Taylor Swift’s 1989 (Taylor’s Version) renews the original album with a contemporary resonance, highlighting her artistic growth.
Superstar Taylor Swift offers a discography full of musical storytelling, including the iconic 1989 album. Originally released in 2014, 1989 was a record-breaking era that solidified Swift’s transition from the country to pop genre, and ultimately, her rise to fame. The original album was incredibly successful:1989 earned a multitude of awards and widely expanded the star’s fanbase.
In efforts to gain complete ownership of her music, Swift has aimed to re-record her previous albums under her title and also publish unreleased songs from their respective eras. The artist began releasing the rerecordings in 2021, and since then has delivered Fearless (Taylor’s Version), Red (Taylor’s Version), and Speak Now (Taylor’s Version). As of October 27th, 1989 (Taylor’s Version) has also joined this collection.
Swift announced the highly anticipated release of 1989 (Taylor’s Version) during the closing night of the first leg of the Eras Tour. Some fans were surprised at her announcement being just over a month after the release of Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), while others had found suspected easter eggs and predicted potential release dates.
The re-recording of 1989 consists of all the songs from the original album and five new vault tracks: “Slut! (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault),” “Say Don’t Go (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault),” “Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault),” “Suburban Legends (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault),” and “Is It Over Now? (Taylor’s Version) (From The Vault).” Additionally, 1989 (Taylor’s Version) [Deluxe] has the intense remix of “Bad Blood” featuring Kendrick Lamar.
Drew Liss ‘26 exclaims his reaction and opinion on vault tracks “Slut!” and “Is It Over Now?”:
“I was intrigued by the title because using such a [strong] word isn’t her [typical] approach to naming songs. ‘Is It Over Now?’ was a huge surprise [in terms of lyrical structure] because of how shocking [Swift blatantly] calls out Harry Styles.”
Liss also summarizes his impressions on the re-recorded songs, saying, “I think [the song that stood out to me the most] was ‘Wonderland (Taylor’s Version)’. ‘Welcome To New York’ is always [fun] to listen to, so it felt [especially] uplifting when listening to it as a [newly-owned] single.” He admires her growth and maturity in the time between the release of the 1989 and its re-recording.
Personally, I was most satisfied with re-recordings of “Out of the Woods,” “I Know Places,” and “You Are In Love.” Each of these songs drastically improved in vocals and quality from the original album, but still held sentimental emotion. However, I did not enjoy how different “Style (Taylor’s Version),” sounded from the initial single; perhaps this could be due to how nostalgic the original song is for me.
I particularly found the vault track “Is It Over Now?” intriguing due to its deep lyrical meaning and distinct accusations. Swift accurately portrays the complexities of the relationship that the song may be about. Overall, the release made the special album more valued.
From Swift’s raw representation of the 1989-era of her life to the heavy topics of her vault tracks, 1989 (Taylor’s Version) undoubtedly has shown the star’s maturity, reflection, and musical improvement in her career.
