Taylor Swift has just released the re-recorded version of her Grammy-winning 2008 album Fearless, taking fans back to the times when they gushed over the mushy songs and believed in teenage love. But she hasn’t released Fearless once again out of sheer nostalgia. It is a well thought-out and an important move for the country-pop singer as she attempts to gain control of her music. Swift announced she would be releasing re-recorded versions of all her first 6 albums after Scooter Braun bought her master recordings in 2019. She also said that there would be some previously unreleased songs, which did not make it to the 2008 version of Fearless. She finally dropped ‘Fearless (Taylor’s Version)’ this weekend with 26 songs, including six previously unreleased ones.
Swift firmly believes artists should own the work they create. She has been fighting for years now to manage the means, method of production, and distribution of her work. Her former label Big Machine Records turned down her request to own her previous six albums. She left the label in 2018. Through her new deal with Republic Records and UMG, Swift gained ownership of any future masters, and also ensured that any sale of the label’s shares in Spotify “will result in a distribution of money to their artists.”
Scooter Braun acquired Big Machine Records, along with the music catalog to Swift’s first six albums. In a Tumblr post Swift called the sale her “worst case scenario,” alleging that she had received “incessant, manipulative bullying” from Braun “for years,” alluding to her feud with his former client Kanye West. “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.”
In August 2019, Swift officially announced her plans to re-record her first 6 albums, which includes Taylor Swift (2006), Fearless (2008), Speak Now (2010), Red (2012), 1989 (2014) and 2017’s Reputation, in an attempt to regain her masters.
In the past year or so, Swift has been trying to release these re-recordings in an attempt to own the work she spent 13 years of her life on. The re-recordings are not very different from the original. The more they sound the same, the less likely a company will be inclined to use the original, which means Swift ensures that she gets all the profit and credit for her work.
Though Fearless is Swift’s second album, it is the first of her Big Machine releases that she’s re-recorded. The album, which includes hit singles ‘You Belong With Me’ and ‘Fifteen’, went on to win the Grammy for album of the year in 2010.
It is a pipe dream for artists of any kind around the world to own the art they create. Music artists have been fighting their stringent contracts and corporate machinations for years, but rarely do they go through the hassle of re-recording and re-releasing old work. Swift, as one of the most successful artists in American music, is in the rare position to want to upend the system and actually have the power to do so.
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