Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) Allows Listeners To Grow Up With Her

When the original Speak Now came out in 2010, I was six-years-old. 

I was enamored with the pretty purple princess dress on the cover and songs of fairytale love and heartbreak, as I attempted to sing along with as much anguish as I could muster.

Taylor Swift is rerecording her old albums to reclaim her rights to them. She started her rerecord series with Fearless (Taylor’s Version) in April of 2021 and Red (Taylor’s Version) in November of 2021. Each rerecord has broken the Spotify record for biggest opening day streams by a female artist. Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) became the app’s most listened to album in a day this year and the most-streamed country album in a day in Spotify history.

Released on July 7, the album has 22 songs with six vault tracks (tracks that were scrapped from the original album that were added to this one). There were some noticeable changes, the biggest and most controversial was the lyric change in the song Better than Revenge. 

The song, which chronicles her perspective of getting cheated on, originally blames the other girl her boyfriend cheated on her with and contains the scathing lyric, “she’s better known for the things that she does on the mattress.” Swift has always regretted the line, and thirteen years later, she has found nuance and no longer believes in the idea of boyfriend stealing. The new lyric reflects growth in her song writing: “he was a moth to the flame, she was holding the matches.”

My personal favorite vault track is When Emma Falls in Love. It captures the feeling of first love and platonic affection. The collaborations on the album—Castles Crumbling featuring Hayley Williams and Electric Touch with Fall Out Boy—fulfilled my childhood dreams.

 Some fans have complained that although her singing on the project is better, the emotions are less prevalent. For example, in Haunted there is no longer a shakiness in her voice. But much like how All Too Well from Red no longer makes her cry, I believe these changes show she has grown as a person. Speak Now was released by a heartbroken 19-year-old coping with love, growing up and moving on to new fairytale adventures, while Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) presents the artist looking back on her past fondly. 

Though Swift is no longer a naïve adolescent finding her way, she maintains the magic of the original as a confident established artist.