Thursday 22 October 2026
Sunday BestJournalThe expanded edition arrived September 25, three days after Swift announced the single 'Patient Zero.' Reviews are mixed, with praise for instrumentation but doubts about the lyrics.
Taylor Swift's expanded album The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore arrived on Friday, September 25, adding four new songs to her 2025 record. The tracks are "Patient Zero," "Cleveland!," "Pink Clouding" and "Babylon," listed as tracks 13 through 16 [1][3].
The original The Life of a Showgirl came out in 2025. In the UK it debuted at Number 1 on the Official Albums Chart in October 2025 with 423,000 chart units, the biggest opening week of Swift's career there and the biggest for an international album this century [3]. It later finished 2025 as the UK's biggest album with 642,000 combined chart units [3]. Swift said the album had "the biggest first week for an album in history" [1][3][4].
Swift said she traveled to Sweden with producers Max Martin and Shellback, who worked on the album. They went to celebrate but found a studio and wrote more songs [1][3][4]. Before this week, fans had largely assumed there would be no expanded edition because Swift had said she was satisfied with the 12-song version [1]. Swift had also hinted at the project: the phrase "Patient for the encore" appeared in the music video for "Opalite," and an Emmys sketch included words whose third letters spelled "encore" [1].
On Tuesday, Swift announced "Patient Zero" as a single. The release was promoted with three physical CD editions: the original recording, a piano version and an acoustic version [3]. The single followed a campaign in which Swift replaced the letter O with zeroes across her social media [3]. The next day, she revealed that the song was part of The Encore [1][4]. In an Instagram post, Swift wrote, "I hope you love them, because they were born out of pure gratitude for your exuberance for and celebration of the album we made" [1][3][4]. The announcement drew nearly 3 million likes within hours [4].
The Encore is digital-only so far. No physical release has been announced. Apple Music lists the project as two discs, the original 12 tracks and the four new ones, while Spotify shows a single 16-track running order [1]. The cover photography is by Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott [1][3].
The expanded album arrives amid a wider pattern of deluxe releases. LaineyGossip reported that the original Showgirl had 11 CD editions and 8 vinyl editions and noted that artists use variants and deluxes to increase sales [2]. The site said the original album sold more than four million album units and speculated about whether a deluxe edition could set a sales record [2]. Variety also noted that the release puts to rest earlier conjecture that Swift would put out a re-recorded version of her debut album this fall [1].
Reviews have been mixed. Exclaim! said the four songs have enjoyable instrumental moments but argued that Swift, Martin and Shellback "still can't find a proper hook" and that the lyrics are either "vapidly juvenile" or seem written with a thesaurus [5]. PureWow's Marissa Wu called the tracks "bops, but they weren't special" and wrote that the encore "plays the victim," "makes a very late apology" and that "every song has a great bridge," but feels static [6].
Corrections. To report an error, write to corrections@sundaybestjournal.com. We list corrections on the corrections page.
Culture and style correspondent
Iris Novak covers books, film, art, design and fashion for Sunday Best. She writes from published reporting and announcements, and does not review works.
Opening in London on 22 May 2027, the show brings together around 40 works by artists including Picasso, Freud, Rembrandt and Magritte before touring Edinburgh, Belfast and Cardiff.
By Iris Novak
Apple Corps says the venue will open in 2028 and span around 9,300 square metres, more than four times the current footprint, with a separate Yellow Submarine viewing platform in St Johns Beacon.
By Iris Novak
