When a large artist drops an album, it often creates a buzz among the people for a mix of reasons. Some root for the album, some go against it, some are a mix–it all depends on the listener. The same goes for Taylor Swift’s new album, The Life of a Showgirl, as it has stirred up some mixed opinions from controversial lyrics in the song “Wood” and love for the song “The Fate of Ophelia”. With all these mixed reviews, I–an avid music listener who has no bias for or against Taylor Swift–thought that the album had its ups and downs. I believed that there were some good songs and some bad.
To know what I’m reviewing, I must first go over the basics of it. The album has a mix of songs, from upbeat and happy to slow and sad. One last thing to know before I get into the songs is what I'm looking for. Most of all, I’m looking for a good-sounding song with a good beat. Next, I’m looking for how the vocals sound and how they mix into the beat. Finally, I look for the content of the lyrics. It isn’t my first concern, but it can make or break a song.
To get straight to the point, of the whole collection of twelve songs, the album had three songs that I personally enjoyed. Before we go over the songs that I enjoyed, I will first go over the ones that I didn’t like and why–and they all have a relatively similar common denominator. A couple of the songs that I specifically didn’t like were “Wi$h Li$t” and “Father Figure.” For the reasons why, it's the same. They seemed uninteresting to me. Most of them lacked a good beat that flowed well with the lyrics and vocals, in my opinion. The lyrics themselves seemed very repetitive and almost copied and pasted to me. These two—along with a few other songs in the album—just weren’t my favorite because of the general sound of them. All in all, these couple of songs just weren’t for me. However, these next three songs I did manage to actually enjoy.
The three songs that I believed were good include: “The Fate of Ophelia”, “Eldest Daughter”, and “Wood”. In the case of “The Fate of Ophelia”, it was my third favorite. I enjoyed the beat and how well the vocals flowed through it. It has a nice pace and a very solid chorus to accompany it. Moving on to “Eldest Daughter” – my second favorite of the three. It was a very low-energy song with a slightly melancholic tone, and I think there is a perfect time and place for this song. Played when the time is right, it's a banger. Off to my favorite song of the album – “Wood”. Disregarding its lyrics that have brought up some controversy, I enjoyed the upbeat tone, lively rhymes, and vocals that went along with it. This song is very quick beat-wise and is, overall, a pretty good song.
The album itself was not my favorite, and the only reason I would say it isn’t my favorite would be due to the fact that the cons outweighed the pros. I felt that there was too much repetition of mediocre sounds and lyrics that I didn’t enjoy. Though it had cons, the album also had its pros, like the three songs that I did enjoy because of their good vocals and beats that satisfied my ears.
