Thoughts: Speak Now (Taylor's Version)

Taylor Swift’s ongoing quest to re-record her first six albums has been a fascinating journey. Few artists have had the opportunity Taylor has had to re-examine and re-contextualize their work— maybe none? It has given her a literal and figurative way to declare true ownership of her art. It’s fitting, then, that Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) feels like the album Taylor has re-contextualized the most. After all, it was the first of her records to be completely written only by her— the original Taylor’s Version, if you will.

2010’s Speak Now was written in the aftermath of the 2009 MTV VMAs incident, in which a still world-conquering Kanye West interrupted Taylor’s acceptance speech. It also coincided with Taylor leaving her teenage years behind and entering her 20s. Both of these subjects set the tone for Speak Now, creating an album that feels anxious about growing up, yet excited for what lies ahead. Re-recording the record at 32, Taylor adds a weariness to the songs that wasn’t there before. In fact, her voice is notably higher-pitched than it was on the Fearless and Red TVs, almost as if she’s trying to evoke the character of Speak Now Taylor. This makes the moments you hear the façade break all that more poignant, almost as if a bit of current Taylor’s pain seeps through the cracks. In “Haunted,” you can hear an extra strain on her voice when she sings “I thought I had you figured out,” and on “Last Kiss,” she delivers the bridge with an emotional heft only hinted at in the original. This strategy has its limitations, however: Just like Fearless TV’s “Fifteen”, the innocent Taylor of “Never Grow Up” is missing, losing a bit of the original’s charm.

On the last two Taylor’s Version releases, the instrumentation has stuck largely to the template of the original albums, with a few deviations here and there to spice things up. On Red (Taylor’s Version), for instance, bonus track “Girl at Home” enjoyed an electronic upgrade that easily bested the original. Speak Now, at least to my ears, features more tweaks to the album tracks than ever before. The biggest beneficiary is “Better Than Revenge,” the “Misery Business” tribute that shares its inspiration’s light misogyny. The guitars are cranked up, the filtered background vocals are grittier, and, most importantly, the slut-shaming line is gone. Its replacement is good, if maybe a bit clumsy, but it still feels like the best possible solution to the problem. The aforementioned “Haunted” also gets a sonic boost, adding to its gothic heft. I honestly wish that a heavier facelift was given to more of the songs, but perhaps Taylor’s goal here is still to hew close to the original — at least for her biggest hits.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Taylor’s Version if there weren’t some vault tracks to discuss — new, previously unreleased songs from the same recording period — and they’re here too. If that sounds dismissive, that’s because they do feel a bit perfunctory this time. The Fall Out Boy collab “Electric Touch” feels a little bloated, though I do wonder what a Taylor-only version sounds like. Hayley Williams’ feature on “Castles Crumbling” fares a bit better, but I am surprised it’s so low key. After This is Why, I wasn’t expecting her to be in "Petals for Armor/Flowers for Vases” mode. Of the four solo tracks, “Emma Falls In Love” (which is a clear “Drops of Jupiter” riff) and “I Can See You” ( a slinky, Jack Antonoff-produced banger) are the highlights.

Speak Now is still my personal favorite of Taylor’s albums, and the Taylor’s Version only solidifies how I feel about it. It’s a collection of transitional songs, both about transitioning from childhood to adulthood (she’s got bills to pay! She’s got nothing figured out!) and from country to pop/rock/whatever Taylor’s into that day. Even though the new material is lacking, the new coat of paint really shines. Long live.