(Disclaimer: A content warning is in order as we briefly mention severe mental health issues and gun violence towards the end of this.)

I have mentioned it before, and I wrote enough about folklore and evermore at the end of 2020 for it to come as a surprise to anyone, but let's get this one out of the way, for future reference: I am thoroughly obsessed with Taylor Swift. I could write an essay on all the reasons why and what makes me tick in her music and her artistry, and this post is a good place to start.

At the end of June 2021, Taylor announced the next album she would re-record was Red, and it is scheduled to hit the shelves on November 19, 2021. Red was Swift's fourth full-length album and originally came out on October 22, 2012. Stylistically, it is thought of as her first true pop album, and saw her collaborating with pop producer and legend Max Martin. Martin is the Swedish man behind everyone's favourite hits ever since the nineties and, as of today, he has written or co-written twenty-four Billboard Hot 100 number-one songs, including Britney Spears' ...Baby One More Time, N*Sync's It's Gonna Be Me, and many of Taylor Swift's top-charting tracks.

Despite Red being thought of as Taylor Swift's first true pop record, it mixes many different genres and still presents hints of the country music she was previously known for. It was nominated for a wide range of awards, including Album of the Year and Country Album of the Year at the 2014 Grammy Awards. It went number one in quite a few countries and sold over a million copies in its first week. That's the part that's the strangest, most foreign to write about as a French fan. Despite her international success and her breaking records almost daily nowadays, Taylor is not part of our mainstream musical landscape. Her music barely gets any radio airplay or television airtime in France and, at best, some of her songs will be used as background music on random reality TV programmes. (The last place I heard a Taylor Swift song played in the wild in France was a remote McDonalds in Normandy.) Red might have sold over a million copies in a week, but it only sold fifty thousand total in France, since its release, which is nothing. 

Red also counts as Taylor Swift's only true break-up record, and here's what she had to say about it: "All the different emotions that are written about on this album are all pretty much about the kind of tumultuous, crazy, insane, intense, semi-toxic relationships that I've experienced in the past two years. All those emotions- spanning from intense love, intense frustration, jealousy, confusion, all of that- in my mind, all those emotions are red. You know, there's nothing in between. There's nothing beige about those feelings." (Red was also the start of Swift equating colours with feelings in her lyrics, but it is such a wide yet niche process it deserves its own, separate explanation.)

There are plenty of people who have explained and will explain the ins and outs of Taylor's re-recording process, the reasons why and the legal technicalities of it, so it wouldn't take much of an effort for anyone to find a version of the explanation that is clearer than mine, but here's my attempt.

From 2005 to 2018, Taylor Swift was signed to Big Machine Records, a Nashville-based label run by Scott Borschetta, who was just starting out at the time. The contract, which she signed at the age of sixteen, gave the label the rights to her first six records. In 2019, after Swift signed a deal granting her full ownership of her music with Universal, Big Machine Records was acquired by Scooter Braun, and his deal included the masters of her first six albums. Taylor explained that she had tried to buy her masters back for years and was not given a chance unless she signed another record deal with BMR, which she was not willing to do. ("For years I asked, pleaded for a chance to own my work. Instead I was given an opportunity to sign back up to Big Machine Records and "earn" one album back at a time, one for every new one I turned in. (...) I learned about Scooter Braun's purchase of my masters as it was announced to the world. All I could think about was the incessant, manipulative bullying I've received at his hands for years.") Since then, the masters have been sold by Braun to Shamrock Holdings, a private equity firm owned by the Disney estate, for about three hundred million dollars.

Following the very public dispute, Taylor Swift decided to re-record her first six albums to finally own her life's work, as she should, as any artist should. She started the process in April 2021 with the release of Fearless (Taylor's Version), and Red (Taylor's Version) is the second step in the journey. These re-recordings are replicas of her original songs so that, ideally, fans will choose them over the non-Taylor's Version ones. The ideas behind what she's doing are a, to own the work of a lifetime and b, to devalue her original catalogue, meaning the people who bought it will not profit from her work anymore. Since the streaming and sales of the non-Taylor's Version albums will drop considerably after their re-recorded counterpart comes out, as we have seen since Fearless (Taylor's Version), the music she does not own will not be worth much anymore, and certainly not the three hundred million dollars it was sold for.

As mentioned earlier in this post, Red (Taylor's Version) is coming out on November 19, 2021. The tracklist was revealed last week, and it contains a lot of exciting material. There will be thirty tracks in total: the sixteen original songs, the three original bonus tracks, an acoustic version of State Of Grace, the album opener, which was also on the deluxe version of the first recording, and ten "From the Vault" songs, which didn't make the original cut, back in 2012.

