Taylor Swift released her “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version)” on Friday, the third of her re-released albums.
But why is Swift re-recording her albums and what does a “Taylor’s Version” album actually mean?
If you’re not a Swiftie or aren’t familiar with Swift’s career, here’s a guide to understanding the re-recordings.
In 2005, Taylor Swift signed with Big Machine Records and recorded six albums during her time with the label. Her contract ended in 2018, and she switched to Republic Records.
Big Machine owns the original recordings, also referred to as masters, of Swift’s music. Scott Borchetta, the previous owner of Big Machine, sold her masters to music manager Scooter Braun, who manages artists like Kanye West, who Swift has obviously had issues with throughout her career.
“I knew [Borchetta] would sell my music, I knew he would do that,” Swift said in an interview with CBS Sunday Morning. “I couldn’t believe who he sold it to.”
Swift made a Tumblr post in 2019 detailing her negative experience with Braun throughout her time in the music industry after her masters were sold.
That same year, Kelly Clarkson tweeted the idea to Swift to re-record her songs she doesn’t own and create an incentive for fans to buy the new versions of her old albums, instead of continuing to buy the old versions.
@taylorswift13 just a thought, U should go in & re-record all the songs that U don’t own the masters on exactly how U did them but put brand new art & some kind of incentive so fans will no longer buy the old versions. I’d buy all of the new versions just to prove a point 💁🏼♀️
— Kelly Clarkson 🍷💔☀️ (@kellyclarkson) July 13, 2019
Each of Swift’s re-released albums have (Taylor’s Version) in the title and the name of each track to signify that she owns them.
The new albums also have updated versions of the original cover art, and they include “From The Vault” tracks, which are songs Swift wrote during that album’s era that didn’t make it onto the original track list.
“From The Vault” songs are the most anticipated part of Swift’s re-releases for fans, as they have never been heard before and usually contain surprise collabs.
Swift collaborated with Fall Out Boy and Hayley Williams of Paramore for “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version).” She reunited with close friend Ed Sheeran and collaborated with Phoebe Bridgers and Chris Stapleton on “Red (Taylor’s Version).” For “Fearless (Taylor’s Version),” she joined forces with Keith Urban and Maren Morris.
Swift’s most streamed “From The Vault” song is her 10-minute version of “All Too Well,” with over 570 million streams.
The re-releases have performed well for Swift, especially compared to the original versions of the albums. Since April 9, 2021, the date that her first re-release came out, “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” has earned over 1.18 million equivalent album units while the original 2008 version has earned 535,000 equivalent album units.
According to Billboard, “Red (Taylor’s Version)” has done even better than “Fearless (Taylor’s Version).” Since its re-release on Nov. 12, 2021, the new recording has earned 3.32 million equivalent album units compared to the original version’s 390,000 equivalent album units.
“Red (Taylor’s Version)” has sold 950,000 copies since its release while the original version has sold just 45,000 since the re-recording came out.
“Red (Taylor’s Version)” has also hit over 2.86 billion on-demand streams since it came out in November 2021 while the original version has earned just 476.28 million streams.
With the release of “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version),” Swift is now halfway through with re-recording her albums. The last three are “1989,” “reputation” and “Taylor Swift.”
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