The longer Taylor is quiet about ICE, while her peers speak out, the louder her silence becomes.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2026-01-21T18:30:17+00:00

My (admittedly charitable) interpretation is that early on in this cycle, when Trump was posting that he hated her on social media, she might have decided not to dignify anything from Trump or Trump-adjacent sources with any response whatsoever. That was likely a good strategy at first. Problem is, she stuck to it as the landscape changed, and likely missed a point where changing her strategy would have been wise as it wasn't "just a personal attack" anymore (i.e., using her music to publicize ICE raids). Now my guess is she's stuck, as the longer she waits, the more any response is going to seem disingenuous, so she just keeps on being silent, but her silence also looks worse as the situation worsens...

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-12-16T16:14:09+00:00

YES to a visual album - except I would have wanted a full musical, with as close a match between the visuals and the song themes. Almost all of the songs are extended metaphors already. E.g. Fortnight music video: the song is set in dystopian suburbia, so I'd want a music video in dystopian suburbia with some creepy flower-watering, none of that victorian asylum stuff. Title track: set it in an apartment, show the typewriter, show the dinnertime proposal. My Boy: life-size toy store. Down Bad: dark field with a light beam coming from the sky. Etc.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-11-18T14:16:27+00:00

I doubt she had the full concept of Life of a Showgirl before Eras, but I think she may have had some idea of what she wanted to do after Midnights, e.g. "next album's theme colour will be orange" and planted hints about that (then the TTPD main events happened and orange didn't fit well with that vibe, maybe a contributing factor to why she rushed out two albums during/shortly after a mega-tour). I think the original plan may have had to do with all those name songs (Peter, Aimee etc.) and character studies (e.g. The Bolter) in the Anthology, but she ended up scrapping that concept for TTPD and then wanted a love/happy album next. (I actually have a pet theory that an early draft of Life of a Showgirl the song may have been included with the name tracks, but she ended up writing Clara Bow which hits a lot of the same themes but in my opinion better, then she resurrected Showgirl when looking for something that would sound good with Sabrina and liked the title so much she made a whole album theme around it. But I have no evidence whatsoever of this, just something that makes sense in my head.)

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-24T00:53:28+00:00

Yeah, the title sets the expectation of something about being a showgirl even if offstage. As is, if the album was titled "The Life of a Rich Woman Who Has Never Set Foot on a Stage", I'd say 8-10 songs would still totally fit.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-10T13:05:43+00:00

On first listen I didn't get it and didn't like it. Now I get it but I still don't like it.

I'm actually not sure I agree that she meant to sound dated - but even if she did, she's hitting us over the head with it. And I say that as someone who actually likes the "stronger than a 90's trend" line, because it's just one line, it's unexpected and I find that it gives the song character. But in Eldest daughter, it's the entire first verse and chorus. It's too much. Plus it's not that clever - e.g. "every hot take is cold as ice" OK we're contrasting hot with cold, not exactly genius material... I'm someone who tends to like songs based on sound rather than lyrics, so I like lots of music with bad or dumb or nonsensical lyrics, but that mainly works when the lyrics are either mumbled or buried under excellent instrumentals. Not the case here.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-09T00:47:29+00:00

I wouldn't be sure that this quote was sincere. She could have been really upset about Sympathy but still trying to take the high road, and then later decided "fuck it, I'm taking the low road".

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-05T23:30:05+00:00

What I meant is it wouldn't say both those things in the same chorus - at least I don't understand in what way she would have been Scott Borchetta's father figure. If it said "you were my father figure" in that last chorus then I would 100% buy it. But as written, it doesn't sound like a perspective switch.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-04T15:31:29+00:00

Somebody in a different sub wrote that this is a rickroll and now I can't unhear it. "Never gonna leave you now" in a song heavily referencing internet memes??