These ten "From the Vault" tracks include Ronan (a charity single based on a blog written by Maya Thompson about her son Ronan, who passed away from a form of cancer when he was four years old), Better Man (a song she wrote for country band Little Big Town), Babe (which she wrote for another country group, Sugarland), and the ten-minute version of fan favourite All Too Well (we'll get there later.) There will also be collaborations with Chris Stapleton (on I Bet You Think About Me), Ed Sheeran (on Run), Phoebe Bridgers (on Nothing New), and Foster The People's Mark Foster. The track on which Foster will appear has not been announced yet, so it's safe to assume he will either have songwriting credits or perform backing vocals (similar to Marcus Mumford on evermore's cowboy like me).

Most of these vault tracks as unheard as of yet. However, some lyrics to Nothing New featured on the deluxe edition journals accompanying Lover, in 2019. ("I'm getting older and less sure of what you like about me anyway / How can a person know everything at 18 and nothing at 22 / And will you still want me when I'm nothing new?") 

There are rumours and speculations that a first single will be coming out on the 13th of August, prompted by one of Swift's many cryptic tweets, "Your next clue will be in the spot where you hear red..." (I personally have no idea. I have a tendency to easily fall down a rabbit hole of fan theories, which I might discuss in more detail eventually, so I want to believe we are getting something this month. I am personally hoping and speculating the first single will be 22, because of the lyrics included in the announcement post.) 

Obviously, as a fan, I am excited to hear Red (Taylor's Version) as a whole, and I am rooting for Taylor Swift to finally own her music and the work of a lifetime. As a bit of a nerd for such things, I cannot wait to listen to the songs millions of times over and figure out the details and tiny words she has changed, as if I have the musical ear to find new instruments or hear key changes, unless they're super obvious. There are also things I am specifically waiting for, and here's a shortlist of them.

1/ I Knew You Were Trouble.

For a basic, no-depth timeline, before Red, Taylor Swift was known as a country artist. There were already pop (as well as many other genres) inclinations in her music, but nothing like what we would see on Red. She could arguably qualify as a pop-star pre-Red, but she wasn't yet working with powerhouses like Max Martin, a man who has defined the sound of mainstream pop for the past twenty-or-so years. One of the album's best-known singles, I Knew You Were Trouble., represents one of her most drastic sound changes of the era, and it's all down to the dubstep-like drop before the first chorus. I know it's there, and at the same time, I am always taken by surprise every time I hear it. It's one of these tiny music details I wish I could hear for the first time again. The idea that a predominantly country artist, America's sweetheart, at that, included dubstep-leaning sounds in her music, against all odds and undoubtedly against all recommendations, was mindblowing. One of the main reasons I am so unbelievably excited about it is because she now works with different people and producers. It is safe to assume Red (Taylor's Version), just like Fearless (Taylor's Version) and her most recent material, will be produced by two of her most-known collaborators, Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dessner. What will they do with Max Martin tracks? How will they translate their uniqueness? Will we feel the original shift all over again? Yes, it was a tiny drop, a split second, but I'm at the edge of my seat for it.

2/ Begin Again

It may be a controversial opinion of sorts, but Begin Again is my favourite song on Red. There is so much hope inhabiting this song, and such an empowering feeling when you think about all the things your ex-significant other or person who broke your heart didn't appreciate about you, but you have learnt to. You like all those things, you get the songs. I am head over heels in love with the idea that things can become better after you have spent what feels like an eternity believing they only brought pain and sorrow. Almost ten years have passed since Taylor Swift first recorded Begin Again, and I cannot start to explain how impatient I am to listen to her words again, but with that extra decade of experience underneath her belt. On top of that, a fantastic part of the re-recording experience as a fan has been to admire the maturity her voice has acquired as a musical instrument. The contrast was already something special between Fearless and Fearless (Taylor's Version), and I am excited to see what it will sound like on Begin Again (Taylor's Version).

