"Head First, Fearless": Taylor Swift Re-Records Her Second Studio Album
Ellie Kim, co-Editor in Chief
Taylor Swift is the biggest pop star of our generation, being honored “Artist of the Decade” in 2020, and having 126 songs appear on the Billboard Top 100. It sounds crazy that she could be taken advantage of in her own playing field, but unfortunately, she fell into a trap. She did not own the master recordings to her first 6 albums.
Swift did not have the opportunity to purchase back her masters in 2019. Instead, it was secretly sold to Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings, who was the manager of Kanye West at the time, someone who has a long history with Swift. She expressed her sadness on social media, writing,
“Now Scooter has stripped me of my life’s work, that I wasn’t given an opportunity to buy. Essentially, my musical legacy is about to lie in the hands of someone who tried to dismantle it… Never in my worst nightmares did I imagine the buyer would be Scooter. Any time Scott Borchetta [CEO of Big Machine Records] has heard the words ‘Scooter Braun’ escape my lips, it was when I was either crying or trying not to. He knew what he was doing; they both did. Controlling a woman who didn’t want to be associated with them. In perpetuity. That means forever.”
Photo courtesy of Ellie Kim, co Editor-in-Chief, at the Nashville Lover Secret Sessions, where fans were hand-picked by Taylor to listen to her first album of which she owns, Lover, a month in advance.
Photo courtesy of Rebekah Field, Copy Editor, at the Reputation Stadium Tour (Gillette Stadium 2018), the highest grossing tour in US history. Here, Taylor is performing a mashup of “You Belong With Me” and “Love Story,” songs from Fearless. You can watch this performance on Netflix’s Taylor Swift reputation Stadium Tour.
Swift is now signed with Republic Records and Universal Music Group, and advocates for artist’s rights to own their master recordings. As a part of her advocacy and effort to take control of her own narrative, she re-recorded her wildly successful second album, Fearless (Taylor’s Version), which was released on April 9th, 2021. This album features the new recordings of her biggest hits “Love Story,” “You Belong With Me,” and “White Horse,” as well as new tracks that she calls “From the Vault;” songs that she wrote between the ages of 16-18 that never made it on the final album. Each song off of this newly recorded album sounds almost identical to the original, and some might say even better with her new matured voice.
Photo courtesy of Ryan McGinley, Entertainment Editor, with her sister Manni (Class of 2019) at Taylor’s 1989 World Tour (Metlife Stadium 2015). 1989 is known to be Taylor’s most successful album, featuring all her hit singles “Shake it Off,” “Blank Space,” “Wildest Dreams,” “Style,” “Bad Blood,” and “Out of the Woods” that dominated radio stations all over the world.
“Artists should own their own work for so many reasons, but the most screamingly obvious one is that the artist is the only one who really knows that body of work”
Taylor Swift, from the prologue for Fearless Taylor’s Version
When Scott Borchetta from Big Machine Records sold the masters to Scooter Braun for 300 million dollars, they did not account for the repercussions from Swift’s massive fan base. As Swift likes to say, her fans (often called “Swifties”) are the “unforeseeable factors” that always come into play. Immediately after Fearless (Taylor’s Version) dropped on all music platforms, it topped the Billboard charts and country music has seen a revival since. According to Entertainment Weekly, the re-recorded Fearless album became the biggest first-week debut of any country album in nearly six years. Swifties are now streaming Taylor’s version of the hit songs, devaluing the masters that Scooter Braun had purchased and highlighting how powerful a loyal fan base can be. Swift’s personal connection with her fans that has been growing since 2006 can be credited for the album’s massive success.