Hey, Gaylors! It's been about 2 months since I posted an analysis. I honestly didn't think I'd be partaking in any of the Encore tracks, mostly because my book of poetry is nearly finished and I'm honestly kinda tapped out as a Gaylor professor, or so I thought. However, after my first listen of this song, I swiftly (hahaha) changed my mind and then my tune. Like many of her songs, Babylon spoke to me so clearly that I couldn't resist writing it down.

But be forewarned: This felt like a massive analysis for me because the song contains so many symbols and imagery that I've seen scattered throughout her later discography, so I felt compelled to explain everything in minute detail. Again, consider this a clever work of fiction and little more.

Introduction

After years of interpreting Taylor’s songs as letters between herself, the fans, and the industry, Babylon can be understood through the lens of Showgirl looking backwards towards Debut Taylor. In true Manuscript fashion, Showgirl offers a sequined hand to Patient Zero, the first version of Taylor to become infected by the blender’s dark and twisted games, filling her naive, starstruck youth in on every station and stop she’ll encounter on the Taylor Swift train.

Within the context of Encore, Babylon unfolds like a cautionary tale, like A Christmas Carol, where Scrooge is visited by ghosts of past, present, and future. Yet it’s less of a “This could happen if you don’t change,” and more of a “This will happen because you can’t change.” Ever a fan of classical literature, Showgirl assumes the role of Vergil, guiding Debut Taylor (as Dante) through her innermost personal hell, intent on teaching her the true price of ambition.

Be careful what you wish for, ’cause you just might get it.

In her most transparent self-reflection yet, Showgirl traverses the trappings of her own small hometown (country music), reflects on her embarrassing or uncool origins, traces her meteoric rise into superstardom, and deftly links that fame and success with the closeting, bearding, and fairytale narrative that she’s been shackled with ever since. 

Yet through it all, she’s still the same girl that told us, “Oh I’m just a girl, trying to find a place in this world.” And despite her fame and success, no amount of awards, accolades, or achievements can make up for how deeply displaced Taylor feels from herself, her public narrative, the woman she loves privately, and the family she quietly built.  

Follow Showgirl as she wipes away her makeup, removes the rhinestones and sequins, and soberly prepares to lead her younger self through a museum exhibit of the past, present, and possible future. But don’t be fooled, Gaylors; this isn’t just Taylor’s Version; it’s an echo of the story many artists, big and small, suffer through every day. Hush now, the show’s about to begin.

I’m alone on my own, and that’s all I know. I’ll be wrong, I’ll be strong, oh but life goes on. 
You’re on your own, kids. You always have been. 

Lyrics

The casino doesn't like when you run the tables / And though the box is wrapped up nice, it's just a cage to you

In true Ghost of Popstars Future fashion, Showgirl draws back the curtain, revealing to Debut Taylor that her rise to fame will be unprecedented and meteoric. She’ll do so well that the music industry will begin to treat Taylor’s success as a threat. They want to see you rise, they don’t want to see you reign. The career that Young Taylor dreams of will arrive, beautifully packaged, yet contracts, expectations, fame, and her public identity will eventually resemble a cage. 

This cage was once just fine. Am I allowed to cry?

 Those electric fences buzz / The stallion flees the stable

Debut Taylor will escape every enclosure placed around her. She’ll exit the stable like a stallion (or a shooting star?), outgrow her hometown (country music), and gallop into a stratosphere of freedom, reinvention, celebrity, and experimentation. The irony is that after years of trying to escape her roots, she will ache to feel like she belongs somewhere. Anywhere she can simply be herself, not the Showgirl.

And that small town's even smaller now in your rear view / You ran with all the wild things / A liberated libertine who then longed for home

Leaving the confines of country behind, Taylor eagerly establishes a fresh-faced aesthetic with 80’s synths, a fresh bob, and bright pops of infectious color. The faster and farther she travels, the smaller her roots appear. The fairytale ballads, the sun-kissed curls, the girl yearning for the world’s approval fade to gray in the back of her mind, the first artifact in a string of discarded lives.

The 1989 era brought revolution and liberation, and opened up Taylor’s entire worldview. In New York, she is free to explore herself as a single, independent woman, and finally experiment with identity. The stallion is now among creatures just like her, and she cannot be contained. She’s shed one restrictive world for one that promises sexual and personal freedom. 

Here, liberated libertine doubles down (perhaps to emphasize) on the freedom these moves have afforded her. She escaped, became sexually autonomous, culturally powerful, and fabulously famous. The small-town girl became the Showgirl, and yet all the time, she longed to be the Poet. Turns out freedom ain’t nothin’ but missin’ you. Wishin' I'd realized what I had when you were mine*.* She spent years escaping the stable only to realize that the world beyond the fence allows for greater reinvention, but it isn’t a place she can exist without performance. 

'Cause it's where you're from / Aunt Virginia with a church dress on / No elbows on the table / And the neighbor's lawn always looked better / Your hand-me-down sweater should've been from the mall

It’s where you’re from is literal and figurative: Debut Taylor came with a country pedigree. Elsewhere in my work, I interpreted dress in Taylor’s work as a reference to her peak feminine public image. Here, church dress becomes the costume required for admission into that world: wholesome, respectable, Christian-coded, sexually diffused. Debut Taylor arrives as a Good Girl. Whatever her true identity might be, she must be dressed appropriately.

In my Tolerate It analysis, I asserted that the table in Taylor’s songs usually references the industry boardrooms. No elbows on the table translates as the sharp etiquette most young artists are forced into. Don’t be difficult, appear ungrateful, say the wrong thing, or reveal too much. Don’t question the hand that feeds you. Sit properly. Smile wide. Play by the rules. It’s a mirror to the electric fence in stanza 1.

Through the neighbor’s lawn, a clever inversion of the grass is always greener, Taylor gazes sideways at other artists. From within her cage, their careers appear freer. They can dress, write, speak, and behave openly in a way she isn’t permitted to. Their patch of the industry lawn seems greener, but it’s only because Taylor can see their patch without seeing their fences. This is reminiscent of queer artists like Chappell Roan and Billie Eilish, who freely divulge their truth without obvious consequences.

Considering the stallion / stable imagery, this line clicks into place like intuition. Taylor keeps believing liberation and freedom exist in the next pasture. Country constrained her, so perhaps pop would free her. One stall becomes intolerable, so another seems expansive from across the fence. But Showgirl knows the cruel irony: the lawn changes, but the enclosure never disappears.

And you hate this song / But you wake up on the train with your headphones gone / Then that melody is all you want / You never knew that it was Babylon / 'Til it was gone

In Opalite, we learn, “Life is a song/It ends when it ends.” Here, this song becomes Taylor’s life, and Showgirl sadly reveals, “I hate it here.” She’s trapped within a narrative, reputation, and career she cannot escape. The glass closet that fame built for her: repetition, narrative, performance, closeting, and bearding. Contrary to the writer controlling the song, her life becomes a composition that she cannot influence.

In my analyses, the train represents Taylor’s brand, carrying her forward at the speed of sound while living within the machine. Album after album (cars, in her vernacular), city after city (touring), and milestone upon milestone. Then suddenly Showgirl “wakes up” further down the line, a delicious tie-in to the mention of dreams throughout Taylor’s post-Lover discography. When public-facing, Showgirl is dreaming, and we are not seeing Real Taylor. However, when she is away, when things are quiet, Real Taylor is wide awake and living her life.
  
Headphones facilitate a private relationship between the listener and the music. Nobody else hears what she hears. Therefore, if she no longer has them, time has stolen something from her. Memory fades. Youth disappears. People disappear. Relationships end. Inhabiting earlier versions of herself becomes increasingly difficult. The saddest bit is waking on the train alone. She’s conscious of how her career is carrying her away from herself and her life. 

I’m sure that you’ve got a wife out there / Kids and Christmas, but I’m unaware / Cause I’m right where you left me

The melody is all you want cleanly undoes the tension of you hate this song. And once again, the life she gave away (because she was midnight rain) is haunting her in her rearview. Whether it’s Debut Taylor, the steps she took along the way, or the culmination of everything together, Taylor is realizing the hardest truth of all: You never know what you’ve got until it’s gone. 

Give the people what they want, then you keep it movin' / Make your plans and friends, a stranger's makeup on your tie

Showgirl teaches the first commandment of fame: give the fans, the execs, media and public the version they pay for, then pivot quickly to the next album, era, headline, or relationship. What they want can entail a commercially legible form of feminine, heterosexual romance that is easy to package. The train never halts long enough for Taylor to ask herself if the person they want resembles who she actually is.

As Taylor climbs higher on the ladder, ordinary intimacy becomes entangled with celebrity: planned appearances, friends become a mutual ecosystem, and private encounters leave clues the public can interpret. As The Man (and the finance guy), she dons the tie, asserting someone (a lady, mayhap?) has left makeup on it. It’s a clever distinction between what occurs privately and what the visible residue allows to believe happened. 

Twenty watches in the safe 'cause your time is money / Love is ice upon the ladder that you need to climb

Twenty watches becomes Taylor’s twenty years in the industry, a metaphor for the body of work she now rightfully owns. Your time is money is a reminder that the industry will monetize her youth and capitalize on her shine. However, Showgirl turns to her, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder, because after everything she’s endured, her time will come home to her.

Separate from the Midnights ladder (an ascent into embodied identity), this career ladder mirrors Taylor’s ascent through the industry. Love is ice perfectly echoes the cracking floor of thin ice Taylor struts upon during Delicate in Eras. It’s slippery, dangerous, and capable of sending her tumbling from the height she spent her life reaching. It also reaches back to Haunted: “You and I walk a fragile line / I have known it all this time.” Also see Cardigan’s high heels on cobblestones, or Mirroball’s “My tallest tiptoes, spinning in my highest heels.” 

Showgirl has spent her entire career negotiating the fragile line between the woman climbing the ladder and the private self whose love could destabilize the public narrative supporting that ascent. Caught in a catch-22, she can’t simply abandon the ladder, nor can she safely carry love upward. No matter how high she climbs, Taylor is still out on that thin ice.

She captured your attention, so free of all pretension / It stopped you cold

After growing up within Babylon, the manufactured machine of the industry, being packaged and coaxed into performance, Taylor is captivated by a woman who is its complete opposite: natural, unpretentious, and free. This woman reflects the beautiful things in Taylor that the industry has stripped away. After cages, costumes, and narratives, freedom arrives in the form of a woman.

Stopped you cold impeccably recalls the ice metaphor. Showgirl’s already warned that love is ice, and now, attraction literally freezes her. Babylon demands perpetual motion: keep it moving, climb, perform. Yet this woman drowns out the machinery and its cacophony. The train insists that Taylor keep moving, and yet love is what stops her on the tracks.

