Taylor Swift and Why She is Re-Releasing her First 6 Albums

By Camila Villalta

Taylor Swift is one of the most influential women of our generation. She has won an extensive number of awards including, 11 Grammys, 23 BMAs (billboard music awards), artist of the decade, woman of the decade, among many more. She was born in West Reading, Pennsylvania but later, at 13, moved to Hendersonville, Tennessee to pursue her country music career. When she was 14, she signed her first record deal with Big Machine Records.

The 31-year-old American singer released her debut album in 2006, Taylor Swift. Her debut single “Tim McGraw” spent 35 weeks in the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart, which was the start of her career. She continued to release Fearless, Speak now, Red, 1989 and Reputation until in November 2018 when her contract with big machine records expired. Swift decided to leave her old record label and join Republic Records and Universal Music Group. Taylor Swift tried to buy her 6 masters back from the label since they owned them; but they gave unfavorable conditions in return. Later, the former president of big machine records, Scott Borchetta, sold her records to her manager at the time, Scooter Braun. Braun decided to sell her 6 masters to Shamrock Holdings for $300 million. Swift had made it very clear that she wanted to buy her masters if they were ever to be sold. As time went on, in an interview about her 7th studio album, Lover, Taylor stated that she was going to re-record her first 6 albums in order to reclaim her hard work but never gave a date.

During the pandemic, on July 24, 2020, Taylor released a surprise album at midnight, Folklore, containing 16 tracks + 1 bonus track making it her 8th studio album. The album contained 2 songs that were speculated and later confirmed to be about Scooter Braun and Scott Brochetta,  “My Tears Ricochet” and “Mad Woman”. When we all thought she was done for the year, on December 11, 2020, she decided to release her 9th studio album named Evermore at midnight. On February 11, 2021, Swift decided to drop the bomb on her Instagram stating that her first re-recorded album was going to be her second studio album, Fearless and that it would be on streaming platforms on April 9, 2021. This album included her famous songs, you belong with me and love story.

Many news articles claimed that Taylor re-recording her old music was a dumb strategy, while others argued that it was a genius strategy. Her first re-recorded album ended up being a success as it earned 401,000 physical album sales in the first 6 months compared to the original 2008 version which only earned 14,000 physical album sales. Fearless (Taylor’s Version) has ended up being the third best-selling album of the year. 2 months later after the successful release of Fearless  (Taylor’s Version), on June 18, 2021 Swift announced the re-recording version of her 4th studio album, Red, and that it would be released on November 19 but later moved to November 12. Since no one works harder than Taylor Swift, on September 17 she unexpectedly released her re-recorded version of “Wildest Dreams” since it was trending on TikTok.

Today,  Red (Taylor’s Version) has received a great amount of love from the public.  Along with the 20 original Red songs, Swift decided to add 10 more songs, including a 10-minute version of fan-favorite song, “All Too Well” and 3 duets, including Phoebe Bridgers and Ed Sheeran. Taylor Swift also took it to the next level, by releasing a short film directed and written by her, with the cast being Maze Runner star, Dylan O’Brian and Stranger things star, Sadie Sink.  The album has made Taylor break a second Spotify record as the most-streamed female in a single day, as she already broke the record once with Folklore. Taylor right now is working on her next re-recording album which is unknown, but her fans can't help but speculate which album she will re-record next with easter eggs the artist likes to use in her music videos, and I certainly cannot wait to see her next move!