Album signifies Taylor Swift’s dominance over culture and her own music.

Swifties rejoice! Today, Friday, October 27, is when the world’s biggest pop star, Taylor Swift, released her version of ‘1989’ album as ‘1989 (Taylor’s Version).’ 

‘1989’ was originally released in 2014 and its name is a reference to the pop sensation’s year of birth. The album was symbolic of the sonic change in her music and transitional rebirth as an artist. The ‘Blank Space’ artist started her career as a country starlet. Her passion and effort saw her success extend into the world of pop, and her music soon followed. The definitive album established Taylor Swift’s era of world-bending pop culture dominance.

The “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” album is more than just a revisitation of Taylor Swift’s classic magnum opus. Under a new producer, Jack Antonoff, the album contains reimagined versions of all 13 originally track-listed songs, new renditions of the extra 3 songs off the deluxe album, and 5 unreleased tracks from Taylor’s music “vault.”

This album marks the fourth re-recorded album of the ‘Shake it Off’ pop star. Taylor Swift is on her journey to take back her music by providing her own versions of songs that she has previously recorded. This is because the pop sensation doesn’t own the master recordings of any songs she recorded before 2019, including major hits such as “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” and “Shake It Off.”

The masters to Taylor’s music were purchased by manager Scooter Braun and sold to the Disney family’s investment firm, Shamrock Holdings, for $405 million. Part of the purchase included the condition that allowed Scooter to profit from the masters. Taylor is on a mission to break free of outside control and own her own music and person. This is the reason for the addition of ‘(Taylor’s Version)’ to these re-releases.

Just as the original, ‘1989 (Taylor’s Version)’ provides Swift yet another era-defining show of her pop culture dominance. The album pushed Taylor Swift passed the 100,000 monthly listeners threshold on Spotify. She is now the first female artist to achieve this and is the second artist to do so following The Weekend. Other talented female artists such as Ariana Grande and Doja Cat have come “close” but still missed the mark by tens of millions of listeners. This crowing achievement signifies that Taylor is bigger than she’s ever been. Furthermore, she reached this point through her work and her fans’ dedication, all while owning her music.