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Taylor Swift Fans React To 'The Life Of A Showgirl'

3 October 2025 | 2:15 pm | Mary Varvaris

"me leaving my tortured poet body to become a showgirl..."

Taylor Swift

Taylor Swift (Credit: Mert Alas & Marcus Piggott/MCA Nashville)

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Taylor Swift’s highly anticipated twelfth album, The Life Of A Showgirl, has just dropped, and we’ve gathered some of the early reactions.

Officially announced on her fiancé Travis Kelce’s podcast, New Heights, which he hosts with his brother Jason, back in August, Swift revealed the album artwork, but continued with an unconventional rollout.

The album’s release date was revealed soon after Swift’s appearance on New Heights, with the cardigan singer unveiling multiple versions of alternate artwork for the 12-track album. Before the album’s release, no singles or music videos were shared. Fans went into the album blind, and they already have plenty to say.

As you enjoy the album, find out more about what’s in store.

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The Life Of A Showgirl – Official Release Party

Swift has directly involved fans with the rollout of her new album. In September, it was announced that fans would get to experience an 89-minute “release party” event, “Taylor Swift: The Official Release Party of a Showgirl,” from Friday, 3 October, to Sunday, 5 October. For Australian fans, the release parties will take place next week.

The release party will feature the music video premiere of Swift’s forthcoming single, The Fate Of Ophelia. In addition to the music video premiere, the release party will include footage from behind the scenes of the music video shoot, lyric videos for other songs on the record, and Swift’s “never-before-seen personal reflections” on her latest record.

Features & Samples

While previous albums from Swift have featured collaborations with the likes of Ed Sheeran and Future, Florence + The Machine, Post Malone, and more, there’s only one feature on The Life Of A Showgirl. The closing song, also the title track, features Sabrina Carpenter—one of the openers on Swift’s Eras Tour, and one of the biggest names in pop.

However, there is a pretty significant sample, with Swift interpolating the George Michael song, Father Figure, in her song of the same name. The British music icon received a posthumous writing credit for the track.

In a statement posted to Michael’s official Instagram account, his estate thanked Swift for sampling the song.

The statement reads: “We were delighted when Taylor Swift and her team approached us earlier this year about incorporating an interpolation of George Michael’s classic song ‘Father Figure’ into a brand-new song of the same title to be featured on her forthcoming album.

“When we heard the track, we had no hesitation in agreeing to this association between two great artists, and we know George would have felt the same. George Michael Entertainment wishes Taylor every success with The Life of a Showgirl and ‘Father Figure’.”

Potential Beef With Charli XCX?

While the rollout for The Life Of A Showgirl worked to ensure nothing would leak, potential lyrics apparently leaked on the eve of the album’s release.

Swift fans alleged that lyrics from a potentially leaked track, Actually Romantic, swipe at Apple hitmaker Charli XCX and even reference her song, Everything Is Romantic.

Fans on X argued that Swift’s line, “I heard you call me ‘Boring Barbie’ when the coke’s got you brave,” is a direct callout to Charli, as the latter has written about drug use in her music. The song is out now, and the leaked lyric turned out to be real.

Since last year, Charli XCX fans have speculated that her song, Sympathy Is A Knife, is potentially about Swift. A song that explores Charli’s self-doubt in the music scene around big pop stars, a key lyric is, “This one girl taps my insecurities / Don’t know if it’s real or if I’m spiralling.”

Clarifying that no songs on her latest album, Brat, were diss tracks, Charli XCX stated on social media last year, “I’m seeing online that some people think there are diss tracks on Brat and I just wanted to come on here and clarify that there aren’t — apart from maybe Von Dutch, which kind of is — but the other tracks in question aren’t diss tracks.

“They’re really just about how it’s so complicated being an artist, especially a female artist, where you are pitted against your peers but also expected to be best friends with every single person, constantly.”

Swifties React To ‘The Life Of A Showgirl’

It seems Taylor Swift fans are so keen for her new album that they’ve reportedly crashed Spotify. We love to see it. Read on for more reactions from fans below.