Taylor Swift Re-records Her First 6 Albums—Here’s Why

Taylor Swift

 

As her fight for ownership of her music continues, Taylor Swift’s rerecording of Red marks the second of six albums the pop superstar is re-recording from scratch.

Ms. Swift has given informed buying back her first albums and is instead opting to rerecord them after a series of label disputes and buy-outs.

When music mogul Scooter Braun bought Ms. Swift’s first label and sparked a really public feud, the debate over the albums has been ongoing since 2019.

Why doesn’t Taylor Swift own her music?

She gave the rights to her first six albums in exchange for a sum of money since a 15-year-old Ms. Swift signed her first record cater to label Big Machine in 2004. Such deals are a typical occurrence within the music industry.

Ms. Swift did so knowing her masters – the first versions of her albums – would eventually be sold to some other person – when she left Big Machine in 2018.

She left with a significant heart, but the choice, she said, was to resign with the label and ‘earn’ one album back for each new one she released.

She has since released three new albums and two re-recordings after signing to Republic Records instead.

Why are masters so important?

A master recording of a song, such as “Nothing New” (see Taylor Swift x Phoebe Bridgers “Nothing New” Guitar Chords) is the first recording of it, and also the one from which all further copies are made.

Including CDs, records and versions streamed on apps like Spotify and Apple Music, the owner of the master also owns and profits from all copies.

The feud between Taylor Swift and Scooter Braun—Why did it begin?

For $300m (£237m) in what seemed a daily transaction for the music industry, Mr. Braun bought Ms. Swift’s first label, Big Machine on 30 June 2019.

Ms. Swift soon turned to Tumblr however to mention that Mr. Braun had bullied her for years and had now stripped her of her life’s add a “worst-case scenario”.

Retaliated to the post and denied parts of Ms. Swift’s story was Scott Borchetta, the founder and chief executive of Big Machine.

With Halsey and Iggy Azalea both supporting Ms. Swift, and Justin Bieber and Demi Lovato backing Mr. Braun, other music industry stars got involved too.

 

ALSO READ: 6 Ways to Get Streams on Spotify and Grow Your Fanbase

 

Who is Scooter Braun?

Mr. Braun could be a record executive, investor, and overall media tycoon from big apple City.

Including Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande, Demi Lovato, David Guetta, and also the Black Eyed Peas, His company, SB Projects, manages several superstar artists.

In 2013 he was listed jointly of the 100 most influential people within the world by Time Magazine.

Who owns the albums now?

Currently owned by a non-public equity firm called Shamrock Holdings are Ms. Swift’s first six albums, released between 2006 and 2017.

Mr. Braun sold the master recordings in November 2020.

Mr. Braun’s legal team insisted she signed a non-disclosure agreement stating she wouldn’t speak negatively of him again, as Ms. Swift had been trying to get the music back from.

Ms. Swift learned that he will still take advantage of it as a part of the deal even when the music isn’t any longer under Mr. Braun’s control.

Which albums does Taylor Swift still have to rerecord?

Owned by Shamrock: Fearless and Red, Ms. Swift has currently rerecorded two of the six albums.

With Taylor Swift, Speak Now, 1989, and Reputation, this means she has four to go.

Before the release of Fearless (Taylor’s Version) on 9 April, Ms. Swift started rerecording the albums in November 2020.

While fan conjecture suggests Speak Now, she isn’t rerecording in original release order it’s unknown which album Swift will release next.

 

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