Swifties everywhere are being sent into a whirlwind of emotions as singer/songwriter Taylor Swift re-records songs from her previous albums. Towards the end of 2020, Swift confirmed that she had begun to re-record the first six albums of her career including: Taylor Swift, Fearless, Speak Now, Red, 1989 and Reputation.
In April of this year, Fearless (Taylor’s Version) was released showcasing a whole new side of Swift. Since the original release of Fearless back in 2008, it is easy to see how Swift has developed as an artist and matured in her performance. The album also features six new songs that were not released on the original track.
Fearless also features six new songs that got cut during the first round as well as a bonus track. Swift has said this addition allows the listeners to get a more complete understanding of the coming of age associated with her album. The extra tracks have worked to develop a much richer meaning and shows her fans what the album could have been many years ago.
Through the re-recorded songs and inclusion of the songs that were cut from the album under her previous recording company, fans get a better idea of who Swift is as a writer and performer. In the old records, a lot of the emotions were lost which we can see more clearly in Taylor’s version of her songs. These newly released songs also show the maturity and growth of Swift as her career has progressed since the songs were first released back in 2008.
Some of the differences between the original songs and newly released versions are the variations in sounds. In the original version, Swift was still finding herself. In her newly released songs, she sings with maturity and confidence that was not there before. The instrumentals were also heard more clearly in her re-recorded songs than the originals.
Fans are anxiously awaiting the release of Red (Taylor’s Version set for November 19. Along the way, she put on Twitter a ‘vault’ containing ‘easter eggs’ which gives fans an opportunity to decode hints about Swift’s future releases. Such clues have included jumbled words and even a crossword puzzle. Each clue is met with Swifties frantically trying to piece things together to figure out what is coming next.
Since the beginning of her career starting in 2006 until 2019, Swift was caught in a contract with recording company, Big Machine. Big Machine and specifically, Scooter Braun, restricted her ability to produce songs she composed on her own. For years, she was creatively limited and forced to produce songs differently than the way she intended for them to be.
The fight for the ownership of her songs between herself and Braun weighed on her for the first 13 years of Swift’s career. However, it is obvious she is coming back better than ever ready to give her loyal fans music her way. The issue was finally resolved in November of 2020, when the deal expired and Swift negotiated ownership of all her future masters. This deal left Big Machine with the ownership of the first six albums but ensured Swift complete freedom of the music she has and will continue to produce from here on out.
The announcement of her re-recording at the end of 2020 has led Swift to become more outspoken about the difficulties she faced while producing for the Big Machine recording company. Swift has since been busy reconfiguring songs and leaning into her roots to focus on producing music that she is proud to have her name on.
