I have not listened to Taylor Swift’s umpteenth studio album, The Life of a Showgirl and I have no plans to listen to it in the future. Yes, I am uniquely suited to pull it apart as a music theory expert, singer, songwriter, music teacher, and arranger. I refuse to listen to The Life of a Showgirl because I know that it will be forced upon me soon enough. I will be browsing in a random grocery store and I will be compelled to listen to bleeped out references to Travis Kelces’s aromatic wood, bizarre warbling about Elizabeth Taylor, and a diss track to someone named Charli XCX whom I cannot even fathom to know anything about. A student will request one of the songs from this album and I will be compelled to learn its banal set of 3-5 chords. I know many older Taylor Swift songs because of my profession. I also know of the many parodies of Taylor Swift songs by The Key of Awesome and Bart Baker.
Taylor Swift was born in 1989 to Andrea and Scott Swift. Respectively, her parents held jobs as a mutual fund marketing executive (Andrea) and a stockbroker (Scott). By age 11, Taylor Swift was determined to make it in the music industry, convincing her parents to move the entire family to Nashville to try and make it as a country artist inspired by Faith Hill. Taylor Swift was unable to get any traction in the country scene, but landed a modeling gig with Abercrombie & Fitch (sketchy, sketchy rabbit hole of a company). By age 13, she had a talent manager and a recording deal with RCA that it is alleged that her father purchased for her. In other words, many people think she was a plant from the beginning.
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