Flashback Friday
This time last year…well, a few months before this time to be exact, I went on a little journey through all of Taylor Swift’s discography. She had announced that a new album, The Life of a Showgirl, was going to drop on October 3rd. I posted on Threads that I only knew Taylor’s songs from what was played repeatedly on the radio but I wanted to start from the beginning and listen to it all. I got an overwhelming amount of support from the Swiftie community as I went from album to album and posted my thoughts.
On October 3rd, I donned an orange sequined jacket and went by myself to the movie theater for the “release party” where they played all the songs on the album with her commentary in between and a behind-the-scenes look at her video for “The Fate of Ophelia”.
It was a good time and I really did become a fan of Taylor Swift. I don’t consider myself a Swiftie, but I do enjoy her songs. If she is nothing else, she is a terrific song writer.
With that said, today she released an encore to The Life of a Showgirl. Seriously, it’s called The Encore.
It’s four songs that I’m assuming were written and recorded after the original album came out. I just sat in my backyard, sans headphones, and listened to the songs. Don’t know if the boy’s soccer team practicing on the other side of my fence heard it, but, too bad if they did.
The songs were good, but I have questions. I may go down a rabbit hole looking up answers because the Swifties, I am sure, by this point in the day have already researched the lore behind each song.
What I want to know is…
“Patient Zero”—Who is she talking about??? Obviously, she’s patient zero, but who’s the guy/ex-boyfriend and who’s the current girlfriend she’s offering to be besties with while she breaks up with the guy?
I don’t know much about Taylor’s life, except that there are a lot of exes. Don’t know the story on all of them.
“Cleveland!”—This is the one that had to have been written after the original album was released. She and Travis Kelsey only recently bought a house in Cleveland. References to the city and wearing a white dress are too closely related to their wedding and where their new house is.
“Pink Clouding”—What does that mean? Is “pink clouding” a thing? Is it slang for something and I’m just too old to know what it’s slang for? Also, who was this ex? I kind of feel bad for him, whoever it was. It sounds like she was kind of mean to him and led him on and then broke his heart. I don’t know if that’s how she intended it to sound, but I don’t like that look for her.
“Babylon”—Was Babylon supposed to be a good place? Like a paradise? I know that’s something from the Bible, but I also might not be remembering correctly. According to the context clues in the song, Babylon was something good and is now lost to the main characters of the song.
These are decent songs. Might need to listen to them a few more times before they grow on me. Won’t be adding them to my “random awesomeness” playlist just yet. Or the “mega random mix” playlist that is everything on the “random awesomeness” list plus every single Taylor Swift album I listened to last year.
By the way…after a year of having listened to all of her music, I can honestly say I have a favorite song. I definitely have a top 5, but at the very top, my absolute favorite, never skip when it comes up song, is the 10-minute version of “All Too Well”. It still gives me chills every time I listen to it.
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