Forget hot girl summer, we’re getting ready for sad girl autumn as Taylor Swift has announced she’s releasing Red (Taylor’s Version) on November 19. The album will be her second official re-record, following the release of Fearless (Taylor’s Version) in April.
Red is Taylor’s fourth studio album and marked the beginning of her crossover from country to pop back in 2012. It’s a kaleidoscopic record that explores all the different types of ‘red’ emotions and Taylor recently described it as her only “true breakup album” which captured “pure, absolute, to the core heartbreak.”
Announcing the news on social media, Taylor wrote “Musically and lyrically, Red resembled a heartbroken person. It was all over the place, a fractured mosaic of feelings that somehow all fit together in the end. Happy, free, confused, lonely, devastated, euphoric, wild and tortured by memories past.”
She also revealed that for the first time ever, fans will get to hear all 30 songs that were meant to go on the album. Yes, THIRTY songs. Including a very special one which is 10 minutes long.
The original Red tracklist had 16 songs, with the deluxe version bringing the total up to 22. Two of the bonus tracks were demos, which seem improbable to re-record, so that leaves 10 spots to be filled on Red (Taylor’s Version).
Here’s what we’re hoping to see!
1. The 10 minute version of All Too Well
The existence of an extended version of the most infamous ‘track 5‘ is something which has plagued the fandom for almost 10 years. Taylor and her collaborator, Liz Rose, have often spoke about the challenge of filtering the song down to an acceptable length. Even then, it’s still the longest song on the album at 5 minutes and 27 seconds.
Now it seems Taylor has officially confirmed she’s releasing the 10 minute version by ending her announcement with “And hey, one of them is even ten minutes long.” In case that wasn’t clear enough, she even included a scarf emoji which refers to the song’s famous lyrics.
2. The mysterious second Ed Sheeran collab
Taylor and Ed’s friendship began in the Red era, with the pair collaborating on one of its songs ‘Everything Has Changed’ and later going on tour together. What a lot of people don’t know is that they actually wrote two songs during that writing session.
“I got an email saying she had been a fan for a while and ‘Should we write a song?’ So we hooked up and wrote two tunes, actually, one on the record and another that’s still out in the ether somewhere,” Ed told Rolling Stone in 2012.
3. Babe
Back in 2013, Train’s Pat Monahan revealed that he and Taylor wrote a song called ‘Babe’ for Red which didn’t end up making the album. Five years later, it was given to country music duo Sugarland who released it as a single. It features Taylor’s backing vocals and she even stars in the music video, but could it be time for her to release her own version?
4. Better Man
Similarly, ‘Better Man’ is an unreleased song which Taylor wrote prior to Red and gave to another artist at a later date. In 2016, Little Big Town released the song as the lead single from their album The Breaker. Taylor has performed it a handful of times over the years, including at The Bluebird Cafe in 2018, but we’d absolutely love a studio version.
5. WANEGBT rock version
If you were lucky enough to see the 1989 World Tour in 2015 (or the Apple Music special), then you’ll be familiar with this. Taylor re-envisioned some of her older songs as part of the setlist and gave them a brand new sound, one of which was an incredible rock performance of ‘We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together’.
6. Ronan
One of Taylor’s most heartbreaking songs is her 2012 charity single ‘Ronan’. It was written about a four-year-old boy who died of neuroblastoma, based on blog posts by his mother, Maya Thompson, who is also credit as co-writer.
All proceeds from sales of the song go towards cancer charities. While it may be too emotional for Taylor to re-record, she continues to keep a close relationship with Maya and it’s very possible that she would be supportive of re-claiming the song’s ownership.
7. Let’s Go (Battle)
A couple of years ago, an unreleased song titled ‘Let’s Go (Battle)’ leaked on the internet and Swifties have been obsessed with it ever since. We’re unsure whether it was written for Speak Now or Red, but it would fit perfectly on the latter.
Sounding like a predecessor to 1989‘s ‘Bad Blood’, the track is about a crumbling relationship and uses the metaphor of a battle scene. You can read the lyrics here.
8. State of Grace acoustic
The acoustic version of ‘State of Grace’ is a forgotten gem that featured as the final track on the deluxe edition of Red. We see no reason why Taylor wouldn’t include it!
9. Nothin’ New
In one of the Lover deluxe journals released in 2019, Taylor included a diary entry from March 2012 where she spoke about writing a Joni Mitchell inspired track.
“I wrote a song on the plane ride from Sydney to Perth on the Appalachian dulcimer I bought the day of my flight. I bought it because Joni played on most of her Blue record. I taught myself to play ‘A Case of You.’ Anyway, I wrote a song on it called ‘Nothin New’ and it’s about being scared of aging and things changing and losing what you have,” Taylor wrote.
She even included some lyrics:
“I’m getting older and less sure of what you like about me anyway
How can a person know everything at 18 and nothing at 22
And will you still want me when I’m nothing new?”
You can pre-order Red (Taylor’s Version) here.