{"id":83427,"date":"2025-08-20T22:08:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T22:08:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/83427\/"},"modified":"2025-08-20T22:08:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T22:08:08","slug":"taylor-swift-played-us-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/83427\/","title":{"rendered":"Taylor Swift played us again"},"content":{"rendered":"

Maybe it\u2019s the dire state of the housing market lately, but I can\u2019t seem to find a rock that\u2019s suitable to live under. This stone is too porous, that boulder is too jagged; none of them has a square footage large enough to crush me so flat that an airtight seal will form between myself and the ground. Every rock I could conceivably live under has been compromised, and that\u2019s just how Taylor Swift<\/a> wants it.<\/p>\n

Even if you\u2019ve been living under a rock, it surely hasn\u2019t been enough to shelter you from the news of Taylor Swift\u2019s upcoming new album, \u201cThe Life of a Showgirl.\u201d After all, you\u2019re a human moving about the earth, and that means you\u2019ve had this information disseminated through one of millions of T.S.-branded channels and firmly planted in your prefrontal cortex. It\u2019s not just that there are headlines written every time Swift so much as breathes, it\u2019s that there are headlines written that speculate when Swift will breathe and how long her breath will be. Will the breath be deep or shallow? Wheezy if, God forbid, the pop star has been stricken with a laryngeal malady? Or is she going to release a re-recording of her breath, along with a set of new, exclusive breaths from the vault? The constant theorizing about these breaths alone is enough to send the world into a frenzy. Naturally, when the breaths are strung together between lyrics and put to music in the form of an album, it\u2019s a seismic event, one that no rock forged is strong enough to withstand.<\/p>\n

One must remember that, in this period of late-stage Swiftian world domination, everything the pop star does should be considered a marketing move. Global supremacy doesn\u2019t happen by chance, which means Swift can leave nothing up to the fates.<\/p>\n

But when Swift announced \u201cThe Life of a Showgirl\u201d earlier this month, the news came in stark contrast to how the pop star revealed her last two original albums. While 2024\u2019s \u201cThe Tortured Poets Department<\/a>\u201d and 2022\u2019s \u201cMidnights<\/a>\u201d were respectively announced during the Grammys<\/a> and VMAs<\/a>, the earth-shattering news about \u201cThe Life of a Showgirl\u201d dropped on . . . a podcast<\/a>. Swift didn\u2019t just pop up on any old podcast, though; she appeared on her boyfriend Travis Kelce\u2019s<\/a> Wondery network show, \u201cNew Heights,\u201d which Kelce hosts alongside his brother, Jason. Still, compared to the live-television spectacles that accompanied Swift\u2019s last two album announcements, or the jaw-dropping surprise releases of \u201cFolklore\u201d and \u201cEvermore\u201d just five months apart, her latest move was decidedly low-key for the most famous woman in the world \u2014 or, at least it seemed that way. In mere hours and without any of the singer\u2019s usual pomp and circumstance, Swift\u2019s episode of \u201cNew Heights\u201d smashed viewership records and became global headline news. After wrapping up her eye-poppingly<\/a> successful Eras Tour<\/a> and reaching the brink of celebrity overexposure in her public relationship with Kelce, Swift needed a way to forge forward with her latest record in a manner that wouldn\u2019t deter sales or skew coverage. \u201cNew Heights\u201d didn\u2019t just give Swift the opportunity to humanize herself to those teetering on Taylor Swift fatigue; the show also allowed her to cleverly capitalize on a booming medium while remaining in control of how the latest chapter of her story will be shaped.<\/p>\n

