Taylor Swift
October 24, 2006
Table of Contents
Background and Record Deal
«I can understand. They were afraid to put out a 13-year-old. They were afraid to put out a 14-year-old. Then they were afraid to put out a 15-year-old. Then they were nervous about putting out a 16-year-old. And I'm sure if I hadn't signed with Scott Borchetta [head of Big Machine Records], everybody would be afraid to put out a 17-year-old.»
Themes and Inspiration
«You listen to my album and it sounds like I've had 500 boyfriends. But that's really not the case. I found that you don't have to date someone to write a song about them [...] I was going through a really tough time in school and facing a lot of rejection among my peers. I found that I was alone a lot of the time, kind of on the outside looking into their discussions and the things they were saying to each other. They really didn't talk to me. In the process of coming to that realization, I started developing this really keen sense of observation -- of how to watch people and see what they did. From that sense, I was able to write songs about relationships when I was thirteen but not in relationships.»


Development and Music
When pressed about the scenario that inspired her first single, “Tim McGraw,” she redirected: “The song is not about a huge, intense relationship. It’s about an innocent one.” Invoking famous country musician Tim McGraw as the singer of a song that conjured nostalgia was also a very smart use of the contemporary country practice of referencing performers of earlier generations as a way of claiming connection to the genre’s lineage. Taylor wrote “Tim McGraw” in math class during her freshman year, knowing that she and her senior boyfriend, Brandon Borello, would break up at the end of the year when he left for college. Co-writer Liz Rose said Taylor showed up at her job (writing songs for Sony/ATV) after school, “With the idea and the melody. She knew exactly what she wanted”. The nostalgic song describes a summer romance and Taylor’s hope that when Borello “think[s] Tim McGraw” he would “think [her] favorite song” – Tim McGraw’s “Can’t Tell Me Nothin” – and remember her.
For tween and teen girls, Taylor was a defender of feeling deeply and unapologetically. One of the album’s sharpest lines was from “Cold As You,” a parting shot at a callous former love interest: “You come away with a great little story of a mess of a dreamer with the nerve to adore you.”
Taylor penned the autobiographical song “The Outside” as an outlet at age twelve, the year she began writing her own songs. Like many of the other songs she wrote early on, the song describes the unhappiness and loneliness she felt when her love of country music alienated her from her peers.
In “Our Song,” Taylor animated her storytelling with frisky conversational phrasing. She wrote “Our Song” for her freshman year high school talent show with no intentions of including it on the album. She claimed she, “Just knew there was something about it” and chose to include it on “Taylor Swift”. “I wrote it about this guy I was dating, and how we didn’t have a song. So I went ahead and wrote us one.” That was among the album’s sunniest tracks. Beneath her singing, the bright acoustic picking and strumming was goosed by a lightweight, programmed loop, a prescient pop-country update that she achieved with her then-producer Nathan Chapman. “Our Song” is placed at the end of the standard edition of the album due to its closing lyrics, a clever request to “play it again”.
Recording
To record Taylor Swift, she had to choose which album producer she would work with: “Then, all of a sudden, it was, ‘OK, we’re going to use this producer’ or, ‘We’re going to use that producer.'” After experimenting with different producers originating from Nashville, Taylor chose Chapman because of the unique sound he put into songs. Big Machine Records was skeptical about hiring Chapman because he had never done a studio album prior to Taylor Swift, only demos. Taylor described the songs he produced as “the right chemistry hit[ting]” and therefore, Big Machine Records accepted Chapman producing some of the album’s songs. In the end, Chapman produced all but one of the tracks on Taylor Swift. Recording was executed during a four month period in 2006.


Album Artwork and Release
On November 6, 2007, the album was re-released under the title Taylor Swift (Deluxe Edition) for a limited time. The deluxe edition contained three new songs: “I’m Only Me When I’m with You“, “Invisible” and “A Perfectly Good Heart“, the radio edits for “Teardrops On My Guitar“, and “Our Song”, and Taylor’s first phone conversation with Tim McGraw. The re-release also bared new artwork and a bonus DVD with all of Taylor’s music videos at the time (“Tim McGraw”, “Teardrops On My Guitar”, and “Our Song”), behind-the-scenes footage of “Teardrops On My Guitar” and “Our Song” music videos, and a performance of “Picture to Burn“, among other material. Target released an exclusive version of Taylor Swift (Deluxe Edition), with performances of Taylor during McGraw and Faith Hill’s “Soul2Soul II Tour”.
A third and final re-release appeared on March 18, 2008 with the original album artwork, including the three new songs from the Taylor Swift (Deluxe Edition), as well as the radio edit of “Picture To Burn,” and an additional pop remix of “Teardrops On My Guitar”. This version of the album was also released on vinyl in 2016. A karaoke version of Taylor Swift was released on January 27, 2009, containing the first fourteen tracks from the album on both CD+G and DVD.
Singles
Promotion
Commercial Performance and Critical Reception
Taylor Swift has sold over 9,3 million copies worldwide as of December 2018. It is the longest charting album released in the 2000s on the Billboard 200 chart.
10 Years Later
«10 years ago today, my first album came out. I couldn’t be more grateful today, thinking back on how much fun we’ve had and how you’ve encouraged me to change and grow. It’s been such an adventure, guys. Thank you for all of it.»
Released | October 24, 2006 | ||
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Recorded | 2005–2006 | ||
Studio | Abtrax Recording (Nashville) Castles (Nashville) Darkhorse Recording (Franklin) Love Shack (Nashville) Quad Studios-A (Nashville) Sound Cottage (Nashville) Sound Emporium (Nashville) The Engine Room (Nashville) The Tracking Room (Nashville) | ||
Genre | Country Pop Rock | ||
Length | 40:28 | ||
Label | Big Machine Records | ||
Producers | Nathan Chapman Robert Ellis Orrall | ||
TAYLOR SWIFT CHRONOLOGY | |||
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