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“Wildest Dreams (Taylor’s Version)” Takes Over #SwiftTok

By Shelbie Ritnour, Staff Writer

Photo Courtesty of Cosmopolitan UK

Over the course of a month, Taylor Swift, globally renowned singer-songwriter, has taken over the social media app TikTok. 

On Aug. 23, Swift surprised her fans by creating her first TikTok on her account. Swift had been mainly using the platform to share content of her cats. Until Sept. 17, when she shocked her fans, and the rest of Tiktok, by posting a video announcing the surprise-rerelease of ‘Wildest Dreams (Taylor’s Version)’. This comes as the viral Tiktok POV trend, using the original ‘wildest dreams’ continues to gain popularity. 

In a little over 30 days Swift has amassed 5.2 million followers on TikTok. She averages 18 million views and 180,000 likes per video . As of Sunday Sept. 25, the video announcing the song release has 47 million views and 6.7 million likes.

Swift is rereleasing her music for financial and retributional purposes. 

Swift released “Wildest Dreams (Taylor’s Version)” so TikTokers could continue making videos with her new version, changing who receives revenue from the viral trend. Profiting off her work while denying profit to those who own her masters. Swift has already begun the process of rerecording her first six albums, presumably tacking “Taylor’s Version” to the end of each album title. 

 In 2019, Swift’s music catalogue was sold by her formal label, Big Machine Records, without her knowledge or permission. Neither of which were necessary for the record label to make the sale, as they had outright ownership of Swift’s music produced from 2005 – 2018. 

Consequently, her catalogue, as well as the rest of Big Machine’s Label Group was sold for over 300 million dollars to Scooter Braun, who has since resold Swift’s catalogue to an unknown investment fund. 

On Tumblr, Swift is quoted as saying the rights ending up in Scooter Braun’s hands was “worst case scenario” and her “worst nightmare”.  Therefore, the goal of rereleasing her music is not only to own it all, but to prevent Scooter Braun and others from making more money off of her work. 

Students on campus are talking about Swift’s new TikTok account.

“I don’t think I’ve ever followed anyone faster,” sophomore international relations major Sage Gauthier said.

Students support Swift’s decision to remake her music.

“I love that she’s owning her masters. I’ve been in support of her re-recording her albums from the beginning because I definitely think that she deserves to own her own music and plus it’s an added benefit for the fans because we get to relive each era and get new music,” freshman musical theatre major Morgan Vybihal said. 

When asked how she felt about the new version of “Wildest Dreams (Taylor’s version),” Vybihal raved.

 “Yes, I think her voice has definitely improved since when she first recorded it, so it’s really cool to witness and I love everything she does anyway,” Vybihal said. 

Other students have differing opinions on Swift’s new release.

“I feel like it was just kind of like silly, because it sounded like the same exact thing to me. It kinda was worse in my opinion,”  junior early childhood education major Leon said.

Leon said that she was unaware that Swift was rerecording her first six albums and the reasoning behind it. 

Though opinions on the new release differed, Vybihal, Gauthier, and Leon all agreed that Swift and all other artists and musicians should own the rights to their own music.

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