If you want to change the culture, listen to Taylor Swift’s new album.
Before you freak out, let me explain.
Taylor Swift, as you’ve likely heard, has a new album out this weekend, entitled, “The Life of a Showgirl.”
Like Swift’s last four albums, this one comes in two versions.
The main one – promoted on Spotify and Apple Music, pressed on vinyl, and eventually sung in concerts – is full of explicit lyrics. The second, a “clean” version which swaps out the explicit content, can only be found by searching specifically for it on streaming. The difference between the two is striking.
The main album of “The Life of a Showgirl” boasts some of the most overt sexual references and language in her career. The fast-paced “Wood” sounds so much like The Jackson 5’s “I Want You Back” that you might miss the over-the-top references to her sexual relationship with fiancé Travis Kelce in a song with the echoing refrain, “His love was the key that opened my thighs.”
In “Father Figure” we hear the word “d**k” on repeat, though not in a sexual context. “CANCELLED!” boasts the f-word, and a number of songs employ “b***h.” The most shocking and border-pushing lyric comes in “Actually Romantic,” where Swift jokingly remarks that one of her haters talks about her so much that “it’s kind of making me wet.”
I cannot, therefore, recommend the main album. Any positive messages get lost in a sea of expletives and sexual overtones.
Yet it seems like Swift knows this. It seems like she knows that her main version crosses lines that many people in her audience simply can’t listen to on repeat.
Enter the clean version.
The clean album isn’t simply the same recording with her profanities muted. No, in this album she replaces the language altogether. Below are a few examples.
Original: “But I’m not a bad b***h.”
Clean: “But I’m not the baddest.”
Original: “I can make deals with the devil because my d**k is bigger.”
Clean: “I can make deals with the devil because my check is bigger.”
Original: “His love was the key that opened my thighs.”
Clean: “His love was the key that opened my skies.”
These adjustments seem natural, in their context. It's like they could have been the original lyrics all along.
What we get, as a result, feels like a completely different album where profanities dissipate to reveal an artist who earnestly wants to marry her fiancé. She wants to “have a couple kids … have the whole block looking like you.” In this album, we hear an artist who promises to be faithful in her marriage, “I’m never going to break that vow. I’m never going to leave you now.”
Even if you’re understandably not a fan of Swift, these messages are worth repeating to the many Americans who will readily listen to them.
Here’s the deal. Swift will continue to make music. Since 2020, she has released countless songs, made over $2 billion on tour, and her almost yearly releases top the charts within seconds. Swift has a hold on millions of fans who are deeply dedicated to her. She will continue to shape culture whether we like it or not.
And right now, she feels a need to create clean versions of her songs. This means, to some degree, there is a demand for it, that there may be a culture shift happening, and that Swift knows it. And we must show the most important and influential singer of our time that clean music is worth making.
I wonder what Swift would do if the clean album got more streams than the main one? My bet is that she would take notes. Maybe even change her direction.
Parker Snider is a minister and writer based in Birmingham. Before entering ministry, he worked in policy and communications at both the state and national level. A lifelong movie fan, Snider writes here about film, exploring what on-screen stories reveal about the off-screen world.
This culture article was made possible by The Fred & Rheta Skelton Center for Cultural Renewal, a project of 1819 News. To comment on this article, please email [email protected]. The views and opinions expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy or position of 1819 News.
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