hello from someone who was NOT born in 1989!

1989 by Taylor Swift was released in 2014 when I was seven years old. It was my first Taylor release as a fan. Most of my memories of 1989 take place in the huge city of Shanghai, China – where I lived at the time of its release – so I like to think it exists for me the way she intended for it to. I had the honor of hearing1989 twice in concert - the first time being opening night of the 1989 World Tour, in Tokyo, and the second time being back in the US a few months later, when she stopped in my city after I’d moved back.

Hearing about Taylor Swift’s re-recording plans in 2019, I was excited about all of the re-recordings, primarily because the world would learn two years later that the re-recorded albums would feature “From the Vault” songs: songs cut from the original record. If you aren’t familiar with the concept of re-recordings – or at least what they mean to swifties – here’s a brief explanation. Taylor Swift signed with Big Machine Records at the start of her career with a contract of six albums, plus a greatest-hits record. As the Reputation (2017) era wore on, talk began online over what would happen to her career now that six albums had been released. Many thought her career would promptly end because they thought she’d already hit the most success she’d ever reach. It’s funny how foolish that sounds now, knowing how much bigger she’s managed to make it since then. Regardless of her signing with Republic Records in 2019, the real kicker that’s kept the conversation from fully ending is about who now owns those six albums. While the complex details are somewhat redundant, the basic gist is that the re-recordings are happening because Taylor wants to own her work. She’s expressed that her former label owner, Scott Borchetta gave her the option to either buy her work from him or earn the rights back by releasing more albums, but she refused both options. Hence, when her seventh studio album, Lover (2019), was released, she announced that she would be re-recording and re-releasing her first six albums. Since February 2021 (when she released the very first re-record, “Love Story (Taylor’s Version)”) she’s released Fearless (Taylor’s Version), Red (Taylor’s Version), Speak Now (Taylor’s Version), and as of October 27th,1989 (Taylor’s Version). So, let’s get into it!

As for the overall album, the most monumental part of 1989 in 2014 was Taylor switching genres. She was launched into a new kind of success as a newly-pop artist.1989 was extremely urban, with a New York City theme (the opening track is literally titled “Welcome to New York”). While much of the album is described to be about living your life as a single woman in a big city, it still heavily discusses love. The liner notes of the album show that the album is less about being independent and more about the freeing journey to finding that independence. By the time the record ends, you feel clean – the title of the closing track on the original standard edition.

Before I get into each song, I’ll clarify that my focus is on the vault songs. However, it would be wrong not to say a little about the re-released tracks themselves, as there’s a lot of discourse online about the quality of them. The original 1989 album was primarily produced by the iconic duo Max Martin and Shellback and the (separate from those two) lead singer of the band Bleachers, Jack Antonoff. Despite Antonoff having worked with Taylor for every album since this record’s original release, fans were worried he would ruin the work of the unreturning Max Martin and Shellback. The re-record is produced by Jack Antonoff and Christopher Rowe (who has also been an active participant in the re-recordings project). So, I’m going to briefly go through each re-record before I get to the vault songs.

Swift pictured on the cover of 1989 (Taylor's Version)

Welcome to New York (Taylor’s Version): I’ve never been obsessed with this song, but I still think it’s a great song. As I listened to the new version of it for the first time, not much stuck out to me, except that the iconic intro sounds better than ever.

Blank Space (Taylor’s Version): Going into this album knowing everything was re-recorded was especially intriguing for 1989 for one reason: the number of smash hits it has. “Blank Space” is one of three songs on the standard edition with over 1 billion streams on Spotify. I only know a little bit about what the internet was like during the 1989 era (I was 7 and not online when it came out), but one thing I have heard no shortage of discussion about is just how iconic this song was. From the golf club swing against the microphone stand on the 1989 tour (complete with an echo of her saying the cities name on beat, which is now a common chant at her ongoing tour) to the line “darling, I’m a nightmare dressed like a daydream” being in every other person’s Instagram bio, this song was an anthem.

I think there’s inevitable disappointment for swifties with the impossible to live up to standards people have for songs that they’ve heard hundreds of times. “Blank Space (Taylor’s Version)” certainly didn’t disappoint me, but it’s bound to have disappointed many others.

Style (Taylor’s Version): I love this re-record. Or at least once the first chorus is over. Many fans online have complained about it “putting shame to the original”, but as with “Blank Space”, that’s inevitable. Some say the intro isn’t as good and the chorus sounds like something Kidz Bop would create, but I say give it a month and no one will care.

