As Taylor Swift’s new album, The Life of a Showgirl, forges an historic first week, its accolades extend to Billboard’s radio charts.
The Republic-released set’s lead single promoted to radio, “The Fate of Ophelia,” blasts in as the first song ever to debut in the top 10 of Billboard’s Pop Airplay chart, at No. 8 on the list dated Oct 18. It passes two hits — one by Swift — that each started at a prior No. 12 best: her own “Shake It Off” (Sept. 6, 2014) and Mariah Carey’s “Dreamlover” (Aug. 14, 1993). Those hits went on to two and eight weeks at No. 1, respectively; Swift holds the record for the most leaders — 13 — in the chart’s 33-year history.
Multiple chains gave “The Fate of Ophelia” concentrated play on its first day of release (Oct. 3), while Swift has made promotional rounds including on iHeartMedia’s Elvis Duran and the Morning Show that day. “That one, just as soon as we wrote it, I had a feeling it would be the that one we’d go with first and the one I’d get to make a music video for,” she told Duran of the song.
“The Fate of Ophelia” also makes an unprecedented start on Adult Pop Airplay, at No. 8. It’s just the third song — all by Swift — to open in the chart’s top 10, outpacing No. 9 bows for “Fortnight,” featuring Post Malone (May 4, 2024), and “Shake It Off” (Sept. 6, 2014).
Plus, “The Fate of Ophelia” charges onto Adult Contemporary at No. 10, Swift’s first top 10 debut on the chart and the best beginning since Adele’s “Easy of Me” (No. 6, Oct. 23, 2021, on its way to a 24-week command).
Given its entrance on Pop Airplay, “The Fate of Ophelia” is, thus, the first song ever to debut in the top 10 of all three pop/adult radio rankings.
Swift scores her 27th top 10 on Pop Airplay, second only to Rihanna’s 30. On Adult Pop Airplay, Swift adds her record-extending 33rd top 10. On Adult Contemporary, she ups her count to a milestone 20 top 10s.
Billboard’s Pop Airplay chart ranks songs by weekly plays on more than 150 mainstream top 40 radio stations monitored by Mediabase, with data provided to Billboard by Luminate. Adult Pop Airplay ranks songs by weekly plays on nearly 80 adult top 40 stations and Adult Contemporary ranks songs by weekly plays on more than 80 adult contemporary stations.
Meanwhile, other songs from The Life of a Showgirl make airplay chart debuts. “Opalite” (No. 34); the title track, featuring Sabrina Carpenter (No. 38); and “Wi$h Li$t” (No. 39) all enter Pop Airplay. On Adult Pop Airplay, they start at Nos. 24, 32 and 33, respectively, along with “Elizabeth Taylor” (No. 39) and “Cancelled!” (No. 40). On Adult Contemporary, “The Life of a Showgirl” debuts at No. 26.
More cuts from the album are receiving early play, including the frisky “Wood.” Notably, a radio edit of the song changes the line, “His love was the key that opened my thighs,” to the squeaky-clean, “His love was the key that opened my skies.” “It really started out in a very innocent place,” Swift said sheepishly on NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, on Monday, Oct. 6. “I don’t know what happened, man …”
Billboard is expected to announce the debut of The Life of a Showgirl on the Oct. 18-dated Billboard 200 albums chart on Sunday (Oct. 12). Highlights of the set’s impact on the multimetric Billboard Hot 100 songs chart are scheduled to post Monday (Oct. 13), with all charts dated Oct. 18 updating Tuesday (Oct. 14) on Billboard.com.
