No surprise here: “Patient Zero,” the song Taylor Swift announced Tuesday, is not an orphan. The pop superstar followed news od the single a day later with a Wednesday morning reveal for a project that incluces four new tracks —”The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore.”
On social media, Swift wrote, “About a year ago, you guys did a truly unfathomable thing. Something that completely blew my mind… You gave ‘The Life of a Showgirl’ the biggest first week for an album in history. I took a trip to Sweden to celebrate with Max and Shellback, my two collaborators on this album. Really we just wanted to reflect and take in how grateful we were for the moment we were in, but there was a studio there and we did what we do when we feel anything at all: We wrote more songs. I hope you love them, because they were born out of pure gratitude for your exuberance for and celebration of the album we made. ‘The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore’ including four new songs is out on Friday and available to pre-order and save now.”
Prior to “Showgirl,” she hadn’t worked with that dynamic duo since 2018’s “Reputation,” but apparently the reunion went so well, she couldn’t resist an extension.
For now, it puts to bed the previous widespread conjecture that Swift was certain to put out “Taylor Swift (Taylor’s Version)” this fall to celebrate the 20th anniversary of her debut album. But setting that aside for an all-new collection is a tradeoff most fans will be happy with. So, “Our Song (Middle Aged Version)” can wait. A