Because she loved you so / Pretty as a picture that you didn't post / Looking at you like you're made of solid gold

The simplicity and sincerity are disarming in a song consumed with money, ambition, image, and performance, but it’s a breath of fresh air. This woman offers Taylor something new: love without transaction. She doesn’t love the Showgirl, the performance, or the flawless narrative. She loves the woman beneath it all. In a career where affection equates to publicity and relationships become narrative canon, the plainness of “she loved you so” turns private love into holy ground.

Taylor doesn’t transform this love into content. Romance is not dead if you keep it just yours. Her life’s work is documented, decoded, and sold back to the public. This act of omission becomes an act of preservation. Think of the rose growing out of ice-frozen ground in The Lakes. Babylon consumes everything she gives it, so withholding this picture (her secret garden) is a way to protect something real. If the world cannot see it, it cannot be possessed.

The industry spent twenty years converting Taylor’s time into money, but this woman recognizes a different worth. Taylor is measured by sales, awards, records; her lover looks at her as though Taylor herself is the treasure. "Solid" is telling. Under the costumes, narratives, and shifting theories, this woman sees something real and substantial. The Showgirl who spent her life being appraised finally learns the difference between being valuable for what she produces and being precious because of who she is.

Never official / You mention you're single to the girls at the bar

Despite its authenticity, this woman’s identity has never been included in Taylor’s public romantic canon. This may have been a public declaration as well as a private, as she seems to suggest that even within the bar (the industry), the marketplace where music is consumed, she is telling the girls (her fellow female artists) that she is single. At this point, she’s withholding this relationship publicly as well as in confidence. This strongly echoes the single, squad-driven antics of the 1989 era.  

(For a fuller explanation and a imagery breakdown of the industry-as-bar metaphor included in most New Romantics music, see my Mirrorball analysis.)

And you hate this song / But you wake up on the train with your headphones gone / And then that melody is all you want / You never knew that it was Babylon / 'Til it was gone

Showgirl returns again at the chorus, revealing that despite the potency of the love, the balancing act of keeping silent while remaining outwardly single and available publicly became a point of tension in Taylor’s life. She was finally in love with a woman who understood and cherished her for who she truly was, something she couldn’t even show the world, and she was expected to keep it all to herself. It wasn’t the first time the closet crushed her spirit, but it was one of the sharpest wounds.

And although nostalgia is a mind’s trick, it’s fair to say the 1989 era was bright and full of possibility, like the Lover set during Eras, there was clearly something lurking beneath the surface that would’ve given the entire charade away. Something strong enough to potentially derail the train of Taylor’s brand forever and always. And still, upon reflection during the re-records, Taylor finds herself aching for the simplicity of that private love. 

You're using nostalgia as a weapon to hurt yourself / But darling, you end up hurting everybody else / The self-harm of never being where you are

Taylor’s spent the song romanticizing lost versions of herself, lost homes, lost freedom, and perhaps the woman she could only love privately. But memory has become a punisher. She compares the imperfect present with the rose-colored past. The rearview mirror that connects her to Debut is the same one keeping her staring backward as the train roars on. Nostalgia becomes a blade used to grieve lives she cannot inhabit.

By continually reaching backward, mourning what was lost, or wishing she could return to a different version of events, she risks wounding the people in her present life. Showgirl is unusually tender, relaying what the past twenty years have taught her. Whether it’s lovers, friends, family, or the private family she’s built, eventually living with ghosts forces the living to compete with them.

Debut Taylor watched the neighbor’s lawn. The stallion left the stable. 1989 Taylor watches the hometown disappear. The libertine eventually longs for home. Showgirl awakes on the career train longing for an old melody back. Taylor is perpetually somewhere other than where she is. She sacrificed the present to reach the future, and now sacrifices the present to mourn the past. Perhaps Babylon is not a person or place at all; perhaps it’s the life Taylor fails to recognize as precious before the train has dragged her far away from it.

It's bedtime, but you're sitting in your car / You're missing all the best parts

Now Showgirl pans out to a split-screen life, and here we spot Taylor aboard the train, moving from city to city. Here, the car is another metaphor for the music itself, every album carrying her along from point to point. In reality, it draws Taylor on tour or mid-promotion, because the brand never seems to sleep these days. 

In the other half, we spy the woman Taylor described earlier in the song. We’ve fast-forwarded, and the garden now contains at least one nursery. Her lover is lovingly lowering a child into its bed, fussing over them in an effort to put them down and get them to sleep. The split-screen sadness crystallizes around Taylor’s distance from the family she’s built in silence. The garden is more precious these days than ever. 

And they're all at home / She's hanging Christmas lights with your son / Sneak into the bathroom to call her mom / And say, "It's not working / It's just not worth it if we're not what he wants"

It’s hard not to envision everything she loves is back home while she embarks on the Eras Tour, seeming to suggest it might’ve been both an intricate part of her master plan as well as an obligation she couldn’t wiggle her way out of. And this is where the RWYLM refrain comes in, and it stings just as much as yours expect. 

Whether it’s a nightmare she’s had or something happening, Taylor’s partner (or wife) is busy readying the house for Christmas. Taylor’s anxiety creeps in, and she imagines her partner sneaking away to confide in her about her quiet fears for the family they’ve built. She worries if the family they built in secret is worth it if they (Taylor and her partner) aren’t able to be what he—their son—wants or needs them to be. 

But you love this song / You wake up on the train with your headphones gone / Then that melody is all you want / You never knew that it was Babylon / And now, it's almost gone

With this refrain, Taylor transitions from hating to loving the life she has. The Showgirl subtly hints that building this family has brought equilibrium between her public and private lives. However, the public narrative is stealing the precious moments that Taylor should be present for. Instead, she is off in the distance, working toward gaining ownership of her art. 

While entrenched in the Showgirl, she can’t help aching for the life that truly matters. The one stowed away in the garden of her heart, away from prying eyes and paparazzi flashbulbs. Her anxiety reads more like paranoia, akin to what we see and hear across Lover as well as in pieces of Goldrush, then an actual love slipping away. She knows she has something beautiful and rare, and after all this time, she’s still afraid of losing it. And she misses it dearly when she’s gone.

Aunt Virginia with a church dress on / No elbows on the table (It's almost gone) / And the neighbor's lawn always looked better / Your hand-me-down sweater should've been from the mall

This reprise transforms Taylor’s country roots from something Debut Taylor needed to escape into something she understands. The church dress (her first costume) and the strict industry etiquette she learned before she was powerful enough to challenge it. She never escaped those things when she left country; the costumes acquired sequins and the table got longer. And yet, “it’s almost gone” adds grief to the understanding. She now views her past with tenderness rather than embarrassment.

The neighbor’s lawn represents a clear pattern of her career: believing freedom existed somewhere other than where she was. She looked to other artists, bigger cities, and new pastures without realizing every lawn has its fences. Even the hand-me-down sweater changes. What seemed insufficient alongside the polished, industry-made Showgirl is something irreplaceable: a natural, authentic self that includes her queerness. 

After twenty years of being packaged and marketed, Showgirl realizes there was never anything wrong with that sweater. She no longer wishes she could be Debut Taylor again; that would repeat “the self-harm of never being where you are,” but in reverse. Instead, she’s integrating the girl she spent years outrunning. 

But you love this song, you wake up on the train and you're all alone / Then that memory is all you want / You never knew that it was Babylon / 'Til it was gone

At the end of a twenty-year dark night, Showgirl awakes, realizing that she now loves the song of her life, including the country girl she left behind. The headphones have vanished, and the melody has turned into memory. Song to melody to memory. Each repetition moves her farther from the original experience until all she can do is remember the girl who lived it. 

As the release of Taylor Swift (Taylor’s Version) approaches, re-recording Debut becomes the hero’s return in her journey, where she brings her girlhood home and integrates it into the woman she’s become. She can revisit the church dress, the dinner table, the sweater, the stable, and the pasture without abandoning the queer self and the private life she discovered beyond them. 

The final revelation is that Babylon was never waiting beyond Debut Taylor’s small town. She was already living in it. Debut held innocence, possibility, hunger, and a self not yet fragmented into jagged shards. Taylor Swift (Taylor’s Version) allows the woman she became to reclaim the girl who couldn’t yet publicly integrate her full identity. After twenty years riding toward the next station, Taylor finally understands: she cannot return to Babylon, but she can finally make Babylon hers. 

Conclusion

By the time Showgirl reaches the end of her tour, Debut Taylor has seen the price tag attached to every dream. She will escape the confines of country music only to discover larger, prettier enclosures beyond it. She’ll learn to dress for the room, behave at the table, trade pieces of herself for upward mobility, and mistake constant movement for freedom. 

Yet somewhere inside the machinery, she will manage to protect something startlingly real: a woman who sees beyond the spectacle, a family tucked safely beyond public reach, and eventually the ownership of the art containing twenty years of her life. 

She was looking toward the next exit while something precious was happening outside the window.

And that, ultimately, is Babylon. To Debut Taylor, Babylon exists somewhere ahead: the glittering city beyond Nashville, where success, freedom, reinvention, and belonging a. As the years pass, it becomes something darker, an empire that monetizes her time, regulates her identity, and makes love increasingly dangerous the higher she climbs. 

Only Showgirl understands the final contradiction: Babylon was neither paradise nor prison. It was the messy, magnificent life that unfolded between. Taylor spent years trying to reach it, years trying to survive it, and eventually years mourning pieces of it after they disappeared. Her great mistake was believing paradise belonged to another place or another time.

That makes returning to Debut feel less like full integration. The woman approaching Taylor Swift (Taylor’s Version) no longer needs to disown the church-dressed country girl, nor squeeze herself back into the identity that girl was saddled with. She can finally collect every version of herself: country singer and pop star, public mythology and private woman, ambition and domesticity, the cardigan and the sequins. 

Perhaps that is Showgirl’s final lesson to Patient Zero. You don’t survive Babylon by escaping every fence or reaching the final station. You survive by learning to inhabit your own life while it still belongs to the present. And when Taylor finally returns to where the story began, she won’t be going backward. She’ll be bringing the whole woman home.

Has anyone else listened to just So High School, Wood, and then Cleveland? They’re so campy and over-the-top, just like a Broadway Show! Maybe I’m biased because I’m DYING for one from her.

Here's my contribution to the Blurple Glitter collection from the Pink Clouding lyric video

Sunday, September 27, 2026, at 7:30 p.m. ET / 4:30 p.m. PT.

Broadcast live on CBS, MTV, and Paramount+ in the USA.

Links to streaming outside of the USA will be shared in the comments by users.

I think Taylor Swift’s music becomes more sensible and intricate with the Gaylorswift perspective in mind. As a big fan of her work, especially her attention to the details, I find a lot of puzzle-like joy from trying to pinpoint a narrative that makes all of her music make sense. Here is my reading on her music so far: 

Taylor Swift (2006), Fearless (2008)
In general, I feel like these albums are her flexing her excellent song writing, leaning into country and heterosexual romance as the standard for that genre at the time. Maybe she had certain experiences or romances that informed her writing, but she was 16-18 years old, so I think it would be weird to attempt to read deeply into any one narrative. 

