The re-record of Taylor Swift’s 2008 album, ‘Fearless’, is here. This means a brand new version and video of ‘The Best Day’ hs arrived, along with sweet new photos of Taylor with her mom.
Taylor Swift, 31, is not the only person who has grown up since she originally recorded her album Fearless in 2008. Her mom has also been along for the ride over the past 13 years, and so Taylor made sure to pay tribute to Andrea Swift for the release of her re-recorded album, Fearless (Taylor’s Version), on April 9. This means the tribute song she wrote for her mom all those years ago, “The Best Day,” arrived with a brand-new lyric video that revealed photos taken recently.
While the visuals start with a montage of videos and photos from Taylor’s childhood, the montage ended with a slideshow of pictures featuring a grown-up Taylor with her beautiful mom. They posed for many smiley selfies together, as you can see in the photos above and below!
As this video demonstrates, Taylor is incredibly close with her mother. This is why it was especially difficult for the Grammy-winning pop star after her mother was first diagnosed with cancer in 2015. By March of 2019, Taylor revealed that the cancer had returned in her interview with Elle; and in Jan. 2020, she revealed that doctors had found a brain tumor in her mother amid treatment.
“Everyone loves their mom; everyone’s got an important mom. But for me, she’s really the guiding force. Almost every decision I make, I talk to her about it first. So obviously, it was a really big deal to ever speak about her illness,” Taylor told Variety after the tumor was found.
Fearless (Taylor’s Version) is the first album that Taylor re-recorded to gain back ownership of her music. When she left Big Machine Records in 2018, she gave up the rights to own the masters of her first six albums, which she originally recorded under that record label. Label head, Scott Borchetta, would not allow Taylor to buy the masters outright — instead, he wanted her to record six NEW albums under Big Machine to earn back each old one. Taylor did not want to take that deal, so she left Big Machine and her masters behind.
However, when Scott then did sell the masters outright — to the singer’s nemesis, Scooter Braun, no less — Taylor decided to take action. As soon as she was allowed to begin re-recording the music in Nov. 2020, she got to work. Fearless, which originally came out in 2008, was the first re-recorded project that she completed. In addition to all the original songs and bonus tracks, Taylor also re-recorded six never-before-heard songs that didn’t make Fearless the first time around. Fans got to hear these “from the vault” tracks for the first time on Fearless (Taylor’s Version).
Taylor has not yet confirmed which of the five remaining albums she plans to re-record next. However, in March, she dropped a snippet of the new version of her song “Wildest Dreams,” which was originally on the 2014 album, 1989. Naturally, this left fans speculating that 1989 will be up next. Meanwhile, Taylor fully owns the rights to the three albums — Lover, Folklore and Evermore — that she recorded since leaving Big Machine.