I Almost Do
RED (2012) | RED (Taylor's Version) [2021]
“I Almost Do” is the seventh track on Taylor’s fourth studio album, RED (2012), released on October 22, 2012. The song explores the conflict between still wanting to reconnect with a former lover and knowing that returning to the relationship would only reopen old wounds. The re-recording, “I Almost Do (Taylor’s Version),” was released on November 12, 2021, as part of RED (Taylor’s Version).
Although “I Almost Do” was never released as a single, it has become one of RED’s cherished deep cuts. Its intimate portrayal of lingering feelings and the struggle to resist reconnecting with a former partner has earned it a lasting place among fan-favorite tracks from the album.
Background and Release
Following Speak Now (2010), Taylor deliberately expanded her musical approach for RED, experimenting with different sounds and collaborators while continuing to work with longtime producer Nathan Chapman. The early writing for the album began while Taylor was still touring Speak Now: by June 2011, she had already written around ten songs for her next record. During an interview with The New Yorker before a June 11 show in Detroit, she described the songs as “sad” and said the most recent one was “about moving on:”
«I recently decided that life is about achieving contentment...You’re not always going to be ridiculously happy. I've written about ten songs so far for the next album. They’re...sad? If I’m being honest. The most recent one is about moving on.»
“I Almost Do” was written by Taylor alone and produced with Nathan Chapman, retaining a more intimate, country-influenced sound than some of RED’s more experimental tracks. The song explores the conflict between wanting to reconnect with a former partner and knowing that doing so would mean risking the same pain again. Taylor later explained: “I think I needed to write this song in order to not call that person, actually.” She described songwriting itself as the alternative to picking up the phone, an idea reflected in the song’s hidden message in the original RED liner notes: “Wrote this instead of calling.”
“I Almost Do” was released on October 22, 2012, as the seventh track on RED. It sits between the carefree “22” and the much more decisive “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” creating an interesting emotional progression within the album: after briefly embracing freedom and fun, Taylor admits that part of her still wants to return to the relationship before ultimately choosing not to.
“I Almost Do” was released on October 22, 2012, as the seventh track on RED. It sits between the carefree “22” and the much more decisive “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” creating an interesting emotional progression within the album: after briefly embracing freedom and fun, Taylor admits that part of her still wants to return to the relationship before ultimately choosing not to.
General Information
| Artist | Taylor Swift |
|---|---|
| Albums |
RED RED (Taylor's Version) |
| Written | 2011 |
| Released | October 22, 2012 |
| Re-Released | November 12, 2021 |
| Studios |
Pain In The Art (Nashville) Kitty Committee (Belfast) Black Bird (Nashville) |
| Genre | Singer-Songwriter |
| Length | 4:04 |
| Labels |
Big Machine Records Republic Records |
| Songwriter | Taylor Swift |
| Producers |
Nathan Chapman (original) Christopher Rowe Taylor Swift |
Hidden Message
Wrote this instead of calling
Official Audio
Song Artwork
![RED (Taylor's Version) [Republic Records, 2021]](https://taylorswiftswitzerland.ch/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/8k-RED-Taylors-Version-scaled.jpg)
Lyrical Theme
The song came from a very specific emotional impulse: wanting to contact an ex despite knowing that doing so would reopen a wound that had not fully healed. Taylor explained that she wrote it about the conflict of wanting to take someone back while knowing that the relationship had hurt her too deeply to risk going through the same pain again:
«'I Almost Do' is a song I wrote about the conflict that you feel when you want to take someone back, and you want to give it another try but you know you can’t. And you can’t because you know it’s hurt you so deeply that you know that you couldn’t bear to go through that again. So you’re sitting there, and wondering where they are, and hope that they think about you, and that you’re almost picking up the phone call but you just can’t. I think I needed to write this song in order to not call that person, actually. I think that writing the song was what I did instead of picking up the phone.»
The hidden message in the RED liner notes, “Wrote this instead of calling,” makes that idea even more explicit. Taylor never publicly named the person who inspired “I Almost Do,” so Jake Gyllenhaal should not be presented as directly confirmed. The song has nevertheless long been associated with their relationship because of its chronology and because the hidden message fits the broader RED narrative surrounding that relationship.
The emotional tension comes from the fact that Taylor isn’t actually over the relationship. She imagines what her former partner might be doing, wonders whether he thinks about her, dreams about him wanting to try again and admits that she still wants to run back to him—but simultaneously understands why she cannot. The repeated idea of almost doing something becomes the song’s central device: she doesn’t call, doesn’t run to him and doesn’t attempt reconciliation, but every one of those choices contains the acknowledgment that she very nearly did. The result is less a conventional breakup song than a portrait of restraint, where the absence of an action becomes the most important action of all.