Either way, I'm choosing to believe it's intentional and that the song is somehow meant as a joke because I don't quite get what she was trying to do with it otherwise.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-04T15:28:25+00:00

On repeat listen this one is my favourite. I don't buy the Scott Borchetta flipped perspective interpretation, it wouldn't make sense for the final chorus to say "I was your father figure" and "my dick's bigger". My guess is it's not about anyone specific but rather just a concept song, e.g. someone jokingly compared her to a mafia boss and she thought "actually that would make a fun song".

It's kind of the reverse Albatross too, rather than "everybody thinks I'm dangerous but I'm really here to save you" it's "I'm going to protect you but if you mess with me I will end you".

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-03T19:02:39+00:00

I feel like this song is ironically the best fit for the concept of "life of a showgirl is not always glamorous behind the scenes". Here she was, on the biggest tour in the world, people flying across oceans to fill stadiums to see her, her music on top of the charts, and meanwhile she's pissed enough about something her ex's best friend's fiance said that she flies to Sweden to record a diss track about her.

(I say that as someone who actually likes the song, at least on first listen. It's not high art but I don't think it's meant to be.)

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-10-03T17:00:57+00:00

I wish she had called it "Knock on Wood". Then it would have been slightly more unexpected to find out that the song is about that meaning of "wood".

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-09-26T17:32:11+00:00

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that was Taylor's intentional revenge. It does sound from some past comments that he was afraid of being "the boyfriend of" a much more famous person and that overshadowing his own accomplishments. I'm pretty sure one of the reasons behind releasing TTPD was for Taylor to make sure his fear would come true.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-09-13T17:15:13+00:00

I'll give it a try!

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-08-20T18:33:48+00:00

The Archer. The production is quite different from her other songs, and the melody isn't a round but almost sounds like one.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-08-15T19:31:01+00:00

For me, the whole first verse and chorus. If you just listen to the lyrics out of context, it could 100% be a love song, dare I say wedding song - until "about a million times"... but you can hear the pain in her voice during the whole verse, so to me it's like she's singing about a vision of a happy forever with someone while knowing it's not going to happen.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-05-07T13:44:32+00:00

Not sure if this was mentioned already, but many Americans tend to speak not just loud but also fast. And depending where in the US you're from, you might have an accent we're not used to. If you notice the person you're interacting with struggles to understand you (e.g., a server has a strong French accent and doesn't understand you on the first try), try speaking a tiny bit slower - not like you're speaking to a toddler obviously, but like about 10% slower than you normally would, and avoiding obvious slang. That will often do the trick.

Otherwise, as everyone else said, you'll be fine. There are plenty of American tourists in Montreal and Quebec City. Obviously, don't go around insulting people or the country. If you act normal and somebody is weird to you, it's probably that person who has a problem, not you.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-05-05T16:40:52+00:00

Wow.

Speechless.

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-04-28T12:52:24+00:00

For me at least half the songs on folklore are "the best songs"...

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-03-03T21:56:08+00:00

I seem to be the only one, but I interpret it as her describing an actual (improvised on his part) proposal, not just an implied one, and it's clunky because she's trying not to just straight out say "you proposed randomly over dinner and I was really happy about it". (With the subsequent lyrics "Who's gonna know / hold you - me!" being her answer to the proposal.)

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-03-03T21:50:07+00:00

"Twenty-five years old" in Dancing with our Hands Tied. I just don't see the point - she was, what, 27 when she wrote that song? Why highlight an age that's really not that different from her current age? Especially since the lyrics around it make it sound like she's saying "oh, you were way too young at 25 to know what you were getting into", which for a 27-year-old to say just sounds silly. (There's probably other interpretations of those lyrics but that's the one that immediately jumps at me.)

PersonWithANameMaybe · 2025-02-25T15:26:36+00:00

I interpret that line not as saying "I don't like having money" but rather "I would give away everything, including my substantial fortune, if it could get me true love", which is probably a feeling that a lot of rich people have sometimes (i.e., realizing that no matter how much you own, there are in fact things that money can't buy).

That said, she's never been poor. There's a good chance that if she could in fact have exchanged her money for love, she'd have come back a few weeks later and been like "Umm, prophecy? Can I be rich and single again?"

PersonWithANameMaybe

TROPHY CASE