Taylor Swift has announced that her upcoming album, The Life of a Showgirl, will be released on October 3rd.
The album lists Max Martin, Shellback, and Swift herself as producers.
Swift also revealed the album artwork, and a track list that features Sabrina Carpenter on the title song, on social media, captioning it: “And, baby, that’s show business for you.”
Swift made the big reveal during a highly anticipated appearance on boyfriend Travis Kelce’s new podcast, New Heights.
The episode, titled Taylor Swift on Reclaiming Her Masters, Wrapping The Eras Tour, and The Life of a Showgirl, covered her recent career milestones and the inspiration behind the new record.
When asked about the significance of the colour orange, Swift said, “It feels like energetically how my life has felt and this album was about what was going on behind the scenes behind the tour, which was so exuberant, electric and vibrant. It’s a record I made with Max Martin, my mentor, and Shellback.”
She added that the album marks the first time in seven or eight years that the trio has worked together on a focused project, which they recorded in Sweden. “We made songs that we’re so proud of. We’ve never made an album where it’s just the three of us, no other collaborators, making a focused album where it felt like catching lightning in a bottle. These guys are just genius.”
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Jason asked what’s the album about. Swift responded: “It’s everything behind the curtain”
“I wanted the album to feel the way my life felt. Every single song is on this album for hundreds of reasons. I wanted to do an album that was so focused on theme and quality.”
On the artwork, Swift added: “The reason I wanted to have an offstage moment as the main album cover is because this album isn’t really about what happened to me on stage, it’s about what I was going through offstage.”
Swift also confirmed there are no other songs coming.
The official track list is:
- “The Fate of Ophelia”
- “Elizabeth Taylor”
- “Opalite”
- “Father Figure”
- “Eldest Daughter”
- “Ruin the Friendship”
- “Actually Romantic”
- “Wi$h Li$t”
- “Wood”
- “CANCELLED!”
- “Honey”
- “The Life of a Showgirl” (ft. Sabrina Carpenter)
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When Jason Kelce asked why she chose to reveal details of the album on the podcast, Swift replied: “This podcast has done a lot for me. This podcast got me a boyfriend, ever since Travis decided to use it as a dating app two years ago.”
Travis responded: “I’m the luckiest man in the world.”
The Life of a Showgirl is the follow-up to Swift’s 2024 release, The Tortured Poets Department, which expanded into a double album, The Tortured Poets Department: The Anthology.
The news comes after a quiet period for Swift since her massive ‘Eras Tour’ ended in December, wrapping up nearly 150 shows across five continents. This year, Swift successfully bought back the master recordings of her first six albums, ending a long ownership battle. During that time, she re-recorded several albums as “Taylor’s Versions.”
“All of the music I’ve ever made now belongs to me,” the singer wrote in a message posted to her website at the time. “I can’t thank you enough for helping to reunite me with this art that I have dedicated my life to, but never owned until now.”
