Taylor Swift‘s new song “Patient Zero,” along with 3 more new songs, dropped on Friday, September 25 after a short countdown. Swift announced the single was on the way with rather short notice, telling her fans about the release just three days ahead of time on Tuesday, September 22 in an Instagram post.
The 36-year-old songwriting phenom wrote, “I’ve been impatiently waiting to tell you that my brand new single “Patient Zero” will be out on September 25 (!!!!!!!!!!!!) and it’s available to pre-order now on my website for 24 hours.”
On Thursday, Taylor announced the music video for the song will premiere during the VMAs on Sunday, September 27. It will star actor Colin Farrell and “Fifty Shades of Grey” star Dakota Johnson.
Taylor Swift Announced an Encore Version of ‘The Life of a Showgirl’ with 4 New Songs on Wednesday
Taylor has been busy, because along with the new single and video coming out, she announced on September 23 that she was putting out a re-release of her October 2025 album “The Life of a Showgirl” which will feature a total of 4 brand new songs.
In the announcement, Taylor wrote called the move a “completely unfathomable thing” that “completely blew” her mind. She revealed that after “The Life of a Showgirl” scored the most commercially successful first week of any album in history, she took a trip to Sweden to celebrate the accomplishment with legendary pop music producers Max Martin and Shellback, with whom she collaborated on the project.
She says the trio simply “wanted to reflect and take in how grateful we were for the moment we were in,” but the presence of a studio led to the group writing even more songs due to creating music being what they love to do when they are “feeling anything at all.”
Taylor says she hopes her fans love the 4 new songs because they were “born out of pure gratitude” for the way her supporters embraced the original album. The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore are out now.
Along with the previously announced “Patient Zero,” the other three songs are called “Babylon,” “Pink Clouding,” and “Cleveland!”
‘The Today Show’ Featured a Sneak Peak of Taylor’s New Music Video for ‘Patient Zero’
The music video’s trailer starts with a shot of Taylor standing at a sink across from an eerily similar yet different looking woman, before switching to two swimmers diving through a pool.
There’s also a scene of two people standing at a grave and laying a flower down in the snow. Next come shots of Colin Farrell and Dakota Johnson’s characters.
The ‘Today’ segment informed fans that the video was shot by Oscar-winning cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki, who’s known for his work on “The Revenant.” The trailer is 13 seconds long, an homage to Taylor’s favorite number which she often uses for various purposes.
The 4 new songs are the first music Taylor has released since Jessie-themed “I Knew It, I Knew You” was released for the “Toy Story 5” film in June.
