She’s done it again. Taylor Swift has broken many records throughout her career: youngest artist to win the CMA’s Entertainer of the Year in 2009, most viewed female artist music video online and the first female artist to win Album of the Year three times with her albums “Fearless,” “1989” and “Folklore.” Now, her newest record has broken another record.
On Friday, Apr. 9, Swift released her newest album: “Fearless (Taylor’s Version),” a re-release of her 2008 album, “Fearless.” The new album featured 20 tracks from the first release of “Fearless.” Swift also included six new unreleased songs from the past.
When Swift changed from Big Machine Label Group — the record label she had been signed with since she was 15 years old — to Universal Music Group’s Republic Records, she pushed to own the master recordings of her own music, a privilege that many artists do not have. Swift’s master recordings were owned by industry mogul Scooter Braun, who famously works with many artists such as Justin Bieber, Ariana Grande and Kanye West.
Swift posted a Tumblr post prior to her 2019 AMA performance explaining to her fans that Scooter Braun and Scott Borchetta, the CEO of Big Machine, were not allowing her to perform her older songs for the performance. She also wrote that Braun and Borchetta would not allow her to use old performance footage in her Netflix documentary. She urged her fans to care about the issue because she felt that the same denials were happening to other musical artists managed by Big Machine. Braun and Borchetta denied Swift’s allegations and after a long and publicized controversy, Swift was able to reclaim her master recordings.
On Apr. 16, one week after the album’s release, “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” hit #1 in the UK. With that accomplishment, Swift has hit #1 in the UK with three different albums, “Folklore,” “Evermore” and “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” in 259 days. The previous record was set by The Beatles with three #1 albums in the UK in 364 days. Beating this record was not a small task; The Beatles have held this record for 54 years.
Swift tweeted out some love to her UK fans on Apr. 16, quoting her “London Boy” track from her 2019 album “Lover.” She has plans to re-release her other early records as well.
Tweet us, @VALLEYmag, with your favorite song from off the album!
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