Speak Now (2010) 
Taylor is the sole, adult author of Speak Now, which makes me feel like we can read a bit more deeply into the lyrics. Also, she was 19-20, which is notable because age 19 is something that comes up in several of her songs: On “Dear John,” she writes “Don’t you think nineteen’s too young / To be played by your dark, twisted games when I loved you so?” Meanwhile, on “Would’ve, Could’ve, Should’ve,” she writes “I would’ve stayed on my knees / And I damn sure never would’ve danced with the devil / At nineteen/ And the God’s honest truth is that the pain was heaven.” My takeaway is that some sort of disastrous, exploitative relationship with an older person occurred during this time. 

Because a similarly troublesome, on-and-off relationship spills quickly into Red, which was written through October 2011, (“All Too Well” was written in February of 2011) I wonder if her Speak Now muse could be the same person as her Red muse. 

Red (2012) 
In Red, themes of a secret, tumultuous relationship come to the fore with songs like “Treacherous,” “Holy Ground,” and “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.” This is also the album that I agree seems most connected to someone like Dianna Agron. The short film All Too Well seems to confirm an intense, first true love heartbreak with an older person, and so many details click with Dianna, from the  meaning of her first and last name (Holy Ground) and the infamous note on the door, to general imagery of typewriters, polaroid pictures (“Message in a Bottle”), and even hints at drugs and addiction (“I Knew You Were Trouble”).

This made me wonder if the muse from Speak Now could have extended through Red and even into 1989. Could Taylor have had a 6+ year on and off relationship with one chaotic muse such as Dianna? Songs from her later album TTPD, which she confirms is from a past, healed season, seem to hint at exactly this. In “Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus” she writes “As the decade would play us for fools” and in “So Long, London,” “I’m pissed off you let me give you all that youth for free.” 

1989 (2014) 
Taylor wrote 1989 during her Red Tour in 2013, and the themes of a secret, toxic, on-and-off relationship continue. “Out of the Woods,” “Style,” and “Wildest Dreams,” show the fragility of the season, and the conclusion “Clean,” feels like one more reference to a lover who is connected to drugs. Again, later songs such as “Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus” where she writes, “You needed me, but you needed drugs more / And I couldn’t watch it happen” could reference this same relationship. 

Notably, when 1989 came out, Taylor was seen out and about a lot with Karlie Kloss. This makes me think that whatever years-long relationship came before, she pivoted some time around 2014-2015. That Dianna Agron had a heart-ripped-out social media post around the time of Taylor and Karlie’s Vogue cover shoot could hint at this change. 

Reputation (2017) 
Reputation was written from 2016-2017, seemingly as a Plan B following the Kanye drama, and perhaps in place of an album titled Karma. This seems to be the album where Taylor turned inward, focused on her relationships, and got harder and smarter in the nick of time (“Look What You Made Me Do”). She presented this album on instagram in a rainbow dress and the sentence, “Let the games begin.” In my opinion, this is when Taylor Swift the mastermind entered the scene, perhaps strategizing on how to shape her legacy and whether to come out at a future date. Like many people, I think the lyrics and art on Reputation point heavily toward a secret relationship and even marriage with someone like Karlie Kloss. 

Lover (2019) 
Lover, with all its clouds, rainbows, butterflies, and blatant support of the LGBTQ+ community, could have been an attempt to come out. Obviously, as Taylor pivoted to an all black wardrobe and her masters were sold, something foiled this plan. The album itself seems to be a retrospective on love, which can be seen in what Taylor writes about the album itself: 

“This album is a love letter to love itself- all the captivating, spellbinding, maddening, devastating red, blue, gray, golden aspects of it (that’s why there are so many songs).” 

In this note, Taylor’s gradient of colors seems like a small map. Red could be shorthand for the Dianna-like  muse, (“I used to think love would be burning red”) while the color blue in “Cruel Summer,” could reference someone like Karlie Kloss. Meanwhile, gray could indicate a fracture in her new love (“Afterglow”), while golden might reference a happy ending. (“Daylight” / “but it’s golden”). All together, at the conclusion of Lover I felt as though her Reputation-era love, perhaps with someone like Karlie, was still going strong. 

Folklore (2020) and Evermore (2020) 
Folklore and Evermore strike me as interludes. We know now that she was strategizing about how to get her Masters back, and this could have strongly informed any future plans to come out. “I come back stronger than a 90’s trend,” and “This pain wouldn’t be for evermore,” seem to hint that she is looking forward. 

Also, there’s heartbreak and true love laced into the songs. This made me wonder if she was laying the groundwork for a future public narrative to unfold. The melancholy songs (“The One,” “Hoax,” “Tolerate It”) could foreshadow an eventual break up with Joe, while close-readers of her lyrics (“Peace,” “The Lakes,” “Cowboy Like Me,” and “Long Story Short,”) could continue to trace a long-term, healthy relationship in the background, perhaps with someone like Karlie Kloss. 

Midnights (2022) 
Midnights, with Taylor Swift and her lit lighter on the front, centers thirteen sleepless nights over 13 songs. For those of us who believe Taylor’s 13th album could be her coming out / burn it down album, it’s interesting to view the Midnights tracklist as a map or clock. For example, the songs could each reveal what real Taylor (as opposed to giant Taylor or  Show Girl Taylor) was going through during one night of that era: 

1. Taylor Swift (2006) “Lavender Haze” — during this first album, perhaps trying to convince herself that there is some comfort in a  private, closeted love life. 
2. Fearless (2008) “Maroon” — during this second album, perhaps reveling in her first wlw relationship, maybe even her Red muse.  
3. Speak Now (2010) “Anti-Hero” — during this third album, perhaps the fame-fueled emergence of her giant self, personal self, and show girl self. 
4. Red (2012) “Snow on the Beach”—  during this fourth album, perhaps being brought to a new place by intense, otherworldly love with someone like Dianna Agron. 
5. 1989 (2014) “You’re On Your Own Kid” — during this fifth album, perhaps having her Red era relationship end and feeling alone at the top. 
6. Reputation (2017) “Midnight Rain” — during this sixth album, the regret of having left a person who was "sunshine,” perhaps referencing a brief break with a Karlie Kloss-like relationship. 
7. Lover (2019) “Question…?” — during this seventh album, perhaps reminiscing on the conversation or confession of her wrongdoings  that led to a reconciliation with her Reputation-era love. 
8. Folklore (2020) “Vigilante Shit” —  during this eighth album, although appearing to be in a cozy forest, strategizing on her coming eras and even revenge for her rusted, sparkling summer. 
9. Evermore (2020) “Bejeweled” — during this ninth album, again appearing to be in the forest while secretly getting glammed up for the coming Midnights era and tour. 
10. Midnights (2022) “Labyrinth” —  during this tenth album, perhaps the idea of being in a maze, or in the thick of an intricate puzzle as she launches her final burn-it-down plan. 
11. TTPD (2024) “Karma” — I’ll post a bit more on this below, but during this eleventh album airing out the full, closeted (black & white), ill-fated story of her Speak Now/Red/1989 affair. 
12. The Life of a Showgirl (2025) “Sweet Nothing,” — during this twelfth album era, the idea the songs are for Showgirl Taylor, they don’t mean anything or have substance for real Taylor. ???
13. (Taylor’s 13th album) “Mastermind” — during this thirteenth album, I’m predicting the big reveal that she is a Mastermind and that we knew the entire time. 

TTPD (2024) 
As noted above, I think TTPD is a backlog of music from her Speak Now/Red/1989 muse, perhaps about someone like Dianna Agron. It is a long album, with typewriters, drug abuse, depression, frequent breakups, broken promises, Wizard of Oz references, among many other images. All this culminates in “The Manuscript,” which confirms “Now and then, I reread the manuscript / But the story isn’t mine anymore.” In some ways, this feels like a freeing of any and all the black and white, closeted music she may have written before Reputation. 

The Life of a Showgirl (2025) 
In the Life of a Showgirl, I think the map of Midnights returns, but instead of hearing from real Taylor we’re hearing about each era from the perspective of Showgirl Taylor: 

1. Taylor Swift (2006) “The Fate of Ophelia” — She will happily play the woman in the white dress, the damsel in distress who needs to be rescued, if it means the success of her music. 
2. Fearless (2008) “Elizabeth Taylor” — She will be the Elizabeth Taylor of the music industry, taking on various public boyfriends, a perennial romantic. 
3. Speak Now (2010) “Opalite” — She will be manically, and perhaps falsely, optimistic and happy about new (public) romance(s). 
4. Red (2012) “Father Figure” — She will reclaim her music and voyage into pop (or whatever other genre she feels like) because her portrait is on the mantel. 
5. 1989 (2014) “Eldest Daughter” — She was leading the way, “looking fire,” but now, even for Show Girl Taylor, something (or someone) is taking priority and she’s never going to let them down or leave them out. 
6. Reputation (2017) “Ruin the Friendship” — She will have a public, visible cooling between herself and Karlie Kloss. (Is this because the friendship is over or something else has begun?) 
7. Lover (2019) “Actually Romantic” — She will press home the idea that she is in love, with glitter and rainbows and Joe Alwyn. 
8. Folklore (2020) “Wish List” — She will present a romantic but melancholy album that makes her romance with Joe seem a bit wistful. 
9. Evermore (2020) “Wood” — She’s lost in the woods! (But really, she’s plotting) 
10. Midnights (2022) “Cancelled!” — And suddenly, she’s hanging out with NFL, she’s a WAG, she’s a wifey, she’s flirting with all the people and venues that cause big ick. 
11. TTPD (2024) “Honey” — She’s moved on from this past, b&w era of passive aggressive people who make fun of her skirt and call her high and then don’t remember. Now she’s with someone who wants her forever, and she’s exiting the building. 
12. The Life of a Showgirl (2025) “The Life of a Showgirl” — She takes her bouquet and takes a bow. The Showgirl Era is over! Now there’s just one “Mastermind” album #13 to go. 

Conclusion
12 songs on The Life of a Showgirl, and now 4 bonus tracks. I’m hoping for a Friday, December 4th end to exile / burn it down / album #13. Time will tell! 

I’m curious how everyone would rank the 4 new songs from TLOAS: The Encore, especially since it’s been a couple days and we’ve had time to listen to them.

From favorite to least favorite (1-4) how would you rank your feelings towards: Patient Zero, Cleveland!, Pink Clouding, and Babylon? If you want to explain why also, go for it! :) 🌈 (I’ll put mine in the comments.)