Out of the Woods (Taylor’s Version): Wow. I give Taylor so many props for this song because as a musician, I can tell that she added very subtle differences just to give it a little extra elevation. Everything in the song is just a little better than the original version, and it’s super satisfying to hear – like a bite of that one brand of cookie dough ice cream that is somehow way better than any other brand of cookie dough ice cream.

All You Had To Do Was Stay (Taylor’s Version): Just as incredible as it was before. Insane song that cannot be brought down by anything.

Shake it Off (Taylor’s Version): this is the last song on the record with 1 billion streams on Spotify, but it’s certainly not the last with some insane stat on another platform. I use Spotify for reference because it tends to cover the fan favorites better, as it’s easier to quickly access and stream on than a music video on YouTube is (where most of the other big stats are). Anyway, some things irk me about this song’s re-record – such as an annoying click I hear incessantly at random points in the song and an obviously different-sounding chant at the end of the iconic bridge. But other than that, this re-record is honestly amazing. It’s much more fun to dance to than it used to be, and I say that as someone who was never a huge fan of “Shake it Off”, as it’s been played nonstop around the world since pretty much the moment it came out in August of 2014.

I Wish You Would (Taylor’s Version): I was nervous to hear this redo because it’s one of Taylor’s classics in my head. By that, I mean that it was one of my all-time favorites of Taylor’s for a while, but eventually got old. Now, it’s pretty much a skip when the album comes on. I call it a classic because I don’t want to call it a skip since it remains a very special song to me.

Now, I apologize for being dreary, but this redo proved that skip placement in my head. I love this song to death no matter what, but the song went from old to both old and less good. For me, that’s solely because of the electric guitar. I hope it will grow on me.

Bad Blood (Taylor’s Version): the best way to describe how I feel about this re-record is the opposite of “I Wish You Would”. I’ve never loved it until now. Her voice sounds incredible. As I’ve aged, the song feels more relevant to my life. That’s kind of obvious given that most music will be more relatable when you’re older than it was when you were little, but it’s a fun feeling.

Wildest Dreams (Taylor’s Version): This is like “I Wish You Would” in terms of being a favorite of mine – except that this song never faded from being a favorite. This re-record had a moment to grow on me before the release of 1989 (Taylor’s Version), as it was released because of a TikTok trend in September 2021, but even then, it was perfect.

How You Get the Girl (Taylor’s Version): The acoustic guitar sounds great, but this song is still how it’s always been to me; rather uninteresting with a few relatively fun parts.

This Love (Taylor’s Version): This song is a great contrast in sound to the rest of the album. The re-record is as incredible as it was when it was released as part of the soundtrack for the first season of The Summer I Turned Pretty (2022).

I Know Places (Taylor’s Version): I like this song. The growl on “they are the hunters, we are the foxes, and we run” in the second verse is incredible, but the song generally is no better than it used to be.

Clean (Taylor’s Version): Euphoria. I love it when the second chorus hits – the re-entering of instruments feels like stepping into a warm shower after a rainy day.

Wonderland (Taylor’s Version): The pre-choruses are insane. Dancing around my kitchen like a crazy person.

You Are In Love (Taylor’s Version): Another classic. Most parts are the same. However, I think the echoes throughout the chorus of “silence”, “way home” and “lights out” are quieter than they should be, which makes me like it a little less.

New Romantics (Taylor’s Version): Like with “Style”, many people are coming at this re-record for sounding “like a Kidz Bop song”, or saying it got the ‘We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together’ treatment” (Taylor changed the production of this Red (Taylor’s Version) track so that the infamous “we-e” in the chorus would sound reminiscent of a bunch of tweens). However, I adore “New Romantics” and already had to put aside my differences with Taylor’s re-recording choices when “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (Taylor’s Version)” was released in 2021, so while this change is notable enough that I sadly do think my listening experiences will be affected a little by it, I am optimistic that I can make an effort to see past it. “New Romantics” is an incredible song and shouldn’t be sold short by this difference.

Ok, now for the fun part: the vault songs! I’ve loved Taylor’s tradition of adding previously cut songs to the re-recordings. All the re-recorded albums came out before I was old enough to truly appreciate how well Taylor emulated certain feelings, so I especially like that these songs are coming out when I have a chance to deeply understand them on the first listen. Some of my favorite songs of Taylor’s are vault songs.

