, but I think it's worth remembering that this is actually the thing

spk_0 that comes before something that eventually I imagine she will take very, very seriously.

spk_0 And I do think that there's a little bit of maybe a relationship between the breeziness of this

spk_0 album, the sort of comfort food digestibility of it and what it eventually in due time is likely

spk_0 to be setting up. Is there a best lyric on this record? I mean, I take her at her word that it's,

spk_0 I pay the check before it kisses the mahogany grain. When the author herself tells me that that's

spk_0 the best thing she wrote on this record, I think I think I take it to face value. That was the

spk_0 thing she was most proud of. And rightly so. I like that. I think that some of the best,

spk_0 some of the best lyrical writing in the same quill penne vein of a lot of the recent stuff,

spk_0 I think is on father figure. And so that makes sense to me. And obviously we know that that's

spk_0 really important to her. So it makes sense to me that that's her favorite lyric. I really love,

spk_0 there's a few that I really love. I love the beginning at the Opalite. I had a bad habit of missing

spk_0 lovers past. My brother used to call it eating out of the trash. I love that so much.

spk_0 And it's so specific. Like there's there are some, I don't mean to be like

spk_0 sandwiching a criticism inside of a compliment because I'm talking about songs that I like.

spk_0 But there is there are stances in fate of Ophelia, like all that time I sat alone in my tower.

spk_0 You were just honing your powers. Now I can see it all.

spk_0 Not sure that really like I get what I get the sentiment, but it's a sentiment. It's sort of

spk_0 that's what it is. Whereas my brother used to call it eating out of the trash,

spk_0 like there's a whole world within that line. There's there's a relationship between two siblings.

spk_0 There's a relationship history for her. There's so much to that in one line. And I think that's very

spk_0 that's Taylor with her fastball. So I love that one. His love with the key that opened was the key

spk_0 that opened my thighs is not.

spk_0 That one. If I chose something from wood, it would be new heights of manhood.

spk_0 That's crazy. Hey. It's just crazy. She did that. But I also do. I love that little detail of

spk_0 I don't need to catch the good day for someone I could trust just getting to know a hard rock is.

spk_0 Yeah, it's on the way. That was where I was like, where are we doing here? She really went there.

spk_0 She really, really went there. Just get it all out. Just get it out.

spk_0 I think we've gotten it all out. So we just need to grade the album.

spk_0 Yeah. You're right. First. Yeah. I gave it a B. Wow. Is that wow? It's just a B. It's good.

spk_0 It's fine. This guy. I thought you were going to go. I thought you were going to go higher than that.

spk_0 I had a really good time. I'm proud of you for giving it that grade because that is exactly what I

spk_0 gave it. I gave it a B. I think the more that you listen to it, the better it's going to get.

spk_0 I think it is reputation-esque in that way. I think the difference is that reputation.

spk_0 Every time you say that, I do feel compelled to just stand on my high horse of I liked reputation the

spk_0 first time I heard. Great. You get to say I told you so. I just think for a lot of people, their first

spk_0 interaction with it was complicated. I think a lot of people's first interaction with this has been

spk_0 complicated. But I think that there are certain broader swathes of people who just aren't going to

spk_0 like this record. I think it's because they probably A, from a generational perspective, feel a

spk_0 little bit separate from the perspective that when she does choose to write deeply is communicated

spk_0 on this record or that some of the ways in which she's communicating the state of joy that she's

spk_0 feeling a little bit cringy or past their moment in the language that she uses. I think there's

spk_0 some generational stuff. I also think there's some people who came into this fan base around folklore

spk_0 and evermore that aren't rooted in all of the bricks of the temple. If you think about this album on

spk_0 a totally standalone basis, I'm not sure I'd even give it a B. But the fact that this woman 12

spk_0 albums in still has something to contribute and can still make an album that sounds and feels

spk_0 like this, I think is incredibly impressive and do with that what you will. But in the temple,

spk_0 it fits. It has purpose and it moves forward. I think into another phase of her

spk_0 stardom, another phase of her creativity and definitely another phase of her life. And so for that

spk_0 reason, I gave it a B. I do not think that it has a hit that is going to really be replayed and put

spk_0 up in the pantheon of Taylor Swift all-timers. There is not a style on this. There is not,

spk_0 we can go through the whole list of songs that there's not a cruel summer, right? There's not.

spk_0 But in the aggregate, I think if its job was to create that hit, then the record didn't do that.

spk_0 If the job was to move her into this next phase of life and career, I think it accomplishes that.

spk_0 And I am so happy for the woman who writes like she's running out of time to finally have some time

spk_0 to write. This has been every single album, Taylor Swift. I'm Nora Prince-Yati. As always,

spk_0 he is Nathan Hubbard. Thank you so much to Kaye McMullan on a Saturday, no less, for producing

spk_0 this episode. And to you for listening, we will have much more on the life of a showgirl. Stay tuned,

spk_0 we'll be in touch. Thanks again.

'The Life of a Showgirl' | Every Single Album: Taylor Swift

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