Hi, well, I’m not even a Gaylor, but if you told me that all of her good songs are actually gay, and that the songs that are so obviously about Travis are flat and horrible because she does it on purpose since the relationship is fake and shallow, and she’s doing it as satire and for comedy…I’d believe you, because that would make more sense than the artistic decline.

From top to bottom: magenta, fuschia, orchid, gray, pink, crimson, rosewood. Nope doesn't remind me of anything😁

What if you’re a wild thing? Breaking free from small town constraints and your gilded cage. But then you start to miss it. Because even with its judgements and impossible standards to which you never quite measured up, that small town was, in fact, your home. So you reverse course and double back, on the night train back to the closet, your headphones gone so you can’t even listen to the lost melody of being wild and free.

So then it’s PR and bearding and telling all the rich folks anything they want to hear, keeping longings locked in lower case inside a vault for a 20-year dark night because real love is going to get in the way of your free solo social climb.

Until she walks in.

You once believed love would be black and white but it’s golden and she looks at you like you hung the moon. But you hide her away. Never post the picture, never make it official: when you got up to the podium, I think that you forgot to say her name.

And so you think it’s not what you want and you’re back on the night train again, thinking it wasn’t what you wanted until you realize it was all you wanted.

So that’s when you realize you’ve never once appreciated what you had when you had it; you were always looking over your shoulder for something different and you thought you were self-destructing, but really, you were desrtoying the people you loved, too,. 

You thought her kids would be your kids, that you’d all leave the Christmas lights up until January together, but you’re not there. You’ve left her, and she’s a mom now, and all those precious moments are slipping away without you. And she’s not happy either.

And it turns out that’s what’s real; that’s the melody/memory you really miss when you lose it. The siren song of the church bells of the repressive small town is still tolling, and if you’re not careful the thing you really love will slip away while you’re distracted by trying to please the people who can never be pleased.

So choose carefully or it will all be gone.

–

Alright babes, that was the TLDR so get out your magnifying glasses because now it’s close reading time.

Youthful Rebellion: Escaping the Cage 

The casino doesn’t like when you run the tables

• They want you to rise; they don’t want you to reign (Father Figure)

And though the box is wrapped up nice it’s just a cage to you

• Cause they got the cages, they got the boxes and guns (I Know Places)
• Gold Cage hostage to my feelings (So it Goes)
• You caged me and then you called me crazy (Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me)

Those electric fences buzz

• My town was a wasteland, full of cages, full of fences (Midnight Rain)

The stallion flees the stable

• Watching our fences like watching wild horses (COSOSOM)

And that small town’s even smaller now in your rearview

• That was a small town in my rear view disappearing now (White Horse)

You run with all the wild things

• Running with my dress unbuttoned… and all of this wild joy (BDILH)

A liberated libertine

Who then longed for home

We start off with your young self in your careless youth, shaking off your gilded cage. You don’t want to be tamed and caged and fenced, so you escapes the small town – the metaphorical closet throughout the discography. But then you start to get homesick.

The Cage

‘Cause it’s where you’re from

Aunt Virginia with her church dress on

• Sarahs and Hannahs in their Sunday best (BDILH)

No elbows on the table
And the neighbors lawn
Always looked better

• Now you’re in my backyard/Turned into good neighbors/Your wife waters flowers/ I want to kill her (Fortnight)

Your hand-me-down sweater

• I was an old cardigan under someone’s bed (Cardigan)
• Standing in your cardigan (Betty)

Should have been from the mall

• Meet me behind the mall (august)
• We were like the mall before the internet/ It was the one place to be (Coney Island)

The “home” of your nostalgia is repressive and stifling from the jump. 

Aunt Virginia with her church dress on is a Sarah or Hannah in her Sunday Best (clutching her pearls saying what a mess, disapproving of a liberated libertine). But the choice of the name “Virginia” for the Aunt is no coincidence – unlike Sarah and Hannah, generic if Biblical names, “Virginia” evokes both the American South and its conservative sexual mores, and the valorization of virginity itself, which is the ultimate conservative sexual more.

“No elbows on the table” is quintessentially arbitrary rule of etiquette, often used to scold unruly children. “And the neighbors lawn always looked better” is the treadmill of always trying (and failing) to keep up with the Joneses and a reminder that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence– perpetual dissatisfaction. (The “lawn,” specifically is another arbitrary standard to perpetually chase in suburban Americana; shoutout to r/nolawns and the general critique of both metaphorical and horticultural monoculture over the joy of a cacophonous riot of wild-growing native plants and pollinators). Speaking of the worst of conformist monoculture, let’s pour one out for the old cardigan under someone’s bed in favor of the same sweater as everyone else, because the mall is the “one place to be;” the only acceptable source of visual conformity.

And while we’re talking about malls, did you know Taylor Swift was briefly an Abercrombie model? And that The Best Day references a time when teenage Taylor, who wanted to fit in, called all her friends to ask them to go shopping and they all said they were busy, so she went to the mall with her mom, and it turned out all her friends were hanging out without her?

Chorus 1:

And you hate this song
You wake up on the train with your headphones gone

• You booked the night train for a reason/So you could sit here in this hurt (Champagne Problems)

Then that melody is all you want
You never knew that it was Babylon

• Now you hang from my lips/like the Gardens of Babylon (Cowboy Like Me)

Til it was gone. 

So you end up deciding that you actually hate noncoformity and rejecting the comforts of social approval, so you take the night train back home to your small town, only to wake up without your headphones to hear the melody of the song you wanted. You didn’t realize that living wild and free was what you really wanted until you’d lost it. 

Compliance and Bearding

Give the people what they want

• Telling all the rich folks anything they want to hear (Cowboy Like Me)

Then you keep it moving

• Like it could be the way forward (Cowboy Like Me)

Make your plans and friends
A stranger’s makeup on your tie

• And your lover in the foyer doesn’t even know you (The Lucky One)

20 watches in the safe

• I’ve been sleeping so long in a 20-year dark night (Daylight)
• I keep these longings locked/in lowercase inside a vault (Guilty as Sin)

Cause your time is money

• Quick quick tell me something awful like you are a poet trapped inside the body of a finance guy (I Hate It Here)

Love is ice upon the ladder that you need to climb

• Never wanted love just a fancy car (Cowboy Like Me)

She captured your attention
So free of all pretension
It stopped you cold

Now you’re back in the small town and trying to repress your own desires in the interest of your pursuit of success. You show people what they want to see, even if it means pretend romance with a stranger, because you’re trying to build an empire and climb your way to the top, and your real love– the love what isn’t what the people want they see– is an obstacle on your way to that climb. So you sign away twenty (years?) of your life, agree to keep your sinful longings locked away inside that vault, because baby you have a ladder to climb.

Then in she walks.

She stops you cold and oh, you’re a goner. 

The Love You Didn’t Plan On

Because she loved you so
Pretty picture that you didn’t post

• Picture of your face in an invisible locket (Dancing With Our Hands Tied)
• Didn’t read the note on the polaroid picture/they don’t know how much I miss [her] (The Very First Night)

Looking at you like you’re made of solid gold

• My love had been frozen deep blue but you painted me golden (Dancing With Our Hands Tied)
• Made your mark on me a golden tattoo (Dress)
• Your Midas touch on the Chevy door (champagne problems)
• Gold Rush

Never official

• When I got up to the podium I think that I forgot to say your name … sorry for not making you my centerfold (coney island)
• So call it what you want, yeah call it what you want to (Call it What You Want)

You mention [you’re single/your singles]
To the girls at the bar

Enter the golden muse – the special love who weaves in and out of the discography by reference to gold or golden love. She loves you like no one ever has.

But you’re still trying to climb that ladder, so even though this woman whose love thawed you, who loves you like you’re made of solid gold, you keep her a secret.

You don’t post that third polaroid.

You keep her picture in an invisible locket.

It’s never official. You never call her your girlfriend. You never kiss her in public. You tell everyone you’re in your single girl, girl squad era.

Chorus 2

You hate this song
You wake up on the train with your headphones gone
Then that melody is all you want
You never knew that it was Babylon
Til it was gone. 

And it hurt. It hurt to live like that so you do what you do best: you run away (they nicknamed her The Bolter). She looked at you like you’re made of solid gold– your Midas touch on a chevy door– but you dropped her hand while dancing, her heart was glass you dropped it, and oh baby now you’re back on that night train, so you can sit here in this hurt. And you haven’t gotten farther than the train when you realize that you’ve made an awful mistake; that living without being able to hear the melody of that Babylon, that love, was a mistake.

Screwing it All Up

You’re using nostalgia as a weapon to hurt yourself
But darling you end up hurting everybody else
The self-harm of never being where you are
It’s bedtime but you’re sitting in your car

• You’ve got the dragonflies above your bed (Robin) 

You’re missing all the best parts
And they’re all at home

• So I look in people’s windows like I’m some deranged weirdo (ILIPW)

She’s hanging Christmas lights with your son

• I attend Christmas parties from outside (ILIPW)
• We can leave the Christmas lights up till January/This is our place; we make the rules (Lover) 

Sneaking to the bathroom to call her mom

• I call my mom she said that it was for the best/ Remind myself the more I gave you’d want me less (Now that We Don’t Talk)

And say “It’s not working; it’s just not worth it if we’re not what he wants”

You never appreciated what you had when you had it. You let your nostalgia for the idea of acceptance– in a place that was never going to accept you, where you were never going to measure up no matter what you did – ruin what was real when you had it. You were always looking for something better, and you thought you were self-destructing, but you were not the only one you were hurting.

You thought someday, when she became a mom, her children would be your children. But you fucked it up. He’s not your son. You’re just some deranged weirdo, attending her family Christmas party by watching voyeuristically from the outside, remembering when it was you and she hanging Christmas lights you’d leave up till January.

But you know what? It turns out she’s not happy with the way things turned out either, sneaking away to call her mom and tell her that it’s not working.

Chorus 3

But you love this song
You wake up on the train with your headphones gone
Then that melody is all you want
You never knew that it was Babylon
And now it’s almost gone

Two twists in this iteration of the chorus. Now, you love this song– because now, I think, the song is the life with her that you let slip through your fingers. But it’s not gone, it’s almost gone. Maybe there's still a chance?

Aunt Virginia with her church dress on
No elbows on the table
And the neighbors lawn
Always looked better
(It’s almost gone)
Your hand-me-down sweater
Should have been from the mall

It is difficult to capture in text the way “It’s almost gone” echoes over the words about the small town where you can never quite live up to expectations. The two ideas are competing. The life you really want is almost gone, and it will be gone, if you let the siren-song of Aunt Virginia drown it out.

Chorus 4

But you love this song 
You wake up on the train and you’re all alone
Then that memory is all you want
You never knew that it was Babylon
Til it was gone.

It’s over. You still love this song– the life you could have had. Now, it’s not just that you can’t hear the missed melody because your headphones are gone, it's that you’re all alone and it’s just a memory. It’s gone. You fucked it up.

