With The Life of a Showgirl: The Encoreversion expanded with four unreleased tracks from her twelfth album, Taylor Swift made a confusing choice. For Maya Georgi, from WECB US, these titles blur the story of Showgirl and make the future of Taylor Swift indecipherable: turn towards cinema with Searchlight Pictures, race for the 2027 Grammys or return to country for the 20th anniversary of her first album.
Taylor Swift has always loved stories. This is what has distinguished his writing for twenty years now, and what has allowed him to maintain his status as an all-powerful superstar. In his work and in the way he presents it, Swift has woven powerful stories of heartache, success, redemption, torment and glory, where all the pieces fit together and it is easy to take sides.
With his latest album, The Life of a ShowgirlSwift delivered a glittering tale of triumph. Finally, finally, the girl who had spent her entire life trying to put the feeling of love into words had changed the prophecy by getting engaged to Travis Kelce (whom she has since married). Professionally too, Swift was at the top. She had just bought back the masters of her albums thanks to the proceeds from her historic Eras Tour, a culminating tour of her entire career, which had inspired the project.
But it’s impossible to deny that the musician’s twelfth album was her most divisive to date (yes, even more than Reputationin 2017). Some of the critics and fans alike did not like the way in which the idea of “showgirl” was translated, musically as in the themes. But whether you love it or hate it, Showgirl was the perfect way for Swift to savor her success, and set the stage for her next jaw-dropping number.
Which is why it’s so baffling that this master storyteller decided the show wasn’t over, walking out The Life of a Showgirl: The Encoreincreased by four bonus tracks. One of the great strengths of the original album was that Swift delivered a tight record of 12 songs, and only 12. “There is no thirteenth, there are no others who will arrive”she declared last year. “Every song is on this album for hundreds of reasons, you see, and you couldn’t take one out and keep the same album. We couldn’t add one. This is exactly what is needed. »
And now the story is suddenly enriched with a new chapter, with the addition of “Patient Zero”, “Cleveland! », “Pink Clouding” and “Babylon”. Unfortunately, as many fans have pointed out, none of these songs add anything to the narrative posed by Showgirl.
Swift explained that she wrote these bonus tracks last year, in the wake of the album’s success. “We just wanted to step back and savor how grateful we were for the moment we were living.”she said, speaking of project collaborators Max Martin and Shellback. At that time, Swift had just gotten engaged; However, its lead single, “Patient Zero,” looks back on a past relationship. “Pink Clouding” also looks back on an old flame, but without the nostalgia full of regret that made “Ruin the Friendship” a track in its own right. “Cleveland!” », for its part, takes up the overflowing joy and madly in love of “Honey” and “Wood”, adding an almost resentful touch. And then there is “Babylon”, which now brings down the curtain: Swift still distils a few pearls of wisdom on an acoustic track that would have had more of a place on Folklore Or Evermore. Truth be told, the four songs all seem to be taken from previous albums, like Midnights Or The Tortured Poets Department. With these four titles, she has not only confused the history of Showgirl : she also blurred that of Taylor Swift™.
Swift is a renowned strategist, planning her career moves years in advance, and has been praised for her marketing masterstrokes. But where is the showgirl going now? The Encore raises more questions about Swift’s next chapter than it does forge a clear path forward.
During the 2026 MTV VMAs, Swift unveiled the very cinematic music video for “Patient Zero”. It’s a chilling thriller, and one of his most impressive videos to date. Was that the aim of the whole operation, to highlight his full-throttle shift towards cinema? We know that the musician is preparing her directorial debut with Searchlight Pictures. Maybe she finally found the time to finish this film, and that’s why she worked on the soundtrack for Toy Story 5.
