REVIEW: Taylor Swift redefines retrospection with ‘Fearless (Taylor’s Version)’

Everyone has that album that defined their childhood. Across the world, massive albums such as The Beatles’ “Abbey Road” or Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” are often cited as pieces of work that revolutionized not only the music industry, but entire generations of music-lovers as well.

However, if you grew up in the 2000s, one of the most unavoidably generation-defining albums was Taylor Swift’s “Fearless.” Released in 2008 with instant hits including “Love Story” and “You Belong With Me,” “Fearless” was an album that spoke to people everywhere. Whether the world liked it or not, this 18-year-old blonde girl from Tennessee and her mastermind abilities to capture teenage emotion through songwriting was about to take the world by storm. 

Since then, Swift’s impact on the music industry has been undeniably astronomical. From consistently massive albums since the release of “Fearless,” she’s effectively raised a generation of storytellers who are inspired by her ingenious music composition, master-class lyricism and, most of all, complete emotional vulnerability. But amid media scrutinization, mass misogyny and, most recently, the hostage situation of her first six albums, Swift and her music have had to survive through some of the most brutal situations the music industry has to offer.

Nonetheless, in her rereleased 26-track version “Fearless (Taylor’s Version),” Swift masterfully reclaims her narrative and demonstrates that she hasn’t just navigated the music industry — she’s absolutely redefined it.

We’ll start with the most notable difference: Swift’s voice has significantly changed since 2008. While this could have risked the original integrity of the album, she actually uses this evolution to her benefit in many tracks. Her once-prominent country twang and nasal vowel pronunciation is noticeably lost, now replaced by a smoother, warmer, deeper, more controlled tone.

This improvement is particularly applaudable in slower, emotional songs such as “White Horse,” “Breathe,” “Untouchable” and “The Best Day.” With tracks like these that require her vocals and lyrics to shine, her new vocal techniques create a tender, blended, intimate ambiance that allows the listener to fully absorb the gravity of her lyrics. If the originals themselves weren’t already soul-stirring, one could say these new versions have taken significant strides to reach further into the hearts of the listeners.

Her new voice’s impact also extends beyond her intimate ballads. In upbeat songs such as “Hey Stephen” and “You Belong With Me,” Swift further demonstrates her improved stylistic and vocal control from years of experience. This is particularly evident in the little details — the edgier, pronounced humming in “Hey Stephen,” the playful hints of a country accent in “Tell Me Why,” the mischievous smirk she had while recording “The Way I Loved You,” her enthusiastic grunts of “huh!” across multiple songs (a vocal quip trademarked to this era).

Listening closely, you can tell she’s putting significant care into honoring these songs by accessing her teenage emotions while recording them and blending it seamlessly with her current musical expertise. She recaptures the original emotion perfectly: While I’m listening to her newfound vocal confidence in the “Fearless” title track, I still get the same heart-fluttering feeling I had listening to the original at 8 years old. It’s a beautiful and almost biblical approach to this project.

Nonetheless, the storytelling elements of this album have and forever will continue to shine through as Swift’s major musical strength. Whether it’s resurfacing her heartbreak with Joe Jonas through “Mr. Perfectly Fine” and “Forever & Always” (I also highly recommend the piano version for a more intimate perspective) or giving advice to her wide-eyed, naive freshman year self with “Fifteen,” Swift’s ability to transport you to specific, personal moments reveals something of humanity as a whole: how connected we all are through shared struggles and experiences. It’s more evident than ever that her music is absolutely timeless for this reason.

Fans of her original album will also notice subtle instrumental changes to original tracks as well. Whether she’s fully building out the instrumentals and harmonies in “You Belong With Me” or adding more strings to pick up momentum by the second chorus of “Untouchable,” Swift has managed to maintain the integrity of the original songs while adding her own finishing touches. It’s these key subtle changes that speak so truthfully to Swift’s sonic evolution and authority over the years, as she’s exercising these songs with more tools she’s picked up from experience.

The other significant difference is the six new “From The Vault” tracks, as she lovingly puts it, that have been released with Taylor’s version of Fearless. Written circa-2008, Swift further demonstrates that she’s in full control of her music by not only giving her fans new music, but also re-imagining these songs in a style that simultaneously pays homage to her country roots and adds hints of her modern “folklore”/“evermore” sonic composition.

This “folklore”/“evermore” inspiration was particularly evident in “Don’t You,” a track that describes the one-sided pain of running into an ex who’s doing fine, with flute-esque chords fluttering in tangent with her breathy background vocals, as if she’s catching her breath in the relationship. On the other hand, tracks such as country duet “That’s When,” featuring Keith Urban, bitter yet upbeat anthem “Mr. Perfectly Fine,” and mandolin-strumming heartbreak ballad “You All Over Me,” featuring Maren Morris, sound like they were mixed in the style 2008 Taylor would have wanted. 

Of particular note is her incredibly compelling lyricism in “You All Over Me” and “Bye Bye Baby.” With lyrics like “But like the dollar in your pocket, it’s been spent and traded in / You can’t change where it’s been, reminds me of me” and “Then the here and the now floods in / Feels like I’m becoming a part of your past,” it feels almost criminal that these songs were left out of the original album. But if anything now, it speaks to how genius Swift has always been in articulating the emotion of love and heartbreak — even only as a teenager.

There are millions of words that can be written about the impact of Taylor Swift. It would be an understatement to call her a force of the music industry, or a mastermind storyteller or even a big sister you never had. She’s more than the blonde Tennessee teenager that performed entire sold-out stadium tours, and she’s more than the words on my lyric booklet as I sat in front of the CD player at 8 years old, absorbing every word of “You Belong With Me.”

 While there can be millions of words written about the impact of Taylor Swift, the release of “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)” has made it more clear than ever: The only words that will define her legacy are her own.

And I cannot wait to see what she’ll say next.