To understand the built-in hype that Swift leveraged by appearing on \u201cNew Heights,\u201d one must remember that, in this period of late-stage Swiftian world domination, everything the pop star does should be considered a marketing move. Global supremacy doesn\u2019t happen by chance, which means Swift can leave nothing up to the fates. Her art is her business, and Swift herself is a brand. More than any of her contemporaries, Swift has made herself synonymous with modern consumerism. A post<\/a> teasing the new era on the fan club account managed by Swift\u2019s team, Taylor Nation, was immediately inundated with corporate accounts in the replies, with businesses like Crumbl Cookies<\/a>, Dunkin\u2019<\/a> and Walmart<\/a> hurrying to comment so their brands could be aligned with Swift\u2019s monolithic capitalist image. Cringey corporate memes<\/a> and a swath of orange-hued profile pictures followed, with Adweek publishing a guide<\/a> to the consumerist chaos. After the organic success of Charli XCX\u2019s<\/a> \u201cBrat\u201d led to brand accounts co-opting that album\u2019s lime green color scheme and sans-serif typeface, it\u2019s no surprise that the trend is continuing with Swift.<\/p>\n

But Swift and these corporations are symbiotic. Swift\u2019s enormous fanbase has proven time and again that they will follow her wherever she goes, and more importantly, buy whatever she puts out. She has commodified herself to such an extent that brands leap to associate themselves with her. And because Swift\u2019s fanbase is its own controlled revenue stream, corporations stand to make a buck if they can successfully make their image synonymous with Swift\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce on New Heights podcast. pic.twitter.com\/qeOrHBlY7z<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Pop Base (@PopBase) August 13, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n

Because she\u2019s made herself the big, blonde sun we all orbit around, Swift was free to let the hype roll in while she readied her next move. There were two days between Swift revealing the album title (with the cover art blurred) in the initial \u201cNew Heights\u201d teaser and the episode itself. In that time, a countdown appeared on her website that corresponded to the episode\u2019s release. In the meantime, fans could preorder the album in various formats, or click an \u201cadd all to cart\u201d button to simplify the process for hoarders \u2014 sorry, collectors. When the full, two-hour episode<\/a> of \u201cNew Heights\u201d dropped August 13, the album\u2019s standard cover art was revealed, and three additional vinyl variants were made available for preorder. At the same time, viewership of the episode\u2019s live premiere soared past<\/a> other popular podcasts and smashed<\/a> the show\u2019s previous records in less than a day. What was a relatively modest announcement for Swift became a boon for the Kelce brothers, with the \u201cNew Heights\u201d YouTube channel growing its subscriber base by hundreds of thousands in just over a week. Swift\u2019s appearance in the \u201cNew Heights\u201d studio was not just a casual drop-by, but a joint marketing effort intended to benefit multiple parties.<\/p>\n

For her part, Swift played coy. \u201cI think we all know that if there\u2019s one thing male sports fans want to see in their spaces and on their screens, it\u2019s more of me,\u201d Swift joked at the top of the show. And while that quip might reflect the boos that Swift received<\/a> at this year\u2019s Super Bowl, it doesn\u2019t exactly echo her impact on the sports world at large. Since Swift and Kelce began dating in late 2023, television ratings spiked<\/a> whenever Swift was in attendance at a game, as did sales<\/a> for game-day tickets and merchandise like official team jerseys. Though Swift might incur some ire from football traditionalists, her entr\u00e9e into the sports world has grown her audience and popularized the NFL on a global scale, unlike ever before. When Swift dated actors and musicians, those were areas of culture that she and her fanbase were already steeped in. But in her high-profile relationship with arguably the most famous football player in the country, Swift has made the sectors of culture she was once absent from into her domain. What\u2019s profitable for Swift \u2014 either in terms of literal money or cultural notoriety \u2014 is just as lucrative for Kelce. In hindsight, it should\u2019ve been easy to see that the only thing the all-American singer needed for the next stage of her ascent was a football-playing homecoming king.<\/p>\n

Start your day with essential news from Salon.
Sign up for our free morning newsletter<\/a>, Crash Course.<\/p>\n