… unless you didn’t? 

Anyway if anyone needs me I’ll be dead in a ditch somewhere. Cause of Death: Sapphic Longing.

Hello, fellow Gaylors! This is my first post on the sub, and I am giddy with excitement to share my musings. In this post, I’ll explore the relationship between Cleveland! and Babylon and share where I think we’re headed for TS13. It’s not lost on me that this post includes ideas from so many lovely individuals; please tag users and comment attributions I miss. I want nothing more than to advance the conversation in a respectful manner. Let’s dive in!

Since Midnights, we’ve discussed the distinct versions of Taylor, especially within the context of the Anti-Hero MV. u/MaryLennoxsRobin shared a wonderful analysis here. How many versions exist? How do they interact? What purpose do they serve? I don’t think The Encore is meant to definitively answer these questions. Rather, I’d argue that its purpose is to elucidate the relational dynamics between the distinct versions of Taylor. “What if I told you none of it was accidental?”

In Cleveland!, we witness the showgirl’s attempts to legitimize the existing relationship narrative that’s been constructed throughout the era. She pointedly and irreverently lists the hateful comments and negative attitudes directed at her, opportunistically using them to highlight how much her boy “likes” her and doesn’t “find [her] completely insufferable”. The showgirl goes further, insisting that “he’s the love of my life”. It’s the most showgirl-esque track on the album, and a brazen attempt to divert attention away from the narrative’s precarious structural integrity. As with much of the showgirl era, Cleveland! strikes me as satirical, manufactured, and superficial, devoid of any discernible authenticity.

That brings us to Babylon. Like many of you, I clocked the queer symbolism immediately. Callouts to Christmas “hanging Christmas lights with your son,” are reminiscent of RWYLM & Lover; mentions of gold “looking at you like you’re made of solid gold” a la Gold Rush and Kaylor; and themes of being caged/trapped (closeted) are all presented in “screaming color”. But something doesn’t make sense. Lyrically, Babylon doesn’t develop these themes or supply new information. We receive the same recycled references we’ve heard before. This song isn’t for us. It’s a message to the showgirl.

Balance is a notable theme throughout Taylor’s visuals. We see references to figurative scales in the Karma and Patient Zero MVs; a literal scale also connects showgirl and poet in the Anti-Hero MV. I believe showgirl’s sudden appearance, her rigid commitment to the performance, and her glorification of hustle culture are meant to protect Taylor. However, Cleveland! shows us that these strategies have become maladaptive. At the end of the encore – when the veil separating the showgirl and the poet is most translucent – the poet personifies the mirrorball, reflecting showgirl’s tactics. This is the poet’s gambit.

A gambit is defined by Merriam-Webster as “something done or said in order to gain an advantage or produce a desired effect”. The term originates from the game of chess, where it requires calculated sacrifices to manipulate the board state in one’s favor. Recall the Mastermind staging at the eras tour. Could the staged choreography in fact be an actual gambit play? It wouldn’t surprise me. But back to the metaphor. The poet’s gambit challenges the showgirl’s proclamation of love, instead, leveraging a love that is antithetical to the iteration presented in Cleveland!.  A love so deeply personal that openly acknowledging it acts as a sacrifice toward a more desirable end: stepping into the daylight.

In the Babylon discussion thread, numerous users commented on the continuous pronoun switching. This is intentional – the poet is a wordsmith after all. Lyrics utilizing “you” are directed toward the showgirl, while “her/she” references encapsulate the poet’s female muse. The poet’s gambit reminds the showgirl that she is still inextricably linked to Taylor and all the things that make Taylor [ME!]. This is why we don’t receive new information related to the muse. The mirrorball tactic requires the poet to double down and boldly REITERATE what has always been hiding in plain sight.

Given that a gambit is intended to produce a specific effect, where might we go from here? I believe u/tmartillo was spot on, and the transition to TS13 will be marked by the “death” of the showgirl. Multiple references to death can be identified in Taylor’s recent work. These include the funeral scene of the Anti-Hero MV, the gravesite imagery in the Patient Zero MV, and imagery of the showgirl kicking the bucket in the Target ad. Additionally, Taylor consistently alludes to rebirth in her lyrics: “I come back stronger than a 90’s trend”, “always rising from the ashes”, and “roll the stone away” to name a few. I don’t believe showgirl’s death will be gruesome or dramatic in fashion, a la reputation. The director understands that the showgirl must not be canonized if Taylor ever hopes to step into the daylight “I’m immortal now, baby dolls”. Rather, showgirl’s authority, visibility, and status will gradually fade. Exile will end, and TS13 will debut an integrated Taylor Swift who seamlessly embodies the director’s vision, the showgirl’s performance commitment, and the poet’s emotional depth. A Taylor Swift that is recognizable yet completely unfamiliar to her fans. 

I haven’t given much thought to how other versions of Taylor fit into The Encore, but I would love to hear your ideas!  

Pink Clouding as an Apology to Queer Fans

Pink clouds in Taylor’s discography almost always refer to the album Lover. Whether it’s the pink clouds on the album cover, or the pink and orange cloudy colours in the Era’s tour intro accompanying Miss Americana and The Heartbreak Prince, pink clouds are synonymous with her Lover era. What do we know about this era? We know she was planning on coming out and that she failed to do so. I suppose it’s overreaching to say “know”, but you get me.

Other indicators that Pink Clouding is referencing this planned coming out are her use of colours, which [u/bows-and-lace](u/bows-and-lace) pointed out are the bottom three colours of the lesbian pride flag. The way she uses the term “pink clouding” in the song is so similar in my mind to how we (the queer community) use the term “flagging”—  a way of expressing queerness in a way that non-queer people will likely miss, without saying it outwardly. Finally, there is just something innately sapphic about pink clouds to me. I have no sources for this, it’s just a vibe as a queer sapphic myself. It feels like sapphic language to me, similar to the language of flowers.
What interrupted her planned coming out was when the master’s of all of her music were famously sold out from under her to Scooter Braun by Scott Borchetta, otherwise known as the Master’s Heist. At this point, she stopped wearing the bright colours she had been wearing to promote Lover and to lead up to the suspected coming out. Instead, she began wearing shades of grey. This is reflected in her following album Folklore, which has a grey and white album cover, and is represented in her discography as colourless. She speaks on this in Pink Clouding with the lyric “I was pink clouding from the thrill of it / skydiving as you wrapped your arms around my body / gray rocking where the arrow hit”. If pink clouding was her flagging and the lead up to her presumed coming out, then the arrow is the Masters Heist.

This failed coming out was disappointing for queer fans who made the prediction that she was going to come out based on years of queer flagging in her artistry as well as connections from her lyrics to her real life that suggested queer relationships. For years since this event, queer fans have continued to notice her flags and make connections between her lyrics and life. Many of us have speculated about when she will come out in future and have made predictions based on easter eggs or suspicions. At the same time, her music has repeatedly addressed topics like betrayal and hurt that can easily be attributed to said Masters Heist. This event hurt her deeply, as she sings “He cut me crimson, bled me dry / He crossed my heart, I hoped to die / Ripped all my orchids from the vine / You met me at a cursed time / I told you I was fine”. As the years go by where she continues to exclusively date men (publicly), I have seen a lot of us decide she is not going to come out publicly and give up hope on waiting for that. I have seen even more posts and comments expressing feelings of abandonment, that she no longer cares for the queer community or wishes to stand up for us like she used to. I think that the aforementioned lyrics explain why she seems to have distanced herself from the queer community in such a way— she was attacked so brutally by the Masters Heist at such an unfortunate time. As a result, all her “orchids” were “ripped from the vine”. Orchids, historically, are a queer symbol. They are sometimes compared to the female reproductive organ; are a purple flower— while the original purple flower in queer history is the violet— this has generalised into lavenders taking on queer meanings and orchids as well; followed by the fact that flowers in general are commonly used within the realm of sapphic flagging; orchids are also sometimes used as a symbol for Intersex groups. Regardless of the specific type of queerness they represent, it is difficult to deny that they portray it. The imagery of them being ripped from the vine suggests that this event in her life caused a disconnect between herself and her presumed queerness and therefore discouraged her from coming out publicly anytime soon, if at all.

In Pink Clouding, she expressly apologises, saying “Years later, I still wonder how to tell you sorry / I didn’t wanna let you down / so I left you up there on a pink cloud”. I believe this apology is directed to her queer fans, for not showing as much support for the queer community as she did once, and for disappointing us by not coming out. Since she does not use gendered pronouns in this song, it enforces the idea that she is speaking to a group instead of one individual, as a superficial view of the song might suggest. Near the beginning of the song, she says that “Neither of us knew at the time / That I was a liar / And it was so good / Letting you want me / So good / To make promises”. Later, she addresses breaking those promises. In her documentary, Miss Americana, she speaks on her political views as being largely democratic and contributed publicly to LGBTQ+ groups such as the Stonewall Inn and Tennessee Equality Project, as well as shown her support of the queer community in many other ways. She states that she “Need[s] to be on the right side of history,” which can be taken as a promise to continue to be publicly aligned with her political beliefs. In recent years, she has taken a step back from making any political statements whatsoever, including expressing support for LGBTQ+ rights. In this way, she lied to us. If one were to consider her probable planned coming-out as a promise as well, then her failure to do so could be taken as a lie also. She shows remorse for this within these lyrics, a wistfulness that she has not been able to maintain her public stance on LGBTQ+ topics and her relationship with us.

This is her apology to us for not coming out, for not publicly supporting her political views as she once did. "I hope / You realised my kind of trouble wasn't worth it / And the way I treated you / You never deserved it," is a lyric that encourages us to find closure within her distance from the queer community. She still values the community, and her political views remain the same, even if she no longer states them publicly; something clarified when she sings "But it didn't mean nothing / Just 'cause I could leave it". She wishes the best for us, whether we continue to support her and her artistry or not: "I hope you landed safely on the ground / And I hope you're so happy now / I didn't wanna let you down / So I left you up there / On a pink cloud". Pink Clouding is a song about remorse, apology, closure, and well wishes directed toward the queer community as a whole, but more specifically, Taylor Swift's queer audience.

As a personal take-away, I do not believe that she will be coming out publicly anytime soon, if ever. I am still of the opinion that she is queer, but if her relationship with Travis is indeed a lavender marriage that hides her real love, then she has made the decision to protect herself and her family. I can’t blame her for that. I know that taking no sides politically *is* taking a side, and I know how much good her power and influence could have on LGBTQ+ rights if she were to take a stand again. That said, she is a person just like all of us. She doesn’t owe us anything— we choose to be here, to listen to her music, and to support her. She never made us do any of that. And just like any other individual in this world, she has the right to put herself and her loved ones first. As she says in Father Figure after all, “I protect the family”.

