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Blogocentric Formulations #1025991 added February 4, 2022 at 11:14pm
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All Too Well (10 Minute Version)
"The Soundtrack of Your Life"  | Day 3
"All Too Well (10 Minute Version)"
by Taylor Swift
This is probably going to turn into a longer piece at some point because I have a lot to say about the "Taylor's Version" re-releases, but I'm going to try to keep it succinct here and talk broadly about the many reason why I've been listening to this song a lot since she dropped the updated Red album in November.
1.The whole "Taylor's Version" movement.
It was a travesty that her old label allowed some dumb record producer to purchase her old masters without first giving her the opportunity to buy them back. So the fact that Taylor decided to re-record all of her old albums and release them as new "Taylor's Version" albums to cut into the proceeds the producers make off her old tracks is a really brilliant idea. There's also something to be said about the fact that Universal is publicly celebrating her doing this because it's popular, while also turning around and quietly updating their contracts with other artist to prevent them from doing this exact same thing in the future... but that business hypocrisy is a topic for another blog post. 
2. Taylor's business savvy.
She's not announcing which album she's releasing before it's out, so the owners of her old masters can't counter-program. They won't get any plays from people going, "Oh, this new album is coming out soon, so I'm going to catch up on it and listen to the original again." Nope, she just drops the new album in whole and is like, "Here you go, world. Update your favorites and listen to this one instead." And why would someone listen to this version instead? Because she's giving people everything. The old songs they love. New versions of the old songs just to mix it up. Bonus tracks that hadn't been released before. Take Red, the album this song is from, for example. The original album from 2012 was sixteen tracks. The deluxe version was 22 songs. Red (Taylor's Version) has 30 tracks (31 if you include the message from Taylor that comes with the version on Apple Music). This particular song was a fan favorite from the original album but was never a single, never had a music video, etc. So in addition to re-recording the original version, she also made this 10-Minute version to acknowledge what the fans wanted. She's not just re-doing the old albums and dumping them into the world... she's rethinking and recalibrating her albums and strategically releasing them in a way that both undercuts her antagonists AND gives the fans an improved product.
3. Taylor's artistry
This song isn't just a double-length song with a bunch of repeated choruses, or a tacked on verse here and there. If you listen to it and compare it to the original, she's expanded the song and put new material between the existing verses. She literally created a more fully-realized version of the song, fleshing it out and seamlessly integrating the new and the old lyrics. There aren't many artists that could pull off doubling the length of a song and still having it feel fresh.
I've been listening to this song a lot (and the whole album, in fact) because it's a master class on improving upon your old work, as well as making smart creative and business decisions that really pay off. Even if you're not a Taylor Swift fan per se, it's hard to deny that she's doing something remarkable with these "Taylor's Version" releases and everything that comes with them.
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