But it wasn\u2019t just the news that Swift was on \u201cNew Heights\u201d that made waves; it was that Swift was doing a podcast at all. As fans quickly pointed out, Swift has never been a guest on any other podcast throughout her long career. (Though, it is worth noting that the medium began to take off right around the time Swift started to shy away from doing formal press, coinciding with the 2017 release of \u201cReputation\u201d and a public reckoning with her image.) The closest thing Swift had done to a podcast was the livestream event<\/a> announcing 2012\u2019s \u201cRed,\u201d which has a paltry two million views compared to the \u201cNew Heights\u201d episode\u2019s 19 million and counting. No matter how strange it might seem for a star of Swift\u2019s caliber to announce her new album on a podcast of all places, it\u2019s an undeniably savvy marketing play. YouTube<\/a> is quickly becoming one of the top media destinations<\/a> for viewers, and Swift understands that a video podcast is far less ephemeral than a mere press release or Instagram post.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s profitable for Swift \u2014 either in terms of literal money or cultural notoriety \u2014 is just as lucrative for Kelce. In hindsight, it should\u2019ve been easy to see that the only thing the all-American singer needed for the next stage of her ascent was a football-playing homecoming king.<\/p>\n

The decision to appear on \u201cNew Heights\u201d also fits into another Swiftian trope: the desire to remain in control of the narrative. Since the \u201cReputation\u201d era, Swift has made martyrdom into a billion-dollar industry, a smart move further aided by her public enemy, Scooter Braun,<\/a> purchasing her master recordings in 2019. In the years-long struggle<\/a> to regain control of her masters, Swift played up her role as the target of a cruel plan, concocted by a man who wanted to govern a woman\u2019s art. This stretch of her career was capped by the Eras Tour, a live celebration of Swift\u2019s life\u2019s work, during which she put out multiple re-recordings of her music. The tour might\u2019ve been a gargantuan success, but it also exhausted a sect of the public who didn\u2019t care about 24\/7 Swift-mania. As a result, \u201cThe Tortured Poets Department\u201d only spawned one moderately successful single and received subpar reviews (at least by Swift\u2019s standards).<\/p>\n

\"Travis<\/p>\n

(Patrick Smith\/Getty Images) Travis Kelce celebrates with Taylor Swift after a 17-10 victory against the Baltimore Ravens on January 28, 2024, in Baltimore, Maryland.<\/p>\n

Though not a stumble by most people\u2019s measure, Swift doesn\u2019t like her footing to be unstable. She\u2019s quietly looking to regain an appealing level of accessibility, one that requires a low lift and looks down-to-earth, like being on a podcast. She\u2019s not taking a step down from the world\u2019s biggest stages; she\u2019s simply pivoting to face the camera. \u201cI\u2019m in the business of human emotion,\u201d Swift says during the show, cunningly nodding to the way she\u2019s commodified her feelings and made a profit on relatability. And at this point in her career, a two-hour podcast talking straight to fans only fuels the parasocial relationship that she\u2019s built with them, thus bolstering her star back into the stratosphere without forcing anyone to watch it rise.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s more, \u201cNew Heights\u201d is a controlled environment where Swift can manage the questions, framing and larger narrative to ensure nothing strays from the story she\u2019s built, something that\u2019s not always possible in traditional interviews. When Swift says, for example, that industry trades said her re-recordings were \u201ca bad idea\u201d that \u201cnobody would be interested in,\u201d neither Kelce balks despite the statement being unfounded. It does, however, fit neatly into the story Swift has been peddling<\/a> about the project since 2022, as does her claim that she never thought about partnering with Shamrock Holdings, which purchased her masters in 2020, despite posting an open letter that same year<\/a> stating otherwise.<\/p>\n

But all cynicism and nitpicking aside, it is admittedly fascinating to see Swift sit down for an extended period to talk about her life and career. The level of fame she\u2019s attained might translate to enormous financial success, but it\u2019s also kept Swift frustratingly isolated from the vulnerability in her art. Whether \u201cNew Heights\u201d marks a change in the way Swift chooses to do interviews, or if it\u2019s solely another brilliant business move designed to resemble marketable candor, remains to be seen. But one can only hope for the former. I want feathered hats, scraping the \u201cCall Her Daddy<\/a>\u201d studio ceilings, and Terry Gross<\/a> counting the number of sequins on a bodysuit during a very special episode of \u201cFresh Air.\u201d If we\u2019re all going to be forced to live the life of this showgirl forever, delivering a bit of that promised glitz outside of a football podcast would be a good place to start.<\/p>\n

Read more<\/p>\n

about what Taylor Swift\u2019s been up to (if, somehow, you didn\u2019t know)<\/p>\n