Since the re-recording process started, she’s technically released vault songs for every one of her latest albums. For example, Lover (2019), the first album she released after leaving Big Machine Records, has the vault song “All of the Girls You Loved Before” (2023). Evermore (2020) could be considered the vault of Folklore (2020), and that’s not even considering the song “Carolina”, released for the movie Where the Crawdads Sing (2022), which is a Folklore cut. As for Midnights (2022), “You’re Losing Me (From the Vault)” was released as a CD-only single in May of this year (and was put on streaming platforms just yesterday) as a part of Midnights (Late Night Edition) (2023).

Taylor said in the announcement post she made for 1989 (Taylor’s Version) that it was her favorite re-record thus far because of the vault songs, so I was psyched to hear the vault songs. Here’s what I think!

“’ Slut!’ (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”: Taylor has kept up with promoting the vault songs, and this is the one being pushed in this vault. Overall, it’s not hard to figure out why. While the song itself isn’t technically hit material (not that Taylor couldn’t get away with making it one), the edgy title will undoubtedly keep people interested in hearing it.

When Taylor posted the 1989 (Taylor’s Version) tracklist and announced this song, people were very curious about its topic. About 75% of people I saw online were convinced she’d come at the media for slut-shaming her (which she experienced an especially high amount of in the first half of her career, part of why 1989 is presented to be about friends rather than romance). The other 25% were convinced it would be some kind of sad ballad. Therefore, I think people wondering what the song is about will make up for most of the streams once the song is pushed to the radio.

Ironically enough, the people convinced the song would be a ballad were still only kind of right. That’s because it’s a love ballad! The hook is “If they call me a slut, you know, it might be worth it for once”. The song feels a little like a foreshadow for the rest of her career thus far. For example, the album following 1989, Reputation (2017), was branded with a similar tactic to this song. Promoted with the lead single “Look What You Made Me Do” (2017), it was anticipated to be an angry revenge album – only for listeners to find out upon the album’s release that it was actually about finding love amidst chaos. This is virtually how “’ Slut!’” is presented. The other way it feels like a foreshadow is because it has immensely reminiscent production to that of her faraway album, Midnights.

Taylor described the song best herself. She says (paraphrased) in a voice memo posted to Tumblr that she decided in 2014 between including this song or the hit “Blank Space” on the original 1989. She says she chose “Blank Space” because “’ Slut!’” felt like Los Angeles, while “Blank Space” felt like New York City, which makes almost unexplainably perfect sense to me. In terms of the writing of “’ Slut!’” Taylor uses simple but specific word choice (“aquamarine moonlit”, “tangerine neon light” and repetition of similar but not often used words like “love struck”, “love drunk”, “lovelorn”, “love thorns”) to explain falling into a love that she essentially thinks will make it worth it to be slut-shamed. The words are all unique, like this relationship. The big punch of the song is, “I’ll pay the price, you won’t”, referring to how women are shamed for dating a lot of people, but no one cares when men do the same. Why is this partner special? “I break down and he’s pulling me in, in a world of boys he’s a gentleman” and “he’s waiting there/the sticks and stones they throw froze midair” are just two moments in the song that make the listener understand.

My favorite line and why: “You’re not saying you’re in love with me, but you’re going to” – both perfectly cocky and very pure, because this guy must be great if she can tell he loves her so easily.

“Say Don’t Go (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”: On my first listen, my jaw dropped from the start of the first chorus till the end of the song. Years ago, I was in class and started writing a song about a similar situation in my head. The song charged out of my brain after school and onto paper. Hearing this song made the remnants of that situation come right back up, and I was shocked by the accuracy. The hook is “I would stay forever if you’d say ‘don’t go’”, which is similar to the line in that song of mine “Say something, this doesn’t have to evaporate”. One of my favorite feelings is hearing a song for the first time and feeling completely and utterly seen, and that line in “Say Don’t Go” did that for me.

“Say Don’t Go” itself is about being led on but taking a leap of faith before you realize that and being shattered. She goes through several stages of grief; by the end, she accepts that he won’t do what she bargained over – which is to say, “Don’t go”. The song builds and hits its peak at the end of the bridge – which some might compare to her hit “Cruel Summer”. She sings “I said ‘I love you’, you say nothing back”, followed up by a couple of seconds of silence and then launching explosively back into the chorus of wondering why this person would do this to her. The song is one of the longest on the record, spanning a whole 4 minutes and 40 seconds.

