Taylor Swift dropped her new album at midnight on Oct. 3 titled “The Life of a Showgirl” with 12 tracks and a collaboration with Sabrina Carpenter on the song “The Life of a Showgirl.”
While people were listening to the music from around the world, here in Athens, the Junior Jewels — a Taylor Swift fan club at the University of Georgia — held an album-listening party.
Starting at 10:30 p.m. that day, Taylor Swift fans and Junior Jewels members gathered in Zell B. Miller Learning Center. They played card games, did homework, bought Junior Jewels pins and made album bingo cards as they waited.
When Isaiah Williams, president elect of Junior Jewels and third-year psychology major, found out about the event, he said he was stressed because he had to start planning.
“As soon as I became president elect, I knew that she was going to drop something, and that’s exactly what she did,” Williams said. “But honestly, I’m excited for a new album. She’s going back to pop, which is really exciting.”
Lauren Donegan, second-year astrophysics major, “freaked out” when they found out about the new release and family members started sending congratulatory texts to them.
A cheer went up in the room at midnight and then the listening began. There were claps at the end of some songs and gasps at the lyrics of others, especially the song “Wood.” The event ended around 1 a.m. after the club listened to the whole album.
“So I would say absolutely, the fact that we’re able to have a whole club based around her is, I think, testament to the fact that, like her, music genuinely does bring people together,” Williams said.
According to data from Statista and Box Office Mojo as of Dec. 10, 2024, her Eras Tour brought the world together with 149 concerts that spanned the globe with about 10.1 million spectators and $2.1 billion in ticket sales.
“…oh, you feel heartbreak. I feel heartbreak. We’re the same. We’re on two different sides of the world, but we feel the same thing,” said Olivia Brookshire, second-year cognitive science major, who went to two Eras Tour concerts.
She said she likes that Swift has songs from different genres.
Swift’s catalog has lots of diversity between genres with her song “Willow” being on Billboard’s Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart for 31 weeks to her song “We are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” being on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart for 34 weeks.
Gabrielle Kutsup is a journalism major in the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Georgia.
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