The emotional tension comes from the fact that Taylor isn’t actually over the relationship. She imagines what her former partner might be doing, wonders whether he thinks about her, dreams about him wanting to try again and admits that she still wants to run back to him—but simultaneously understands why she cannot. The repeated idea of almost doing something becomes the song’s central device: she doesn’t call, doesn’t run to him and doesn’t attempt reconciliation, but every one of those choices contains the acknowledgment that she very nearly did. The result is less a conventional breakup song than a portrait of restraint, where the absence of an action becomes the most important action of all.
Production
The production of “I Almost Do” draws heavily on Taylor’s early country sound, built around Nathan Chapman’s acoustic guitar, bass and drums and a relatively restrained arrangement that keeps the focus on her lower-register vocals. The gentle country-folk instrumentation is complemented by filtered guitar tones and subtle synth textures, while the drums give the song a soft-rock pulse that gradually adds weight to its otherwise intimate, hesitant mood.
Live Performances
“I Almost Do” was never included as a regular song on the setlist of “The RED Tour” (2013–2014), but Taylor gave it an early live life as an acoustic surprise song. She first performed it on the tour’s opening night in Omaha, Nebraska, on March 13, 2013, and returned to it just over a month later in Tampa, Florida, on April 20, 2013. Both performances presented the song in its most intimate form, standing in contrast to the elaborate, theatrical production that surrounded much of the tour.
Taylor then left “I Almost Do” untouched for a decade. Its next performance came on June 9, 2023, when she brought it back as the second surprise song of her “The Eras Tour” show in Detroit, performing it acoustically on piano. The song made one more appearance during the tour on July 13, 2024, in Milan, where Taylor performed “I Almost Do” as a piano mashup with “The Moment I Knew” (2012). The pairing created an especially poignant mini-journey through RED: “I Almost Do” captures the temptation to reach back toward a former relationship, while “The Moment I Knew” describes the moment when that relationship’s ending becomes undeniable.
Taylor then left “I Almost Do” untouched for a decade. Its next performance came on June 9, 2023, when she brought it back as the second surprise song of her “The Eras Tour” show in Detroit, performing it acoustically on piano. The song made one more appearance during the tour on July 13, 2024, in Milan, where Taylor performed “I Almost Do” as a piano mashup with “The Moment I Knew” (2012). The pairing created an especially poignant mini-journey through RED: “I Almost Do” captures the temptation to reach back toward a former relationship, while “The Moment I Knew” describes the moment when that relationship’s ending becomes undeniable.
Taylor's Version
“I Almost Do (Taylor’s Version)” was released on November 12, 2021, as part of RED (Taylor’s Version), with Taylor and Christopher Rowe serving as producers. The re-recording stays close to the intimate, acoustic-guitar-led character of the original while featuring Taylor’s more mature vocals, fuller drums and a subtly refreshed guitar arrangement, giving the song a slightly richer and more polished sound without changing its restrained emotional character.
Critical Reception
The critical reception to “I Almost Do” has been notably favorable in retrospect, although its initial reception was somewhat more divided. Slant Magazine felt that “I Almost Do” lacked some of the specificity that had become one of Taylor’s songwriting trademarks, while Saving Country Music considered it a good but comparatively unmemorable album track whose central hook did not quite stand out amid RED’s more dramatic shifts in sound.
Over time, however, the song’s reputation has become considerably stronger. Rolling Stone’s Rob Sheffield ranked “I Almost Do” among Taylor’s songs and argued that, for almost any other artist, it would have been a career peak, praising its emotional effectiveness while suggesting that its slow-jam arrangement could even have worked as a more aggressive rock song. The song has also benefited from the broader critical reassessment of RED: as the album has increasingly been viewed as a pivotal work in Taylor’s development as a songwriter, “I Almost Do” has come to be appreciated for the quieter side of that emotional range—its restraint, vulnerability and unusually honest depiction of still wanting someone you know you cannot return to.
The contrast between its early and later reception is particularly interesting because the song’s relative understatement was initially one of the things critics found less distinctive about it, but has become part of what makes it endure.
Over time, however, the song’s reputation has become considerably stronger. Rolling Stone’s Rob Sheffield ranked “I Almost Do” among Taylor’s songs and argued that, for almost any other artist, it would have been a career peak, praising its emotional effectiveness while suggesting that its slow-jam arrangement could even have worked as a more aggressive rock song. The song has also benefited from the broader critical reassessment of RED: as the album has increasingly been viewed as a pivotal work in Taylor’s development as a songwriter, “I Almost Do” has come to be appreciated for the quieter side of that emotional range—its restraint, vulnerability and unusually honest depiction of still wanting someone you know you cannot return to.
