Once upon a time, we had albums. An artist would release a record and we’d play the hell out of it. Then, maybe 25 years later, we’d get a deluxe version with lots of extra tracks, and that was okay, because we’d had decades of only having bought the one version of the record.

Those days are long gone, as artists of all types are at the variant game, releasing multiple versions of the same LP with a couple of tweaks, and leaving completists with an unenviabke task and quite the overdraft.

It feels like this is something that really started with K Pop groups, but has been perfected by Taylor Swift who announces The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore.

We’ve had The Life of a Showgirl + Acoustic Collection, The Life of a Showgirl: So Glamorous Cabaret Version, differently coloured vinyl variants, store specific versions, one that came with a cardigan, and now, this one, which has four new songs on it.

The press release says that this latest version was born of a trip to Sweden with co-creators Max and Shellback, and “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.”

We think this is the 38th version. It might be more. We’re not sure. We don’t have to participate in this, but boy, doesn’t it make you feel tired?

THIRTY EIGHT. No wonder they’re grateful.