My favorite line and why: “I said ‘I love you’, you say nothing back” – the harmonies and way it’s delivered make it easily the best part of the song.

“Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”: This was one of my initial favorites in this vault. The chorus is catchy, and pretty much anyone who has experienced a connection with a human can relate to it at least a little. This is because this song can be seen in a platonic way very easily. She details throughout the song how she hears about her ex’s life now and wonders how he’s doing, but always comes back to the conclusion: “I guess I don’t have a say now that we don’t talk”. She touches on being a people pleaser (“remind myself the more I gave you’d want me less”), relying on her mom as a shoulder to lean on (“I call my mom, she says that it was for the best”), and finally making the best of it (“I don’t have to pretend I like acid rock” and more relatable, “with ‘important’ men who think ‘important’ thoughts”). The song comes to a halt at the end of the bridge, with a play on the hook, “Guess this is how it has to be, now that we don’t talk”, and then it promptly ends.

My favorite line and why: “The only way back to my dignity was to turn into a shrouded mystery, just like I had been when you were chasing me” – this line is so weirdly real.

“Suburban Legends (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”: this is already the hidden gem of the album, likely because it’s the vault song that belongs on the album the least. It’s one of my current favorites. The melody is addicting and every part of the song has lyrics I adore. Some of these include (all from different sections of the song), “you were so magnetic it was almost obnoxious”, “you kiss me in a way that’s gonna screw me up forever”, “I am standing in a 1950s gymnasium, and I can still see it now” and, “I pace down your block, I broke my own heart 'cause you were too polite to do it”. The song is about a high school relationship that ended despite how she thought it would last forever (“(I dreamed that) I ended up back at our class reunion, walking in with you”), and how much it hurt when it didn’t (“you don’t knock anymore, and my whole life’s ruined”). She was hoping they’d be the exception to the saying “nothing works out when you’re in high school”, but instead learned why people say that.

My favorite line and why: “You were so magnetic it was almost obnoxious” – I saw someone say on TikTok once that girls don’t have crushes, they have obsessions, and I feel like this represents that.

“Is It Over Now? (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”: Many compare this song to “Question…?” (2022) off Midnights for its passive aggressiveness and slightly open-ended-ness. This is the fan favorite of the “From the Vault” tracks on 1989 (Taylor’s Version), partially because of the media deciding it relates back to her infamous relationship with Harry Styles, which spawned “Style” and “Out of the Woods” – also fan favorites – and partially because of a viral TikTok dance.

Having a song titled “Is It Over Now?” is a classic Taylor move for the end of an album, and it’s kind of perfect that she ends an album full of bops with a final absolute banger, the hit of the vault songs. The song is about a typical love story going down in flames as both partners cheat, implying that maybe the relationship is on and off. The choruses open with “Let’s fast forward” followed by 300 occasions of trying to start relationships. This is followed up by the decision of commitment, (“I see your profile and your smile on unsuspecting waiters”, “if she’s got blue eyes, I will surmise that you’ll probably date her”) and then passive aggressiveness with the line, “you dream of my mouth before it called you a lying traitor”. She then explains the cheating, and the chorus ends with, “Is it over now?”, emphasizing the lack of closure in the relationship. The bridge appears twice – first right before the second chorus, and second in the standard place – after the second chorus. She explains that even though she cheated, she thinks it’s less important because she hid it, whereas even if her partner tried to, he sucked at it, which she thinks says a lot. Despite all this, she still misses his affection, “I think about jumping off of very-tall-somethings, just to see you come running and say the one thing I’ve been wanting, but no!”

My favorite line and why: “You dream of my mouth before it called you a lying traitor” – I love how this shows the duality of humans.

In conclusion, Taylor Swift is a legend. Taylor handles the re-recordings project with grace, and it’s very empowering to watch. I always try to end reviews with what I think artists will do next, but that’s just so challenging with Taylor. I’d like to say I look forward to her next album or re-recording or the continuation of the ongoing Eras Tour, but she keeps her eras so encapsulating that I’m happy right where she’s left me. I look forward to what she makes of the 1989 (Taylor’s Version) era and am happy to let her current take me and other listeners wherever she wants us to go, as I have since I was seven years old.

You can stream 1989 (Taylor’s Version) on all platforms.