(Taylor's Version): What It Means

If you are a new Taylor Swift fan, or you are just interested in learning more about her then one of the most important things to know is what "Taylor's Version" means. Taylor Swift announced she was re-recording her first six albums in 2019.

To fully understand why Taylor is re-recording all of her albums we have to start from the beginning. Taylor was signed to a record-label called Big Machine Records founded by Scott Borchetta. Taylor had been with them from the very beginning of her career in 2006. Taylor wanted to buy her music from Borchetta, but was not given the opportunity. Later the record label was sold to Scooter Braun in 2019 and therefore gave him the rights to all of Taylor's master recordings. This meant Scooter Braun would get paid anytime someone wanted to use her music. Taylor did not like Scooter Braun for many reasons including his ties to Kanye West.

After leaving Big Machine Records in 2018 and going to Republic Records she was able to negotiate owning her master's moving forward. Now that she is recording she will be able to own all of her work. This is something that is important to Taylor and she has been very vocal about it. In her Seth Meyers interview she talks about how she has always wanted to own her own music and this process of re-recording is what will allow her to reach that goal. Taylor has received great feedback about this process from fans and other artists. One incentive she gives to fans to listen to the re-records is the "from the vault" songs. These are songs that weren't originally released on the first recording of the album, and she re-records them and releases them on her version! So, now when you see (Taylor's Version) next to one of Taylor's albums, that means she owns it. She has successfully re-recorded Fearless, Speak Now, and Red. 1989 (Taylor's Version) will be released in late October, and the last two re-records have yet to be announced.