Taylor Finally Owns Her Own Work
• Our long national nightmare is over… Taylor Swift has officially purchased her back catalog of recordings that were initially released through Big Machine Records, after six years of transfers and turmoil. She reacquired those six albums and associated visuals from Shamrock Capital, for an undisclosed nine-figure sum, a price tag that is being characterized by Swift as exceptionally fair and reasonable. Variety has more details.
Swift shared her big news in a lengthy handwritten letter posted to her website, declaring, “All of the music I’ve ever made… now belongs… to me.” She added: “And all of my music videos; All the concert films; The album art and photography; The unreleased songs; The memories. The magic. The madness; Every single era; My entire life’s work.” Taylor later posted this photo to her socials with the simple caption, “You belong with me.”
Taylor will be reissuing her old Big Machine albums, which were first sold by Big Machine against her wishes in 2019. But now there will be two fully authorized versions of each of those albums in the marketplace, since she’s saying the re-recorded “Taylor’s Versions” will continue to be available alongside the originals. Two of those bonus-filled editions have yet to come out, including the long-awaited Reputation (Taylor’s Version), although Taylor admitted that she hasn’t yet recorded even a quarter of her version of Reputation — nicknamed Rep TV, saying, “the Reputation album was so specific to that time in my life, and I kept hitting a stopping point when I tried to remake it.”
News of a possible sale by Shamrock to Swift was first reported by the New York Post, but a source close to the negotiations disavowed elements of that story, saying the Post’s estimated price tag of $600-million-to-$1 billion was grossly inflated. Insiders say the price was far closer to the $300 million Shamrock was reported to have paid in 2020.
The source also said there was no involvement of Scooter Braun, whose Ithaca Holdings bought the catalog in 2019 before Shamrock acquired it from him a year later; he no longer participates in any profit from a sale, and Swift’s camp is adamant he had no part in Shamrock’s decision to sell. Said the source close to the sale, “Contrary to a previous false report, there was no outside party who ‘encouraged’ this sale. All rightful credit for this opportunity should go to the partners at Shamrock Capital and Taylor’s Nashville-based management team only. Taylor now owns all of her music, and this moment finally happened in spite of Scooter Braun, not because of him.”
Taylor’s post continued, “All I’ve ever wanted was the opportunity to work hard enough to be able to one day purchase my music outright with no strings attached, no partnership, with full autonomy. I will be forever grateful to everyone at Shamrock Capital for being the first people to ever offer this to me. The way they’ve handled every interaction we’ve had has been honest, fair and respectful. This was a business deal to them, but I really felt like they saw it for what it was to me: my memories and my sweat and my handwriting and my decades of dreams. I am endlessly thankful.” She added, “My first tattoo might just be a huge shamrock in the middle of my forehead.”
