Taylor Swift 1989… Taylor's Version review: Nine years on, these swooning melodies sound better than ever!

TAYLOR SWIFT: 1989 (Taylor's Version) (Universal)

Verdict: Pop masterpiece revamped

Her astonishing activity ethic has been putting astir different musicians connected nan satellite to shame for years, and Taylor Swift continues to reign arsenic nan hardest moving female successful pop.

Her Eras circuit is group to go nan astir lucrative successful history, its accompanying movie is shattering container agency records, and this twelvemonth has already seen her re-record 1 of her early LPs pinch July's merchandise of Speak Now (Taylor's Version).

Now she's returning pinch her 2nd revamp of 2023 – a new, expanded type of her best-selling album, 1989, that is outselling nan remainder of nan Top 40 mixed arsenic it heads to No.1. Named aft nan twelvemonth she was born, and first released successful October 2014, it was nan grounds that sealed her move from state to pop. 

It replaced Nashville banjos and tunes astir high-school crushes pinch 1980s-style electronics and lyrics astir much analyzable big relationships. It besides sent her profession stratospheric.

Swift, 33, is re-recording her first six LPs successful consequence to nan waste of nan maestro tapes – and nan authorities to her early catalogue – to euphony mogul Scooter Braun against her wishes. 

In her bid to regain ownership, she's already revisited her formative albums Fearless, Red and Speak Now, skilfully replicating nan original arrangements virtually note-for-note.

But 1989 is nan jewel successful her crown and, judging connected its phenomenal income to date, it hasn't disappointed her loyal service of 'Swifties'.

Taylor's sound is much mature than it was successful 2014, but these restorations instrumentality faithfully to nan original arrangements. 

Some fans person complained that nan tracks primitively produced by Swedish popular kingpins Max Martin and Shellback – including Blank Space, Style, Shake It Off and Wildest Dreams – person mislaid a small of their oomph, but nan differences are negligible. 

Style feels somewhat flat, but Wildest Dreams, successful which Swift's teenage idealism gives measurement to a much jaded position of romance, now sounds warmer.

Much of nan attraction has fallen connected nan 5 'from nan vault' tracks that didn't make nan original cut, and they are uniformly gorgeous, taking 1989's popular template and enhancing it pinch swooning melodies, banks of backing vocals, clever lyrics and ear-catching hooks.

One song, Say Don't Go, pairs Taylor's diary-style lyrics pinch different elephantine successful Diane Warren, queen of nan powerfulness ballad and a writer who has penned hits for Céline Dion and Cher. It builds into an epic, pinch crackling drums and booming synths.

In contrast, Slut!, contempt that provocative title, is simply a softer ballad successful which Swift laments that it is she alternatively than immoderate of her erstwhile lovers who is publically shamed for her romanticist dalliances: 'Got lovestruck, went consecutive to my head, sewage lovesick each complete my bed… and if they telephone maine a 'slut!', you cognize it mightiness beryllium worthy it for once,' she shrugs.

Of nan different caller tracks, Is It Over Now? is simply a superb slow-burner, and Now That We Don't Talk a classical love-gone-wrong communicative successful which Swift drily finds nan agleam broadside of a break-up ('I don't person to dress I for illustration acerb rock'). 

Suburban Legends feels for illustration a throwback to nan diary songs of old. 'I collapsed my ain bosom because you were excessively polite to do it,' she reflects.

When she first released 1989, Taylor described it arsenic a 'rebirth, my first charismatic popular album.' 

It won medium of nan twelvemonth astatine nan Grammys successful 2016, and made her a superstar. Nine years on, it sounds amended than ever.