The contrast between its early and later reception is particularly interesting because the song’s relative understatement was initially one of the things critics found less distinctive about it, but has become part of what makes it endure.
Music & More
I Almost Do
4 Videos
5:46
4:05
4:05
4:05
Commercial Performance
“I Almost Do” was not released as a single, but it nevertheless entered the charts alongside the release of RED because of the album’s exceptionally strong digital sales. It debuted and peaked at No. 65 on the Billboard Hot 100, spending one week on the chart, while performing particularly well on country and digital-sales charts: it reached No. 13 on Hot Country Songs, No. 10 on Digital Songs and No. 1 on Country Digital Songs. In Canada, it reached No. 50 on the Canadian Hot 100, giving the album track a surprisingly strong chart showing despite receiving no traditional single promotion.
Its chart performance in 2012 is especially interesting in the context of RED’s extraordinary first-week consumption: “I Almost Do” was one of several non-singles that briefly entered the Hot 100 simply because so many listeners were buying individual album tracks digitally. It was therefore not a conventional hit—there was no radio campaign or music video behind it—but its No. 1 peak on the Country Digital Songs chart demonstrated that the song had a particularly strong audience among Taylor’s country listeners, even as RED was increasingly moving toward pop.
Nearly a decade later, “I Almost Do (Taylor’s Version)” charted even higher than the original in several markets. Upon the release of RED (Taylor’s Version) in November 2021, it debuted at No. 59 on the Billboard Hot 100, alongside 25 other Taylor songs that simultaneously occupied the chart, a record-setting display of the enormous consumption surrounding the re-recorded album. In Australia, the re-recording reached No. 45, while in the UK it peaked at No. 93 on the Official Streaming Chart. The comparison is telling: the original was already capable of charting purely through album sales in 2012, but the Taylor’s Version benefited from a vastly larger streaming audience and the renewed cultural attention surrounding RED, allowing this longtime deep cut to return to the charts nearly ten years later.
Its chart performance in 2012 is especially interesting in the context of RED’s extraordinary first-week consumption: “I Almost Do” was one of several non-singles that briefly entered the Hot 100 simply because so many listeners were buying individual album tracks digitally. It was therefore not a conventional hit—there was no radio campaign or music video behind it—but its No. 1 peak on the Country Digital Songs chart demonstrated that the song had a particularly strong audience among Taylor’s country listeners, even as RED was increasingly moving toward pop.
Nearly a decade later, “I Almost Do (Taylor’s Version)” charted even higher than the original in several markets. Upon the release of RED (Taylor’s Version) in November 2021, it debuted at No. 59 on the Billboard Hot 100, alongside 25 other Taylor songs that simultaneously occupied the chart, a record-setting display of the enormous consumption surrounding the re-recorded album. In Australia, the re-recording reached No. 45, while in the UK it peaked at No. 93 on the Official Streaming Chart. The comparison is telling: the original was already capable of charting purely through album sales in 2012, but the Taylor’s Version benefited from a vastly larger streaming audience and the renewed cultural attention surrounding RED, allowing this longtime deep cut to return to the charts nearly ten years later.
Lyrics
[Verse 1]
I bet this time of night you’re still up
I bet you’re tired from a long hard week
I bet you’re sittin’ in your chair by the window
Looking out at the city and I bet
Sometimes you wonder about me
[Chorus]
And I just want to tell you
It takes everything in me
Not to call you
And I wish I could run to you
And I hope you know that
Every time I don’t, I almost do
I almost do
[Verse 2]
I bet you think I either moved on or hate you
Cause’ each time you reach out, there’s no reply
I bet it never, ever occurred to you
That I can’t say hello to you and risk another goodbye
[Chorus]
And I just want to tell you
It takes everything in me
Not to call you
And I wish I could run to you
And I hope you know that
Every time I don’t, I almost do
I almost do
[Bridge]
We made quite a mess, babe
It’s probably better off this way
And I confess, baby
In my dreams you’re touching my face
And asking me if I’d want to try again with you
And I almost do
[Chorus]
And I just want to tell you
It takes everything in me
Not to call you
And I wish I could run to you
And I hope you know that
Every time I don’t, I almost do
I almost do
[Outro]
I bet this time of night you’re still up
I bet you’re tired from a long hard week
I bet you’re sittin’ in your chair by the window
Looking out at the city and I hope
Sometimes you wonder about me