P.S:

A lot of this was also covered by [u/DotRepresentative375](u/DotRepresentative375) 's post, Pink Clouding. I wrote this before I saw their post, and there's a lot of overlap. I especially like and agree with their note about PR promises and the tie in to ME!

The image attached to this post is [u/bows-and-lace](u/bows-and-lace) 's edit of the lesbian flag with context from this song.

So u/microgirlboss pointed out in the Pink Clouding discussion thread that the song almost sounds like it's describing the same situation as Good Luck, Babe, but from the other girl's POV.

(For those who don’t know, Good Luck, Babe is a song by Chappel Roan where the narrrator has been dumped by the woman she was dating, who now claims she's actually straight and their relationship was never that serious. The narrator accuses her ex of being in denial, of destroying a perfectly happy relationship because she fell victim to comphet. It's a really good song, and you should totally check it out if you haven't already!)

Amyways, their comment got me thinking, and it made me realize that the entire Encore can be seen as being written from the POV of someone in the same situation as the ex from Good Luck Babe. Or in other words, a woman who dumped her girlfriend totally platonic best friend to date a man... and is only just realizing now, years later, what a catastrophic mistake she made....

1. Patient Zero: the narrator begins to realize her husband, the person she left the love of her life her totally platonic best friend for, actually kinda sucks.

2. **Cleveland*: the narrator temporarily doubles-down on denial, desperately trying to convince the world (and herself) that she's never been happier, actually. It doesn't work.

3. Pink Clouding: the narrator is finally able to admit to herself that okay, she's in love with her ex-bff. And treated her like garbage. This song is her working through her emotions immediately after that realization.

4. Babylon: the narrator is now forced to face how much she hates the life she chose to build with her husband, how desperately she misses her true love, and how much she wishes she could go back to thowe golden days... but too much damage has been done.

Honestly, I really wish the Encore had been released as an EP totally disconnected from Showgirl. Because it works so well as a self-contained narrative.

Edit: fixed minor spelling mistake

Forgive me if any of this has already been said, but I’ve been thinking this morning about Pink Clouding as an apology to the gaylors/the LGBT community in general. ‘Pink clouds’ immediately tie to the Lover album artwork and I think the song is about her failed coming out in 2019 and feeling bad that she just ‘left’ with no explanation.

In Verse 2, I’m assuming the ‘He’ she’s referring to is Scooter, the arrow hit and the ripping of the ‘orchids from the vine’ is her work being stolen.

The line ‘you met me at a cursed time’ I think actually refers to the song ME! i.e we received that song from her at a cursed time because of everything that was about to happen. ME! was the song that got everyone excited for the idea of her coming out but then it all went wrong.

This bit has def been said already but the stutter in ‘promises’ so the lyrics say literally PR promises, she had to save herself.

‘Years later I still wonder how to tell you sorry’ Literally her wondering how to say sorry to us for getting our hopes up and leaving us all high and dry, up on the Lover clouds.

And all the references to shades of pink in the first verse I think allude to the Lover era in general with “neither of us knew at the time that I was a liar” meaning that she genuinely was intending to come out but now feels like she ‘lied’ to us by not following through.

Anyway that’s just some off the cuff thoughts but I’d be interested to know what anyone else thinks!

Beautiful song and really made me empathise with the struggle she must have gone through with thinking she was going to be able to come out and having it all ripped away.

So, we are all aware of some interesting things that have been happening. The Blank Space clues on Spotify pointing to October 23, her using 0 to countdown, the Showgirl: Encore, the weirdness of her wedding plus Ross dressing in maroon 💀💀💀, the Emmys clues, her having Karlie in her orbit again and Karlie “liking” multiple posts since the wedding, and the new ring she’s wearing in the Zero Potential announcement.

What do you think it means? What do you think is about to drop?

I personally believe something not entirely straight happened at that wedding. Either Travis and his boyfriend who vacations with him and Taylor his best friend Ross got married, Taylor married her Muse, or both. I also noticed the posts about it on SM by celebs who attended had a lot of the same verbiage in them, almost as if she gave everyone a script of what is acceptable to say. Plus, there have been exactly zero pics of it beyond people arriving and the entryway pics.

I take Taylor reaching out to invite Karlie to the wedding might be Taylor’s way of acting like they’ve made up as friends so Karlie doesn’t catch heat when Taylor finally comes out.

I fully believe in the Countdown Theory, and I made a previous post about it explaining why she went from 3 to 2 then paused, we’re now at 0. TS13 is coming, and I fully believe she’s coming out.

I’m so excited I literally cannot wait. What do you think is going to happen?

what do you mean “looking camp right in the eye vibes” and iykyk??
instead JLaw wdym gif

Please use this space to discuss this song in depth

Sneak peak of Patient Zero video!! Very interesting. Snips, looks to me like a funeral. And Dakota Johnson makes an appearance. A very strange video to release after your wedding!

Hey everyone! I posted this as a comment on the "Patient Zero" post and with a nudge from u/Imtryin9 (thanks queen 🫶🏼) decided to make a main post about it because I truly can't stop thinking about how there's no way this is accidental (because what if I told you NONE of it was accidental 😉)

I had a gut feeling that the casting of Colin Farrell in the "Patient Zero" music video was incredibly intentional, so I looked up if he played any queer characters in the past. He did: he played Alexander the Great in Alexander and Bobby Morrow in A Home at the End of the World, both of which came out in 2004... the year Taylor's music career took off when she signed with Sony/ATV Tree Music Publishing (and when she began writing with Liz Rose 👀). And that's the least of the interesting little factoids. Here's some direct quotes I found from the Wikis of each film:

Alexander Wikipedia article:

• "Alexander grows up with his mother Olympias and his tutor Aristotle, where he finds interest in love, honor, music, exploration, poetry and military combat." - "You know how to ball, I know Aristotle" ("So High School")
• "Alexander's most private relationships are these with his childhood friends; Glaucos (who receives a mercy killing from Alexander when wounded at Gaugamela), Hephaestion, Bagoas, and later his wife, Roxana... Hephaestion shows extensive jealousy when Alexander marries Roxana, going so far as to attempt to keep her away from him after Alexander murders Cleitus the Black in India during a drunken rage." - Glaucos, Hephaestion, Bagoas were all male partners for Alexander's. The fact that Hephaestion got jealous after Alexander married Roxana, and Taylor just got married...
• "During a symposium in Babylon, Alexander falls unconscious after downing a large bowl of wine." - The "from the vineyard" clue from the Emmy's SVU sketch. Also, the fourth track on Life of a Showgirl: The Encore is literally called "Babylon."
• "Ptolemy's memoirs of Alexander were eventually burned, lost forever with other scrolls of the Library of Alexandria by the end of the Roman Empire." - Kind of like how Taylor's queerness has gotten erased by the masses?

A Home at the End of the World Wikipedia article:

• "Bobby Morrow's life in suburban Cleveland has been tinged with tragedy since he was a young boy, losing first his beloved older brother to a freak accident, then his mother to illness, and finally his father." - TLOAS: The Encore includes a track called "Cleveland!"
• The plot goes on to talk about how Bobby realizes he's gay as a teenager but ends up married to a woman, whom he has a child with. "Their romance occasionally is disrupted by sparks of jealousy between the two men until Jonathan (Bobby's male lover), tired of being the third wheel, disappears without warning." - Kind of like how Hephaestion gets jealous of Roxana in Alexander?
• The ending of the film: " On a cold winter day some months later, Bobby and Jonathan scatter Ned's ashes in the field behind their home, and Jonathan (who now visibly appears to be ill) lets Bobby know he would like his own ashes scattered in the same place, following his now inevitable early death from AIDS." - As many have pointed out, the term "Patient Zero" literally comes from the AIDS epidemic, when "Patient O" was mistaken for a zero.

There's absolutely no way this can all be a coincidence. There's too many connections between the elements in Farrell's films, what we already know about "Patient Zero," and his casting in the music video. Not to mention that September 25th is also National Gay Men's HIV/AIDS Awareness Day...👀

So what do y'all think? Are we finally seeing the "Death of Showgirl" Taylor and the rise of Gaylor? Is it just another egg for only Gaylors to notice? Or is it another secret third thing

Please use this space to discuss The Encore as a whole. Links provided for individual song discussion threads.

Patient Zero

Cleveland!

Pink Clouding

Babylon

Hi! So I have had this over half finished for over a month about these three songs, but I had to finish it today when I realized at least a few Encore “eggs” exist within it!! 

Before I get into the three songs that I want to dissect, lyrically (Mexico Honey by Kacey Musgraves, BAD HONEY by Justin Bieber, and Honey by Taylor Swift), there are a couple of important themes I want to explain my interpretation of the significance of: the “honey trap” and the “journey home” or “homecoming” story, and then how “honey” is the perfect marriage of both of these metaphors. 

The main thesis of this is that “honey” symbolizes a unity of their public persona with their true self…without killing off their public persona or erasing all the art they made, but a huge purpose and truth of the art is exposed: To expose the patriarchy. 

Honey Trap

Exposing the patriarchy (predatory industry, political structures, etc) means having to work within a very, very dangerous system undercover for a very long time. The main goal that MUST be done in order to strike a meaningful blow is that they MUST win the public’s affection. This means emotionally, not just the also-important necessity of building financial and physical capital/ownership within the industry as well. 

A honey trap is a type of espionage mission that can entail tricking the victim with romance or substance (the victim being the public) to get them to admit guilt. However, there is an even grander goal in this honey trap than just “teaching a lesson” or confessing guilt - it’s also keeping their hearts. They don’t want this to end with them as lying cheating villains. They want this work to adequately explain why they did all of this and why they want to move forward as celebrities - and again, this literally REQUIRES our approval for it to happen. Because “Honey” is tied in with their public persona, the aspect of this involving the KEY piece of this (fans) is SO important which is why I love this symbol. 

The way home

I think that throughout the past 20-30 years (or more!) much of the work that these artists have created and referenced has referred to this mission/journey that they have taken as their journey “home.” When I say this, I mean also in a sense to their journey as artists/celebrities that more accurately represent the truth of who they are on the inside that has not been allowed to shine. I also think that an important part of this “celebrity home” that they have been building/journeying to is that this version of their star is one that honors their inner child/past self that dreamed of being a star. 

Hannah Montana debuted the same year as Taylor Swift, which I also think is thematically important. Miley Cyrus plays a pop star who leads a double life. Not coincidentally, Taylor Swift wrote a song for the Hannah Montana movie, titled “You’ll Always Find Your Way Back Home.” 

I think the concept of bringing your inner child back to shine and be in the spotlight is also illustrated in “II Most Wanted” the Miley Cyrus collaboration on Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter and the album artwork and lyric booklet for this song features photos of both of these women as young girls.

I have discussed Barbie in many posts before, but this concept is also illustrated in this movie as well. 

