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It’s showtime: Taylor Swift‘s 12th album, The Life of a Showgirl, is finally here and streaming everywhere. The album was produced by Swift alongside Max Martin and Shellback, who first worked with her on Red.
Swift’s latest features 12 tracks, including the long-awaited single “The Fate of Ophelia.” The video for the track premieres at in-theater release parties this weekend and will begin streaming Sunday. Sabrina Carpenter is the only guest vocalist on the album, appearing on the title track.
The star celebrated the release of her record today in an Instagram post, sharing behind-the-scenes photos alongside the caption: Tonight all these lives converge here/The mosaics of laughter and cocktails of tears/Where fraternal souls sing identical things/And it’s beautiful/It’s rapturous./It is frightening.”
Swift continued, “I can’t tell you how proud I am to share this with you, an album that just feels so right. A forever thank you goes out to my mentors and friends Max and Shellback for helping me paint this self portrait.” The singer also teased, “If you thought the big show was wild, perhaps you should come and take a look behind the curtain… The Life of a Showgirl is out now.”
Swift announced her new album in August. She appeared on her partner Travis Kelce‘s podcast New Heights that same week, sharing the album cover, track list, and some details on the making of the album.
“I would be playing shows. I would do like three shows in a row. I’d have three days off,” she explained of her reunion with Martin and Shellback. The duo produced massive hits of Swift’s Red, 1989, and Reputation but were noticeably absent from the rerecorded versions of those albums as well as every new album since. “I’d fly to Sweden, go back to the tour, and was actually working on this. I was physically exhausted at this point in the tour, but I was so mentally stimulated and so excited to be creating.”
Swift wrapped her expansive Eras Tour in December 2024. She first announced the global trek in late 2022, soon after releasing her album Midnights. As she prepared for the second year of Eras, she announced her The Tortured Poets Department, which came out in April 2024.
Swift has shied away from the public eye since the podcast was announced, the only exception being her and Kelce announcing their engagement on Instagram. Like TTPD, her rollout for this LP has largely consisted of revealing the various covers of exclusive vinyl editions of the album. In the coming week, however, she will be doing a press blitz, with planned appearances on The Graham Norton Show, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Late Night With Seth Meyers, and several popular radio shows.
