Taylor Swift Buys Back Her First Six Albums

Taylor Swift is now the proud owner of the master recordings for her first six albums.

In 2019 Swift’s label Big Machine Records sold Swift’s catalogue to Hybe America CEO Scooter Braun without her consent. Big Machine was founded in 2005 by former Dreamworks exec Scott Borchetta. Braun was the manager of Justin Bieber and co-founded RBMG Records with Usher.

Braun paid $330 million for the masters to the six albums giving him ownership of all of the masters, music videos, and artworks copyrighted by Big Machine. Braun then sold the masters to Disney’s investment first Shamrock in 2020 for $405 million.

Swift purchased back the asset for $360 million.

Big Machine released Swift’s first single ‘Tim McGraw’ on 19 June, 2006. Her debut album ‘Taylor Swift’ followed four months after on 24 October 2006.

Swift’s first six albums were:

Taylor Swift (2006)
Fearless (2008)
Speak Now (2010)
Red (2012)
1989 (2014)
Reputation (2017)

Swift attacked back by re-recording four of the six abums.

The four re-recordings (Taylor’s version) were:

Fearless (2021)
Red (2021)
Speak Now (2023)
1989 (2023)

Taylor Swift published the following letter on her website:

“Hi,

I’m trying to gather my thoughts into something coherent, but right now my mind is just a slideshow. A flashback sequence of all the times I daydreamed about, wished for, and pined away for a chance to get to tell you this news. All the times I was thiiiiiiiis close, reaching out for it, only for it to fall through. I almost stopped thinking it could ever happen, after 20 years of having the carrot dangled and then yanked away. But that’s all in the past now. I’ve been bursting into tears of joy at random intervals ever since I found out that this is really happening. I really get to say these words:
All of the music I’ve ever made… now belongs… to me.

And all my music videos. All the concert films. The album art and photography. The unreleased songs. The memories. The magic. The madness. Every single era. My entire life’s work.

To say this is my greatest dream come true is actually being pretty reserved about it. To my fans, you know how important this has been to me — so much so that I meticulously re-recorded and released four of my albums, calling them Taylor’s Version. The passionate support you showed those albums and the success story you turned The Eras Tour into is why I was able to buy back my music. I can’t thank you enough for helping to reunite me with this art that I have dedicated my life to, but have never owned until now.

All I’ve ever wanted was the opportunity to work hard enough to be able to one day purchase my music outright with no strings attached, no partnership, with full autonomy. I will be forever grateful to everyone at Shamrock Capital for being the first people to ever offer this to me. The way they’ve handled every interaction we’ve had has been honest, fair, and respectful. This was a business deal to them, but I really felt like they saw it for what it was to me: My memories and my sweat and my handwriting and my decades of dreams. I am endlessly thankful. My first tattoo might just be a huge shamrock in the middle of my forehead.

I know, I know. What about Rep TV? Full transparency: I haven’t even re-recorded a quarter of it. 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. All that defiance, that longing to be understood while feeling purposely misunderstood, that desperate hope, that shame-born snarl and mischief. To be perfectly honest, it’s the one album in the 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. There will be a time (if you’re into the idea) for the unreleased Vault tracks from that album to hatch. I’ve already completely re-recorded my entire debut album, and I really love how it sounds now. Those 2 albums can still have their moments to re-emerge when the time is right, if that would be something you guys would be excited about. But if it happens, it won’t be from a place of sadness and longing for what I wish I could have. It will just be a celebration now.

I’m extremely heartened by the conversations this saga has reignited within my industry among artists and fans. Every time a new artist tells me they negotiated to own their master recordings in their record contract because of this fight, I’m reminded of how important it was for all of this to happen. Thank you for being curious about something that used to be thought of as too industry-centric for broad discussion. You’ll never know how much it means to me that you cared. Every single bit of it counted and ended us up here.

Thanks to you and your goodwill, teamwork and encouragement, the best things that have ever been mine… finally actually are.

Elated and amazed,

Taylor”

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