3/ The Moment I Knew

The Moment I Knew is a later favourite in my life, a song I rediscovered recently and admitted I hadn't loved enough in the past. The lyrics are so perfectly descriptive and precise, in a way only Taylor can do, and they take you exactly where the story of the song is happening. You feel like you are in that place too, observing and experiencing. You see what's happening, you can picture the red lipstick, the tears in the bathroom, the party dress, and the Christmas lights glistening. It is so easy to understand what the phrase "the moment I knew" summarises and the desperation in the sentence "he said he'd be here." It's such a simple story, but one with big consequences for a relationship already on the rocks, and one that paints such a detailed picture. Ten years down the line, I want to know what that picture is going to look like. Am I going to feel that same hopelessness when I hear the line "he said he'd be here?" It's natural to wonder how songs that describe such a specific moment in time will resonate when the emotions surrounding them are not fresh anymore, and it's strangely exciting to discover what they will become.

4/ All Too Well (ten-minute version)

All Too Well is an unshakeable favourite among Taylor Swift fans, but it is also more widely regarded as a masterpiece in songwriting and raw emotion, and considered one of the best songs in music, period. A writer at Rolling Stone called it his favourite song of the past decade, and it has been praised by well-known publications and media such as Vulture, Billboard, NPR, NME, or The New York Times. The song, originally over five minutes long, was never released as an official single, but it remains beloved in the fanbase and gets played live regularly. In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, Swift mentioned its recording process: "It was that song but probably had seven extra verses. I included the f-word, and I remember my sound guy was like, "I burned a CD of that thing you were doing in case you want it." I was like, "Sure." I ended up taking it home and listening to it and was like "I actually really like this, but it's 10 minutes long. I need to pare it down." One of Taylor's long-time collaborators, Liz Rose, has declared that All Too Well was "probably a 20-minute song when [Swift] called me." Since then, the fans, myself included, have been dying to hear the original version, swearing and all. On the 18th of June, when she announced Red (Taylor's Version), Swift wrote: "This will be the first time you hear all 30 songs that were meant to go on Red. And hey, one of them is even ten minutes long." When the tracklist was revealed, we all found out, for sure, that All Too Well, the ten-minute version, would be closing the Red re-recording. (I'm partially excited and partially terrified.)

I do not know where the swearing is, no one does, but two covers of the song have helped me decide where I would like it to be. In The Wonder Years' Dan Campbell's version, for the ReRed compilation, he sings "this thing was a masterpiece 'til you fucked it all up" (instead of "tore it all up"). And in Slowly Slowly's Ben Stewart's cover, he sings "now you mail back my shit" (instead of "now you mail back my things.") And I might be biased because I love both musicians and covers, but I have decided it's where I want the swearing to be. He fucked it all up, and he mailed back her shit.

Check out the ReRed compilation here - all profits go to the Equal Justice Initiative.

5/ Collaborations, I Bet You Think About Me, and the potential I Almost Do parallel.

As previously mentioned, there will be four collaborators among the "From The Vault" tracks: indie darling Phoebe Bridgers, Taylor's long-time friend Ed Sheeran, Foster The People's frontman Mark Foster, and country superstar Chris Stapleton. I tend to feel neutral towards Ed Sheeran, though I have always loved +, and I love the work he has done with Taylor in the past. His feature on reputation's End Game is well-written, and Everything Has Changed, also present on Red, is lovely and hopeful and has grown on me immensely. Sound-wise, I hope Run, their From the Vault track, is in a similar vibe- something quieter, almost acoustic, that focuses on their vocals and lyrics.

I don't know much about Mark Foster or Foster The People, but this man has contributed to one of the most deceitfully upbeat songs of our generation, Pumped Up Kicks. In my head (and, I suppose, in many people's heads), the track started as a fun indie song, great to dance to. Then, I read somewhere that the song was much darker than we believed, and clocked the line "better run, better run, faster than my bullet" in the chorus. Only while I was writing this am I discovering the inspiration behind the song, explained by Foster himself. "I was trying to get inside the head of an isolated, psychotic kid" and, "I wrote Pumped Up Kicks when I began to read about the growing trend in teenage mental illness. I wanted to understand the psychology behind it because it was foreign to me. It was terrifying how mental illness among youth had skyrocketed in the last decade. I was scared to see where the pattern was headed if we didn't start changing the way we were bringing up the next generation." Long story short, the song we all danced to and sang along to at the start of the decade was about a mentally troubled teenager who might be committing a shooting in his school. Obviously, I am not expecting anything similar in terms of stories or topics in whatever Foster will be contributing to in Red (Taylor's Version), but I am keeping in mind that he basically put the happiest beat on some of the darkest lyrics in modern pop.

