Taylor Swift’s Version of ‘1989’ Is Finally Here
It’s been waiting for you
It’s been a long time coming but Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) has arrived. This is the fourth album she has re-recorded of the six previously owned by Big Machine Records.
Swift announced 1989 (TV) in August during the last stop of her Los Angeles Eras Tour shows. The new version features five previously unreleased vault tracks, which includes one co-penned by Diane Warren. She worked on the other four with Jack Antonoff.
This is the second re-recorded album to be released by Swift this year, following the July release of Speak Now (TV). The new versions of Fearless and Red were released in 2021. In between, she dropped Midnights, an album of all new material.
1989 was a massive moment in Swift’s career, solidifying her as a full-blown pop star and separating her fully from her country roots. She began teasing this shift on fourth album Red, when she first enlisted Max Martin and Shellback as collaborators. She continued her work with this pair on 1989, which was first released in 2014. The LP was also the first album to kick off her longstanding work relationship with Antonoff, who has worked on every album of Swift’s since. Imogen Heap and Ryan Tedder had contributed writing and production credits on the project, which has Swift stepping into synth pop fully.
The success of 1989 set the tone for years to come: It became the second pop album in the 2010s to have five Top 10 singles, following Katy Perry’s Teenage Dream. It also won Swift her second Album of the Year Grammy, making her the first female solo artist in history to win that particular trophy twice.
Swift has yet to reveal when her final two re-records — Taylor Swift and Reputation — will be released. Eras Tour will kick back up again in November with a few dates in Brazil. In 2024, she will tour Asia, Australia, and Europe before returning for her final shows in North America.
From Rolling Stone US.