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I'm Only Me When I'm With You

Bonus Track | Taylor Swift (2006)

“I’m Only Me When I’m With You” is a song on the deluxe edition of Taylor’s debut album, Taylor Swift (2006). Taylor co-wrote it with Robert Ellis Orrall and Angelo Petraglia about her and her best friend Abigail Anderson, how well they know each other and feel free to be themselves when they are together.

Background and Release

Taylor penned “I’m Only Me When I’m With You” when she was thirteen and trying to get discovered by record labels. Her co-writer Robert Ellis Orrall confirmed via Instagram that they recorded the song two years later on January 21, 2004, along with “A Place In This World” and Taylor’s unreleased track “What Do You Say?”. “I’m Only Me When I’m With You” was released on the deluxe edition of her debubt album Taylor Swift, as well as her EP Beautiful Eyes (2008).

Lyrical Theme and Production

The lyrics of “I’m Only Me When I’m With You” describe how Taylor feels pressured to act a certain way around other people to gain acceptance from them, especially in regards to her career. But when she’s with her friends and family, she feels like she can be herself.

Sonically, she was inspired by 2000s teen sensation Avril Lavigne. She went into the studio with producer Robert Ellis Orrall and told him she wanted to write a song with a sound similar to Avril’s style – but with a country twist. It was the first time they all worked together and Robert was surprised by Taylor’s confidence at such a young age. He told the “Swift Legacy Podcast”:

«I remember the first song we wrote was ‘I’m Only Me When I’m With You.’ And she was like, ‘I wanna write something like Avril Lavigne, but country.’ And I was like, 'Cool.' We got kind of stuck on a line somewhere and Angelo hadn’t thrown out any lyrics yet…and he threw out these two lines […] and she just looked at him and said, ‘I don’t know, that’s kind of trite. […] I’m not sure my demographic would say something like that.’ And he went, ‘Huh,’ and I just put my fingers like little guns and went, ‘Shot down by the 13 year-old! Alright!‘ It was astonishing, her confidence. Right from the get-go.»

Robert Ellis Orrall

At the time, Taylor was still signed to RCA Records under her development deal. When Robert sent a label executive the demo they had cut the feedback was not good: “They went, ‘No, I don’t think so. It’s too pop.”

Taylor and her team really believed in the song’s potential nontheless. Once she got her record deal with Big Machine it was decided that “I’m Only Me When I’m with You” would be released on the deluxe edition of Taylor’s debut album. Instead of reworking it they kept the original demo they had recorded two years prior because everyone was really happy with the way it sounded. Robert concluded: “I think we nailed it. She ended up opening her shows with it.”

Music Video

Taylor edited the music video for the song herself, on her Macbook. It features homemade videos of Taylor, Abigail and some other friends of hers, as well as her family. It is laid-back and shows a more family-oriented side of Taylor. The video was released on March 3, 2008, and was later uploaded to Taylor’s YouTube channel on June 16, 2009. When introducing the song and video on her TV channel Taylor Swift NOW in 2016, Taylor said:

«The 'I'm Only Me When I'm With You' was something I edited on my laptop. And it was just footage I had from being on the road, when I was like 16 or 17. We were all travelling on one bus. Like the whole band, me, my mom. It was a huge moment when we upgraded to two buses, and we had a girl's bus and a guy's bus. For a long time, it was just like, people cram together on this bus. It was hilarious, and fun, and a lot of those moments are captured in this video, which was just stuff that I had filmed on my camera. So, it's funny to go back and look at it. I never feel like I wasn't allowed to be a teenager just because I was in this business. Like, I definitely still got to have that.»

Taylor Swift

The release of the music video teased the song’s potential release as a single – which did not happen. Robert Ellis Orrall recalled: “You know, songwriters make the most money when we have singles. And I remember I never felt comfortable asking the record label or Scott [Borchetta] what the next single was going to be. But all of the sudden I saw the video for ‘I’m Only Me When I’m With You’ had been released and it went straight to No. 1 in one week. And then it was like, ‘No, it went to No. 1 already.’ It felt like they got enough out of it and they moved on to another one. But all is good, all is good.”

Live Performances

In total, Taylor has performed “I’m Only Me When I’m With You” more than 100 times. She regularly sang it in promotion of her debut album when she was a tour opening act for many country music superstars. It even served as the first song of her set. Later, the song was also added to the encore of her first headlining tour, the “Fearless Tour” (2009-2010). During the performance, she invited her own opening acts (most often the band Gloriana) up on stage to sing the song with her. Taylor then performed “I’m Only Me When I’m With You” on October 26, 2018, as an acoustic surprise song during her “reputation Stadium Tour” concert in Melbourne, Australia. When introducing the song, she said:

«So the song that I have decided to play tonight is one that you guys were requesting online. And I have not played this in forever. There are a lot of people in this room who were not born when this song came out. So, for anyone who does know it, you're gonna have to scream even louder, okay? I wrote this song when I was 13 years old. And it was a bonus track on my first album.»

Taylor Swift

Five year later, Taylor chose “I’m Only Me When I’m With You” as the first surprise song for her show on June 30, 2023, in Cincinnati while on “The Eras Tour” (2023-2024).

Lyrics

[Verse 1]
Friday night beneath the stars
In a field behind your yard
You and I are painting pictures in the sky
Sometimes we don’t say a thing
Just listen to the crickets sing
Everything I need is right here by my side

[Pre-Chorus 1]
And I know everything about you
I don’t wanna live without you

[Chorus]
I’m only up when you’re not down
Don’t wanna fly if you’re still on the ground
It’s like no matter what I do
Well, you drive me crazy half the time
The other half I’m only trying
To let you know
That what I feel is true
And I’m only me when I’m with you

[Verse 2]
Just a small-town boy and girl
Living in a crazy world
Trying to figure out what is and isn’t true
And I don’t try to hide my tears
My secrets or my deepest fears
Through it all nobody gets me like you do

[Pre-Chorus 2]
And you know everything about me
You say that you can’t live without me

[Chorus]
I’m only up when you’re not down
Don’t wanna fly if you’re still on the ground
It’s like no matter what I do
Well you drive me crazy half the time
The other half I’m only trying
To let you know
That what I feel is true
And I’m only me when I’m with you

[Bridge]
When I’m with anybody else
It’s so hard to be myself
And only you can say

[Final Chorus]
That I’m only up when you’re not down
Don’t wanna fly if you’re still on the ground
It’s like no matter what I do
Well you drive me crazy half the time
The other half I’m only trying
To let you know
That what I feel is true
And I’m only me, who I wanna be
Well, I’m only me when I’m with you, with you