During 2020, you couldn't go anywhere or log onto social media without hearing about Phoebe Bridgers. She was nominated four times in the 2021 Grammy Awards (Best Alternative Music Album for Punisher, Best Rock Performance for Kyoto, Best Rock Song for Kyoto, and Best New Artist), and Elton John loves her music so much that he told her, in his podcast, "if you don't win at least one, I'm going to hit someone, OK?" I personally see a collaboration between Phoebe and Taylor as something that was bound to happen, as both are widely known for their ability to describe melancholy and sadness, and they are both recognised as brilliant lyricists. They both are storytellers in their purest form, and they tend to include many details in their songs, painting a precise picture of what they are narrating. We already know Bridgers is set to appear on Nothing New, a song written about aging, growing up, and growing old, as if that's not going to hurt, from the lyrics we have so far. However, it is also worth mentioning that many women who collaborate with Taylor Swift do so on backing vocals. Examples include HAIM on no body no crime, Maren Morris on You All Over Me, and Colbie Caillat on Breathe. Is Phoebe Bridgers going to be the artist who breaks the streak?

Finally, the story of why I know Chris Stapleton is a little more fun and light-hearted. Back when I used to work in a certain magical building not far from London, I was called over to help a VIP group make their purchases, and as it so turned out, that VIP posse was led by Chris Stapleton. I didn't know who he was, I was only told he was a country singer and had collaborated with Justin Timberlake in the past. (They performed a Tennessee Whiskey/Drink You Away medley during the 2015 Country Music Awards, and Stapleton went on to do backing vocals on Timberlake's song Say Something. For context, one of my team leaders loved Justin Timberlake, hence why he appeared in the conversation.) Due to the pressure we were under every time a VIP group came into our area, I don't think I have ever shaken that much while holding someone's bank card in my life, and I am pleased to report he was a very nice and polite person. When I heard he was collaborating with Taylor Swift, the first thing I thought of is "I met this man once!" and, after seeing the picture chosen by most media outlets, my brain said, "he didn't look like that when I met him!" Music-wise, I only know he is a well-known country singer, and since I have loved every single one of Taylor Swift's country features, I have no doubt I will love what Chris brings to the table on I Bet You Think About Me.

As a long-term Taylor Swift fan, I am involuntarily trained to try and figure out if any sort of content she puts out, from song lyrics to numbers, is interconnected. Every time I see the title I Bet You Think About Me, my gut goes to another song from Red, I Almost Do. Every line in the verses starts with the phrase "I bet," and the first verse even includes the line "And I bet sometimes you wonder 'bout me." Obviously, this is just speculation from my hyperactive brain, but I can't help but think I Bet You Think About Me and I Almost Do are linked.

After the release of Red (Taylor's Version), there will be another four albums left to re-record: Taylor Swift, her 2006 debut album, fan-favourite Speak Now, her smash hit 1989, and 2017's massively underrated reputation. Due to a five-year exclusivity clause, if I'm not mistaken on the legal term, the re-recording process of reputation can only start in 2022, so it's safe to assume this one will come last. I don't know which one will come next, but I have a feeling we will get 1989 (Taylor's Version) in the summer. It feels like a summer album, after all, a collection of anthems to reclaim yourself after you've gone through a lot, and it feels right to have it hit the waves in the summer.

The care and work Taylor Swift puts into these re-recorded albums, the lengths she goes to find fantastic people to collaborate with, and the sense of excitement she creates over songs that are already known and adored is bewildering to me, and one of the reasons why I admire her as much as I do. I'd almost feel bad having a wishlist of things I would love to hear, or people I would love for her to work with- she's already doing so much. However, here's a shortlist of things I would adore, and I might even expand on it later- that's why a hyperactive brain does to you.

The main thing I want would technically fall under a From The Vault track on Taylor Swift (Taylor's Version), and it's a re-record of her song I'd Lie. It was the first song of hers I've heard, and it remains one of my top favourites, thirteen years down the line. The second thing I would adore is for her to properly record the spoken-word version of one of her poems, which appeared on the reputation world tour. Before she performed Getaway Car, you could hear her voice in the stadium reciting a poem entitled Why She Disappeared. I have listened to it many, many, many times since, and it feels empowering to me, just like a lot of reputation. I would love nothing more than having it as an interlude on the re-recorded version, just before what would become Getaway Car (Taylor's Version). And, finally, if I could have a wishlist of collaborators for what comes next, it would include Olivia Rodrigo, Carly Rae Jepsen, Tim McGraw, Hayley Williams, and yes, it's far-fetched, but hear me out- Jimmy Eat World's Jim Adkins.