On April 9, 2021, Taylor Swift released her re-recording of her Grammy-winning 2008 studio album, “Fearless.” This re-recording, “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” is a masterful recreation. In 2019, Swift announced that her first six studio albums had been sold against her will to Scooter Braun, who manages huge stars such as Kanye West and Justin Bieber.
Swift has targeted Braun with accusations of manipulation and incessant public shaming, especially after the infamous Kanye-Swift drama where Kanye interrupted Swift’s acceptance speech at the 2009 MTV Music Video awards. As Swift wrestled with the fact that her art was controlled by an incredibly toxic man she did not trust, she decided to invalidate her original recordings by re-recording all the albums he now owns.
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The New Yorker writes, “These re-recorded albums are [Swift’s] attempt to deflate the commercial and cultural value of the original recordings, while keeping their artistic sanctity intact—a Machiavellian act of strategy overlaid with flavors of empowerment and devotion to her fans.”
“Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” was Swift’s first strike against Braun. Not only did she re-record all of the songs on the deluxe version of the original “Fearless,” but she also released six songs that she wrote during the “Fearless” era but never released. This brought “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” to the grand total of 26 tracks.
As fans have been listening to “Taylor’s Version,” many have reflected on the nostalgia they’ve experienced as they delve back into the “Fearless” era. Billboard released an article where they compiled tweets from awestruck Swifties as they fell back in love with songs like “The Way I Loved You” and “Hey Stephen” over a decade after they were first released. The consensus on the re-recording of “Fearless” was that Swift seems to have stayed incredibly true to her original tracks, and the only difference that is commonly pointed out is the maturity of her voice.
In an article posted to Lipscomb University’s news service, writer Hannah Cron discusses how impactful it was to hear “Fifteen” sung by a Swift who had lived over a decade since she first recorded it. There is certainly a beautiful kind of nostalgia that can be experienced listening to the iconic “Fifteen” in 2021. I personally remember listening to it before I was even 10 years old. It is full of a sweet kind of naive teenage innocence—I wonder what it was like for Swift to return to this song as a 31-year-old woman.
Of course, I can’t fail to mention one of the most iconic tracks on “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)”: Swift released “Mr. Perfectly Fine” as one of the singles from the album earlier this year, and it currently sits ranked #1 on her Spotify profile with 40,911,415 streams. “Mr. Perfectly Fine” seems to be a direct call-out to Joe Jonas, who infamously broke up with Swift over the phone in 2008. It is filled with the teenage angst and drama that can be found in Swift’s earlier songwriting. Joe Jonas’ wife (the literal queen Sophie Turner herself) helped turn the song into something of a meme after she shared the song to her Instagram story with the caption “It’s not NOT a bop.”
Taylor Swift’s re-recording of “Fearless” is an inspiration to anyone who has felt invalidated or attacked by someone in a position of power over them. It also encourages listeners to think about their past selves and their teenage years, as Swift does in her re-recording of an album she wrote when she was in her teens. At the end of “Fifteen,” Swift says, “I’ve found time can heal most anything / And you just might find who you’re supposed to be / I didn’t know who I was supposed to be / At fifteen.”
Time has allowed Taylor Swift to grow into an incredibly mature, thoughtful, and deeply poetic songwriter, but it also allows her to reflect on who she was while she was growing up. The beautiful thing about Swift’s music is that we get to see her evolution through different eras and what they’ve taught her, and we have also gotten to grow up with her through our own different eras. She helps her listeners learn from their pasts, and shows them what it is like to grow.
I personally can’t wait for the re-recordings of the rest of Swift’s albums. “Reputation (Taylor’s Version)” will definitely change my life. I also can’t wait until Swift owns all of her art that is out in our world—she has given so much of herself to the world (due to her fame and popularity), and she deserves to own her own stories.