Taylor Swift buys back master recordings of first six albums

Taylor Swift has officially bought back the rights to her first six albums, following a six-year battle over owning her music.

In a letter shared on her website, Swift confirmed she had successfully purchased the rights to all six of her first albums.

“All of the music I’ve ever made now belongs to me,” she announced.

“I’ve been bursting into tears of joy… ever since I found out this is really happening.”

The singer famously began releasing re-recorded versions of her first six albums after Big Machine Record sold them to Scooter Braun in 2019.

Swift slammed the deal at the time, saying Braun had been complicit the “incessant, manipulative bullying” against her by Kanye West, one of his clients.

Her first release came in 2021 with Fearless (Taylor’s Version) followed closely by Red (Taylor’s Version) in 2021, and later by Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) and 1989 (Taylor’s Version) in 2023.

Each release included unheard “vault tracks,” songs written for the album but never released at the time.

Will Taylor Swift still release Reputation (Taylor’s Version)?

Fans had been eagerly awaiting the release of her first album, Taylor Swift, and her sixth album, Reputation with many speculating an announcement at the AMAs last week.

However, in her letter, she told fans she had yet to complete the project, after “hitting a stopping point” while trying to remake 2017’s Reputation album.

“The Reputation album was so specific to that time in my life,” she explained. “All that defiance, that longing to be understood while feeling purposefully misunderstood.

“To be perfectly honest, it’s the one album in those first six that I thought couldn’t be improved by re-doing it… so I kept putting it off.”

While many fans would be disappointed at this news, Swift said the vault tracks intended for the record would be released if fans were “into the idea”.