Songfacts®:

• "Woman's World" is the lead single from Katy Perry's sixth studio album, 143. The pop-feminist anthem finds Perry on a mission to empower women worldwide as she belts out lyrics that highlight the qualities women embody.
• In August 2020, Perry gave birth to her first child, a daughter named Daisy Dove Bloom. Speaking with Apple Music, she explained how motherhood rekindled a desire to create music that resonated.
  
  "People, when they think of me, they think of 'Roar,' they think of 'Firework,' sometimes they think of 'I Kissed a Girl,' but I think mostly they think of these kind of empowering songs," Perry said. "Songs with a message, songs that are captions on T-shirts and stuff like that, or things that help people get through. And I love that. I love hearing the stories and really, I write these songs from a place where I need to get through something. But so I wanted to continue with that and also, this is the first contribution I have given since becoming a mother and since feeling really connected to my feminine divine."
• Katy Perry co-wrote the track with Chloe Angelides and its producers Dr. Luke, Aaron Joseph, Vaughn Oliver, and Rocco Did It Again!
  
  The inclusion of Dr. Luke raised some eyebrows. Perry's a frequent flyer on Dr. Luke's production magic carpet, having soared to the top of the charts with hits like "I Kissed A Girl," "California Gurls," and "Dark Horse" cooked up by the duo, but this was their first collaboration following Kesha's lawsuit against Dr. Luke accusing him of sexual assault. Luke maintained his innocence, and in 2023 a settlement was reached in the case.
• The album title, 143, is a numeric code for "I love you," commonly used in the early '90s in the days of pagers. Speaking about the album, Perry said: "I set out to create a bold, exuberant, celebratory dance-pop album with the symbolic 143 numerical expression of love as a throughline message."
• The music video, directed by Charlotte Rutherford (Lil Nas X, Nicki Minaj), opens with a seemingly empowering scene: Perry, a scantily clad Rosie the Riveter wannabe, wielding power tools and defying gender stereotypes. But then it takes a detour into the bizarre. A rogue anvil flattens Perry, and she magically reappears in a white bikini with bionic legs.
  
  The rest of the video resembles a fever dream, with Perry refueling at a gas pump and driving a monster truck with internet personality Trisha Paytas.
  
  Many viewers questioned why a supposedly female empowering visual contains so much imagery that caters to the male gaze.
  
  Responding to criticism, Perry said the video it was intended to satirize the subject of gender norms.
  
  "You can do anything! Even satire!" she wrote on X. "We're kind of just having fun, being a bit sarcastic with it. It's very slapstick and very on the nose."
  
  "And with this set, it's like, 'Oooh, we're not about the male gaze but we really are about the male gaze,' and we're really overplaying it and on the nose because I'm about to get smashed which is like a reset for me, and a reset for my idea of feminine divine, and it's a whole different world we go to after this."
  
  "We wanted to open this video making it look like a super high gloss pop star video, and that's what it is," she concluded.
• Katy Perry played "Woman's World" live for the first time at an intimate show at the Evita in Los Angeles on August 23, 2024.
• 143 marks a turning point in Perry's career as the first project born from a place of personal and professional contentment. Speaking with Apple Music's Zane Lowe, Perry reflected on her journey through previous albums: "One of the Boys was like, oh my God, hold on to this ride. Then Teenage Dream and Prism - my personal life was not really working, but my professional life was."
  
  Things began to shift with Witness, bringing more balance to her life, which Smile then solidified. But with 143, Perry finds herself writing from an entirely new place.
  
  "This album is a celebration of feeling whole," she explained, adding that for the first time, she's creating from a space of peace rather than pain.
  
  She also addressed a common misconception among artists: "The biggest lie we've ever been sold is that we have to stay in pain to create." With 143, Perry rejects that narrative, offering a new perspective fueled by fulfillment rather than trauma.