In 2006, 17 year old Taylor Swift debuted her first album under the record company, Big Machine Records. She went on to release 6 albums under Big Machine and didn’t own any of them, until now. She signed her contract with Big Machine at just 15 years old. She released 6 albums over the span of 13 years.

Swift left Big Machine in 2018, a year before it was bought by Scooter Bruan. The new owner of BMLG (Big Machine Label Group), sold all 6 of Taylor’s masters in a deal with Shamrock Holdings. This deal in November of 2020 made Bruan over $300 million off of Swift’s music (First post). 

In 2019 Swift announced publicly that she would be re-recording all of her old masters. This was a huge deal because she would finally have ownership of her entire career’s worth of music. Swift’s fans were ecstatic over this news, not only would their idol own her music but they would also have refreshed versions of songs they love.

Taylor kicked off this new era when she dropped “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” in April of 2021. The original version of “Fearless” was released in 2008. Since then Swift has released another re-recorded album with speculation of more on the way soon. 

The re-recorded albums include the old favorites but they also include fresh “From the Vault” songs that are being heard for the first time. The “From the Vault” songs were meant to go on the original album but didn’t make the final tracklist. These re-vamped albums have generated so much excitement in the music industry and a unique sense of making old music feel brand new again. 

Less than a week ago, Swift released another re-recorded album. At midnight on November 12th “Red (Taylor’s Version)” was released. This album includes 30 songs and has a run time of 2 hours and 10 minutes. 

“Red (Taylor’s Version)” broke Spotify’s record for the most streamed album in a day. On release day it generated 90.8 million streams. Besides breaking records, this new album has also sat at the top of Spotify’s top albums chart. 

These refreshed albums have been a major success so far, keeping fans wondering which one will come next. The re-records represent a new era for Swift, one that will hopefully stay around for a long time.