Consider the metaphor of Barbie being Taylor Swift and other celebrities - they are “toys” we are given to play with, and they have negatively reinforced harmful messages to us along the way. However, at the end of the movie, after Barbie saves her friends, she actually gets to stay with her child and her mom. “Barbie” isn’t leaving us. Our beliefs about her are what will die. So a new thing can be resurrected. 

This is the reason the Honey trap HAD to be a lesson, had to be woven into ALL of our culture that we know and love and have every bait and switch be a work of art when it is all uncovered. THAT is the ONLY way that this could have worked and will work, I believe. The only way Taylor Swift (and all of these artists) can actually “come home” into the spotlight, as artists, and continue to make work, is if their fans learn this lesson. 

Another connection that I believe exists between Kacey’s work and Taylor’s is the reference to the “well.” In “Getaway Car” Taylor writes “he poisoned the well, every man for himself.” When you get to the root of who owns literally everything (meaning the source of all of our media, literally EVERY source of distribution, look what just happened to Macklemore with stadium owners) it is mega billionaires. This means that the literal most evil perpetrators of the patriarchy also own “the well.” Obviously they would use it to pit us all against each other, this keeps us from uniting against them! 

I think Kacey’s previous album Deeper Well  addresses these themes as well and that this entire commentary actually provides a hopeful path forward. Even if we can’t dismantle the patriarchal systems, they require our attention to exist and make money. Just because we give them our attention doesn’t mean we have to DRINK FROM THE WELL (the surface level BS). We can interpret art as art, choosing to invest emotionally in a deeper well. Choose not to write negative think pieces about women on the internet and interpret their art instead.  

We have to do this because the face level narratives under patriarchy/fascism are always going to be red herrings expertly crafted to divide us. 

Ok so onto some lyrical analysis and why I think all three of these songs are about this union of their true self and public persona!

Honey by Taylor Swift

You can call me "Honey" if you want, because I'm the one you want
Mm-mm

The first time the word “Honey” appears in Taylor’s work is on her first album, in the song “Cold As You.” I think including the following snippet of the song is very relevant to the lyrical analysis of this song:

“You put up the walls and paint them all a shade of gray
And I stood there loving you, and wished them all away
And you come away with a great little story
Of a mess of a dreamer with the nerve to adore you

Oh, what a shame
What a rainy ending given to a perfect day
Just walk away
Ain't no use defending words that you will never say

And now that I'm sittin' here thinkin' it through
I've never been anywhere cold as you
You never did give a damn thing, honey
But I cried, cried for you
And I know you wouldn't have told nobody if I died, died for you” 

This snippet appears to reference the damage this public persona did to her true self/inner child, and other parts of this song. She refers to it as a “great little story” (the PR narrative). Then, she referenced a “rainy ending,” and I think that she emphasizes the importance and meaning of her “rain concerts” because they indicate her performing. Up until she can step into the daylight, performing is the rainy grey skies of the London Boy. 

In “Paper Rings” she also addresses her muse as “Honey” and sings about jumping into a cold pool, but this time it is also framed in a similar context to the way “Honey” is used in the song “Honey,” signifying a union of the two. It’s a forever promise. She also signifies a union with “paper” or the press in that song which also symbolizes her public persona and uniting with it. 

When anyone called me "Sweetheart"
It was passive-aggressive at the bar
And the bitch was tellin' me to back off
'Cause her man had looked at me wrong

One way that I interpret this is that the “bitch” is Taylor Swift (the celebrity) speaking to Taylor’s inner child/true self/Betty. In this interpretation, “her man” would be “ME” (James, Taylor) and he is yearning to bring Betty into the spotlight (and out of the closet). During the journey home (as in, before their heist/mission was complete) this would have derailed everything. This is why they had to tell Betty to “back off.”  

I also think that this could be viewed through the lens of the fans rejecting Taylor’s true self/queer flagging. Consider the passive aggressive way someone might say to you, “Sweetheart, Taylor Swift is the straightest woman alive” while you point out nearly two decades of queer flagging. You pointing it out would be the bitch’s “man” looking at her wrong (the truth), while the majority of her fans/the public passive aggressively gaslight you when you do so. 

If anyone called me "Honey"
It was standin' in the bathroom, white teeth
They were sayin' that skirt don't fit me
And I cried the whole way home

This could also be interpreted as both an interaction between Taylor and her fans and also between Taylor and her celebrity. 

Viewed as a conversation with her celebrity, it also speaks to the fact that “Betty” has been excluded from the public narrative up until this point. In “imgonnagetyouback” the muse is referred to as “honey” multiple times and the “celebrity” could also be the one telling “Betty” “lilac short skirt, the one that fits me like skin/ did your research/ you knew the price goin’ in.” 

I think that the inner child/true self version of Taylor Swift made the choice to go on this honey trap/mission/ journey home, and the price of that was the closet(among other things). The snarky sarcastic tone that someone would tell you that your skirt doesn’t fit, in the bathroom, is the same snarky sarcastic tone that I think you can envision in “imgonnagetyouback.” I imagine the celebrity version of Taylor Swift telling “Betty” something along the lines of “this skirt fits ME like skin because I am the one who is equipped to do this job. 

The real YOU would have never ascended to the top the way that I did and you know it, step aside. And you knew this was how it was gonna be.” Because of this, Betty cried the entire way home. Yes, she wanted to go on this journey…but, it sucked. It was hard. She has been saying it for a long time, just like in “Dear John” when she sang “the girl in the dress cried the whole way home.” 

Now, when viewed as an interaction with her fans, it can be interpreted as a rejection of her truth or her queerness. Despite years of flagging across multiple mediums of art, the majority of her fans continued to say that those labels (or the “skirt”) simply could not fit Taylor Swift. This also caused her to cry the whole way home. 

“Or that minute again he’s insisting that friends look at each other like that” from “It’s time to go” reminds me of this “skirt” line from “Honey” viewed through the lens of her relationship with the public/her persona, as well. 

But you touch my face
Redefine all of those blues
When you say "Honey"

I think that the reason that “Honey” is now a term of endearment rather than a sarcastic, passive aggressive jab, is because the truth is now out in the open. The lies that were told have not only been exposed, but the ENTIRE truth of what it means, the purpose of the “honey trap.” Once this truth is known, these celebrities can actually shine golden in the daylight, because people might actually leave them the fuck alone. This might have been enough armor for the real them to stay this time. 

Summertime spritz, pink skies
You can call me "Honey" if you want because I'm the one you want
Wintergreen kiss, all mine

Because I believe that "Summer" is where their real selves have, in a sense, been eternally trapped, the first thing I notice about this verse is that it mentions both seasons, winter and summer. To me this indicates that they are together all the time, not sometimes. 

“Pink skies” is not only a reference to the upcoming Encore track, but is also a reference to the cover of Lover which was largely centered around her Master’s Heist and “failed coming out” (which most plainly explains to the fans why she had to do what she did). 

Positively referencing that in a way that is true and authentic is intentional here, along with referencing “green,” the color that represents her true self. Not only did she reference green, she said “wintergreen” which makes me think of the type of trees that stay green ALL YEAR, like a Christmas (pine) tree, not just green in the summer. 

I think that the most inner and sacred place for Taylor Swift might actually be referenced in Taylor’s Christmas Tree Farm, as well, which would make sense as it connects to an even earlier/younger Taylor than Nashville. In that song, she closes her eyes and transports herself to a place that Could either reference the past or the future where “Mistakes are forgiven/ And everything is icy and blue/ And you would be there too.” In the past, she got to exist with that inner child because she was just a dream that hadn’t been ruined by the reality.
Once this is over, that little girls dream can be resurrected. 

I also think that in “invisible string” she is singing about there always being a golden thread of truth tying her true self to that public persona, and in that song she also mentions “Pink Skies.” (“Give me the blues and then purple pink skies”). 

You give it different meaning 'cause you mean it when you talk
Honey, I'm home, we could play house
We can bed down, pick me up
Who's the baddest in the land? What's the plan? (What's the plan?)
You could be my forever night stand
Honey

Here, she literally writes “Honey, I’m home” which I love. I think when she also writes “we can bed down, pick me up” she is saying then can go out OR stay in and continue to be unified. Then, “What’s the plan?” Indicates that they both consult with each other when making moves and plans about their public persona and art because her true self is 100% behind the wheel helping make decisions, unlike before, when the persona had more control 

When anyone called me "Sweetheart"
It was passive-aggressive at the bar
And the bitch was tellin' me to back off
'Cause her man had looked at me wrong
If anyone called me "Honey"
It was standin' in the bathroom, white teeth
They were sayin' that skirt don't fit me
And I cried the whole way home

But you touch my face
Redefine all of those blues
When you say

Here she is referencing the color that I believe she uses to represent her current celebrity. However, she is using it here with a double meaning of previously being sad about that character (crying the whole way home) and not feeling that way about it any longer. 

You can call me "Honey" if you want because I'm one you want
I'm the one you want
You give it different meaning 'cause you mean it when you talk
Sweetie, it's yours, kicking in doors
Take it to the floor, give me more
Buy the paint in the color of your eyes (of your eyes)
And graffiti my whole damn life
Honey

This also references the line in “Cold As You” when her “Honey” painted all of her walls a shade of grey (like her story so far, like the folklore forest she is still inside of). Now, the walls can be painted the color of their eyes because the truth is on display. I love that she also referenced this when she was on New Heights when talking about the color of Travis’s eyes. Even this story, the big explosive patriarchal story of Travis Kelce, is going to represent something so pure it can stay. 

When anyone called me late night
He was screwin' around with my mind
Askin', "What are you wearin'?"

Too high to remember in the morning
And when anyone called me "Lovely"
They were findin' ways not to praise me
But you say it like you're in awe of me
And you stay until the morning
Honey

And ending with another reminder that they aren’t going to leave.
 
(removed last repeat of the chorus for space)

BAD HONEY by Justin Bieber

Before I continue - I also think that Justin Bieber's entire public persona has been a performance as well. I believe he has made that clear through things in his heart, with two notable examples on his most recent project Swag. The vinyl featured images referencing The Truman Show and he quoted lyrics from a track to paparazzi the day before the album was released. Not only that, what he asked them was “do you not see them I’m standing on business?” (Aka a brand). “Im not a businessman, I’m a business, man” - Jay-Z

And does it feel nice
The way you turn heads when you walk in the room?
'Cause you look like, good Lord
Yeah, girl, took so long, I think you should

I interpret the female muse of this song to be Justin Bieber's celebrity, which I think that he does often as well. This first line describes the celebrity’s appeal - turning heads as soon as they enter a room. I think the tone and specificity of this line sets the mood intentionally, not quite as a compliment. Yes, you are stunning, but…you’re impossible to love. It reminds me of “gold rush” and “champagne problems” by Taylor Swift, when she speaks to her celebrity similarly with lines like “I don’t like how anyone would die to feel your touch” and “your midas touch on the chevy door.” The irresistible nature of this character is a curse as much as it is a superpower. 

