Taylor Swift announced on Friday, May 30, via her website that she had acquired the rights to her master recordings after a six-year fight, which includes previously released music, music videos, and more.
The official, original recordings of Swift’s first six albums were acquired by private equity firm Shamrock Capitol in 2020. The firm bought the masters from music manager and executive Scooter Braun, who had bought them in 2019 when he acquired Swift’s first label, Big Machine Label Group.
Swift shared in a letter posted to her website announcing the news:
“Thanks to you and your goodwill, teamwork and encouragement, the best things that have ever been mine…finally are.”
That same day, Swift posted a photo to her Instagram where she sat surrounded by her first six albums on vinyl, with the original covers of the re-releases with the caption, “You belong with me.”
Since 2021 when Swift released Fearless (Taylor’s Version) she has been rerecording her first six albums to regain control over her work. She has so far released Red (Taylor’s Version) also in 2021, and Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) and 1989 (Taylor’s Version) in 2023.
Fans have been anticipating the release of Reputation (Taylor’s version) particularly since a snippet of “Look What You Made Me Do (Taylor’s Version)” was included in the final season of The Handmaid’s Tale.
“The Reputation album was so specific to that time in my life, and I kept hitting a stopping point when I tried to remake it,” Swift said in her letter.
“To be perfectly honest, it’s the one album in those first 6 that I thought couldn’t be improved upon by redoing it. Not the music, or photos, or videos. So I kept putting it off.”
Swift said that “there will be a time (if you’re into the idea)” for her to release the “vault tracks,” or unreleased songs, from the album. She added that she has already finished rerecording her debut album and that she “really loves” how it sounds now, so fans can potentially look forward to the two remaining re-releases in the future.
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