Babylon

“Babylon” uses the ancient city the way Swift’s best extended metaphors work – as a frame sturdy enough to hold the whole song up, not just a clever opening line she abandons by the second verse. The story underneath is familiar (leaving home for a bigger, shinier life; realizing what got left behind was the actual paradise) but the metaphor keeps earning its keep across the bridge, where the “Babylon” image finally turns personal instead of just decorative – an unofficial romance and a family taken for granted, both named without Swift over-explaining either.

It’s the one song on “The Encore” that sounds like it was written because the idea demanded a song, rather than because the calendar demanded four more songs. The production matches that ambition without overselling it – restrained verses building to a chorus that actually widens the frame instead of just getting louder. It’s not a top-tier Swift single, and the central idea has been done elsewhere in pop with sharper teeth, but it’s a real song doing real work, which is more than the other three “Encore” tracks can claim.

6.4/10 – the deluxe edition’s one song that would have held up as a real single, not just a bonus track riding the album’s name.

Hero image: Taylor Swift performing, 2019, by Glenn Francis, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.