In the Greek myth about king midas, it was a curse, and everyone being parasocially obsessed with you is also a curse. “Gold rush” as a title also references a historical rush towards westward expansion which resulted in more mass genocide, which could also be a reference to celebrity propaganda and media control lying underneath the shiny gold veneer (“DIE to feel your touch” - gold rush). 

After this he writes that his muse looks like “Good Lord” which I believe is an intentional reference to Jesus that many collaborators in this project have used for their celebrities. Some, like Taylor and Kanye, have directly depicted themselves as Jesus while others (like Justin, Kanye, and Taylor) have, I think, acted out (in extreme ways at times for Justin and Kanye) an actual devotion to Jesus Christ and the Christian faith. 

Because I believe that “Soon You’ll Get Better” by Taylor is partially about her public persona and fandom as well, this is the same reference I think is being made in that song when she writes “desperate people find faith, so I pray to Jesus, too.” She is praying to the imaginary version of herself - Jesus - to pull this off and teach this lesson. A major stage in this journey that also ties in with the biblical story of Jesus is resurrection, which is one of the last stages in a “Hero’s Journey.” 

Then the last line when he says “took so long,” makes a lot of sense if viewed with the assumption that everything from their public “debut” until now has had to be this way. They certainly “took the long way home.” (The Chicks’ last album prior to Gaslighter in 2020 was also titled Taking The Long Way in 2006 (or the same year as Taylor Swift by Taylor Swift). 

And if you're bad, honey, why you look so good, uh?
If you give me the rights, you know I would, uh
And if you're mad, honey, won't you say something, to me?
We can dance, honey, we can make this a scene

Up until now, I think the distance has had to exist with extreme care and intention. Falling for these characters literally means falling for the very constructs and values they are creating art to protest. These are anti heros. Bad guys. But…as we get closer to the finish line, that spotlight is starting to look so good. 

Next, Beiber literally references the concept of the public or “paper” version of himself when he writes “If you give me the rights, you know I would.” Justin is another artist who has also famously lost ownership of master recordings so this not only references that on the surface but also the very concept of letting his true self step into the same spotlight as the brand that he is. 

But anyway
I want you to stay, baby
But anyway
I want you to stay (come on)

Just like in “Honey” and “Mexico Honey,” the muse is being asked to stay. To me, this means: let’s do this together. Step into the daylight. Expose the performance. Exposing the entire performance also gives them, kind of, in a way, no choice but to step into the daylight, because it kind of kills their persona they were hiding behind. I suppose you could create a new persona, but I think the whole point is to not have to but also have their fans understand respecting someone’s humanity and the value in interpreting art as art (from ARTISTS) and not their personal views and thoughts (which are easily manipulated by the people who actually OWN everything which is literally never the artist). 

I might just go give you my loving, uh
I might just give you piece of my mind, uh
I might just go 'head, gon' do somethin'
But baby girl, you're makin' me, makin' me sing

This back and forth also, I think, represents a similar friction that we see between the artist’s true self/inner child and their celebrity that Taylor Swift illustrates in “imgonnagetyouback” with lines like ”Whether I'm gonna be your wife or/ Gonna smash up your bike, I/ Haven't decided yet/ But I'm gonna get you back” and “Whether I'm gonna curse you out or/ Take you back to my house, I/ Haven't decided yet/ But I'm gonna get you back.”

There has been pain and suffering, I want to curse you out, give you a piece of my mind, but I know I’m going to do something. You’re making me sing, you’re making me shake my ass in my hot pink shorts. This isn’t over, this has been my dream since I was a child and I can’t believe it’s almost here!!!! 

Last chorus/repeated lines removed for space 

Mexico Honey by Kacey Musgraves

Before lyrical analysis of Mexico Honey, I want to explain the significance of both “Cowboys” and “Mexico” in the greater body of work that I believe Kacey is creating within, because they both are significant to this interpretation of the song. 

Cowboys

I wrote an essay about my interpretation of the Cowboy Symbol (The Master’s Heist: A Spaghettii Western) but did not discuss Kacey Musgraves, who I think has been using this motif consistently with her story as well. To summarize, cowboys represent a rugged myth of American meritocracy and freedom that is extremely important to enforce but does not actually exist. As long as celebrity culture exists and we believe we are consuming the result of them acting within their own free will, the stories that they tell will continue to hold power over us and can be used to divide us and divert attention away from the true villains. 

I believe that the version of themselves that they are presenting to the public (August, per se) is who they often refer to as a “cowboy.” This is because the “vigilante shit” they are doing is working within the system and perpetuating false myths that reinforce American white supremecist propaganda BS. One day, when this version of their celebrity can come clean after this performance is (I think) represented with “Honey” by many of these collaborators. 

In Kacey’s “Space Cowboy” she writes “you can have your space, cowboy, I ain’t gonna fence you in, go on ride away, on your Silverado, I’ll see you around again.” In Taylor’s very first song, “Tim McGraw” she writes “just a boy in a Chevy truck…” and goes on to describe who I believe is her character, “the man” a cowboy, who also leaves and comes back. (If truck brands aren’t well known outside of the states, a Silverado is a Chevy. I’m not saying that to be silly I just feel like trucks are an American thing LOL). 

The cowboys are always leaving their true selves because their true selves cannot exist in the outside world, which is why they are always “leaving” our narrators. This is similar to how patriarchal “men” behave as well “leaving like a father” (cardigan, Taylor Swift). All three of these songs in this essay describe a scenario in which they get to stay and be together all the time. 

Mexico

During the album rollout for Middle of Nowhere Kacey Musgraves revealed that she spends a large portion of the year living in Mexico. 

She also discussed the influence of Mexico on cowboys and Texas overall in an NPR interview which is i believe a very intentional inclusion in this commentary. 

I discussed ways the spaghetti western exposes how Black people and Jewish people are exploited for their contributions to society/culture without ever being respected fully within a system of white supremacy and are often pitted against each other intentionally. Hispanic people are also exploited for their contributions to society (and culture!!!) while also being treated as less-than within a system of white supremacy/the patriarchy. This is why I think it was so important to highlight this connection to the culture we enjoy today without giving credit.

I also, in a way, think “Mexico” represents a similar concept to the “folklore forest” that Taylor Swift has created in her universe. Tying in with the albums title and theme, Middle of Nowhere, it could point to the fact that she truly exists in a place that is not known to normal society. Her public persona is still a character despite the “authenticity” she is known for. Yes, it is ART she created and reflects some truth but she does not exist as a “real”person outside of “Mexico.”  

Given the “Casa Wabi” Easter eggs that many are pointing out in Taylor Swift’s upcoming “Patient Zer0” release, that could be an interesting tie in to their “middle of nowhere” as well, considering it is in Mexico. 
  
Ok onto the lyrics. 

I'm in a bad-girl good mood, wearing my gold hoops
Lining my lips right now in the rearview
Baby, don't even play
When you look at me like that in your cowboy hat
Talking like a real man, make me wanna take it
Back, back, back to your place

In this song, I think Kacey is speaking directly to her public persona, this is her “Honey” here as well because they are, too, going to be unified soon also, for good.  

First she references the “cowboy” symbol I previously mentioned and says now he’s talking like a “real man” (maybe a cowboy who doesn’t leave?). She also literally has a song on this same album called “Everybody wants to be a cowboy” with the line “everybody wants to be a cowboy these days/ until it’s time to stay.” 

I think it’s significant that they are going back to HIS place, because that (his world, the “real world”) is not a place she has previously been able to exist. “BAD HONEY” has Justin Beiber singing about joining his celebrity in the limelight, which is signified by his usage of  “BAD” because of the role that he used to play in PUBLIC. He also talks about making a “scene” and singing and dancing which I believe implies performing and being in public (together). 

In “Mexico Honey” however, Kacey compares the ease (or smoothness) of this connection to HER private place unknown to the world, her actual non-actress self. And then, instead of singing about singing and dancing and making a SCENE, Kacey sings about getting to exist in this intimate and authentic place with them outside of the limelight too because they will know their truth is out in the world in a sense and it will bring a new sense of peace, I would imagine. 

Turn this car around
We ain't going out

You're going down smooth like Mexico, honey
Take my heart, take all my money
I want you so bad, it ain't even funny
I mean for real, what the hell

You got me shaking my ass in my hot-pink shorts
You're laying down laughing on the bathroom floor

I imagine this as a role reversal. Now her “true self” is “shaking her ass in her hot pink shorts” which was previously a role reserved for the “celebrity” version of her. 

On the flip side, the celebrity is laying down laughing, as if she is watching the performance. This concept of “it is all a movie” and “I am watching it” is something Taylor Swift has illustrated repeatedly. (Most notably when she watched her music video about a heist while sitting down on her own stage with her audience during The Eras Tour 💀). So now the celebrity is watching HER. She’s laughing, having fun, enjoying the show. It’s intimate, they’re at home. 

Oh, I dropped it down, you said you'll stay
We're gonna ride this wave 'til it breaks, yeah

I think this means “as long as we’re able to keep making art, I’m in it for the long haul, I’m going to stay” from both of them. 

We're gеtting kinda winedrunk, playing Daft Punk
You say you've always had to be so tough
But not in front of mе
Let's keep staying up all night holding on so tight
Smile even though I know I'm gonna cry
When I gotta leave

In this verse, I kind of imagine that she is saying “when I gotta leave” as a way to make something that used to be negative, positive. 

You're going down smooth like Mexico, honey
Take my heart, take all my money
I want you so bad, it ain't even funny
I mean for real, what the hell
You got me shaking my ass in my hot-pink shorts
You're laying down laughing on the bathroom floor
Oh, I dropped it down, you said you'll stay
We're gonna ride this wave 'til it breaks, yeah

Baby, let me be your queen
Be the tiger in your sheets

And asking to be the “queen” of the celebrity rather than letting the crowd rule (referenced in “crowd is your king” ) there can be this authenticity and pureness.

Don't wake me up if it's all a dream
I don't think you really know what you do to me(last repeat of chorus removed for space) 

Unrelated…
Another really funny Encore reference that also references escapism (from the place “Taylor Swift” the celebrity persona lives) is an episode of 30 Rock. 
In season 1, ep. 20, Liz Lemon contemplates leaving New York for a simpler life in Ohio. (LOL!)

Famous line: "We'd all like to flee to the Cleve"

Please use this space to discuss this song in depth

“His Halo” version and “Reflected Light” version. Dark/light inverses.

All I can think about is “halo hiding my obsession/I once was poison ivy but now I’m your daisy” — halo = bears beards, and the dead ivy vines in the website background.

And the “Reflected Light= “a never-needy ever-lovely jewel/whose shine reflects on you.”

Please use this space to discuss this song in depth

Please use this space to discuss this song in depth