Guest Bwogger Paige Williams prepares the Columbia community for Red’s rerelease this Friday.

The night I received my acceptance letter from Columbia, I listened to “Welcome to New York” by Taylor Swift. One line stood out: “When we first dropped our bags on apartment floors/Took our broken hearts, put them in a drawer.” I naively thought I was past the trivial romantics of high school—a markedly new start. I was giddy! I envisioned my college experience in this city to be as sensational as her album 1989 predicted. 

Two months in, my experience here at Columbia is much more like Red, the younger, frenetic sister of 1989. Taylor epitomized Red on her social media when she announced the re-recording: “Happy, free, confused, lonely, devastated, euphoric, wild, and tortured by memories past.” Ouch! (Special thanks, Taylor Swift and Adele for dropping albums within a week of each other and making this the saddest “Sad Girl Autumn” of all.)

Taylor wrote Red when she was twenty-one years old, and it architectured a bridge between her country roots and pop future. Plus, the album’s genesis involves Columbia—sort of. It was largely inspired by Taylor’s relationship with actor Jake Gyllenhaal, who she dated for about three months in 2010. Gyllenhaal was a student at Columbia until his sophomore year when he dropped out to focus on acting. 

To pay homage to the Red (Taylor’s Version) re-recording, I present a crash course on this album before its release on Friday, November 12. You may ask, what are your credentials? (1) I saw the Red tour in Philadelphia when I was ten years old, and I cried. (2) I have listened to this album hundreds of times since—and cried. 

Why is Taylor Swift re-recording an album from nearly a decade ago? Great question. Taylor signed with Big Machine Records in 2005, and after her contract expired in 2018, she changed to Universal’s Republic Records. Big Machine Records sold to Ithaca Holdings, owned by a music manager named Scooter Braun. Braun then sold her masters, reportedly without her knowledge. She doesn’t profit from her first six albums, including Red.

Why is this decision meaningful? Taylor Swift is worth about $550 million. She does not need the profit from these new recordings. She wants and deserves control of her musical journey—one that has been well over a decade in the making. 

Is Red a good album? YES, emphatically!

“I’ve never listened to Red!” Do not fear. Below, I have the entire Red (Taylor’s Version) tracklist with all I know and recommend. For the sake of time, I have described each song with a sentence. 

*I also added the best listening location (on or near campus) and favorite line. 

*Taylor will release never-before-heard songs “From the Vault.”

Red (Taylor’s Version) Tracklist:

“State of Grace (Taylor’s Version)” — An unexpected rush of adoration. 

Favorite Lyric: “These are the hands of fate/You’re my Achilles heel”

Listening Location: Law Bridge

“Red (Taylor’s Version)” — A relationship chronicling nearly every visible wavelength on the electromagnetic spectrum. 

Favorite Lyric: “Loving him is like trying to change your mind once you’re already flying through the free fall”

Listening Location: Milstein

“Treacherous (Taylor’s Version)” — That bad idea you must pursue, even if only in your head. 

Favorite Lyric: “Put your lips close to mine/As long as they don’t touch”

Listening Location: Median between Columbia and Barnard, 117th street

“I Knew You Were Trouble (Taylor’s Version)” — “I can fix [insert person]!”

Favorite Lyric: “Once upon a time, a few mistakes ago”

Listening Location: Dodge gym

“All Too Well (Taylor’s Version)” — A gut-wrenchingly sad reflection on the total devastation and microabrasions of a split. 

Favorite Lyric: “And you call me up again just to break me like a promise/So casually cruel in the name of being honest”

Listening Location: The 1 train, at dusk

“22 (Taylor’s Version)” — Youth.

Favorite Lyric: “We’re happy, free, confused and lonely in the best way/It’s miserable and magical”

Listening Location: Dorm elevator, preferably on a Thursday night

“I Almost Do (Taylor’s Version)” — Fight the overwhelming urge to call your ex.

Favorite Lyric: “And asking me if I wanna try again with you/And I almost do”

Listening Location: Your room, late at night

“We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (Taylor’s Version)” — The title says it all.

Favorite Lyric: “I say, ‘I hate you,’  we break up, you call me, ‘I love you’”

Listening Location: Low Steps

“Stay Stay Stay (Taylor’s Version)” — Repetition that Homer would admire. 

Favorite Lyric: “You took the time to memorize me/My fears, my hopes and dreams”

Listening Location: Joe Coffee (Pulitzer)

“The Last Time (feat. Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol) (Taylor’s Version)” — Cyclic torture of apologies and broken promises. 

Favorite Lyric: “You wear your best apology/But I was there to watch you leave”

Listening Location: Butler stacks

“Holy Ground (Taylor’s Version)” — Love now, think later. 

Favorite Lyric: “Back to a first-glance feeling on New York time/Back when you fit in my poems like a perfect rhyme”

Listening Location: West Village

“Sad Beautiful Tragic (Taylor’s Version)” — The breakup hurts, but looking back does more damage. 

Favorite Lyric: “I stood right by the tracks/Your face in a locket”

Listening Location: Futter Field

“The Lucky One (Taylor’s Version)” — The harsh reality that crushes the rosy expectations of fame.

Favorite Lyric: “And they tell you that you’re lucky/But you’re so confused,/’Cause you don’t feel pretty, you just feel used”

Listening Location: Sundial

“Everything Has Changed (feat. Ed Sheeran) (Taylor’s Version)” — The one percent of people who fall in love with that childhood best friend. 

Favorite Lyric: “’Cause all I know is we said, “Hello”/And your eyes look like comin’ home”

Listening Location: Steps in front of Earl

“Starlight (Taylor’s Version)” — A vintage tale of a whirlwind romance. 

Favorite Lyric: “He said, ‘Look at you, worrying so much about things you can’t change/You’ll spend your whole life singing the blues/If you keep thinking that way’”

Listening Location: Pupin

“Begin Again (Taylor’s Version)” — Rejoicing over decency after dating someone awful. 

Favorite Lyric: “You said you never met one girl who/Had as many James Taylor records as you, but I do”

Listening Location: Hungarian Pastry Shop

“The Moment I Knew (Taylor’s Version)” — The moment where your deepest fears and reality intersect. 

Favorite Lyric: “And what do you do when the one who means the most to you/Is the one who didn’t show?”

Listening Location: Furnald Lawn

“Come Back…Be Here (Taylor’s Version)” — A relationship that becomes long distance a little too soon to survive it. 

Favorite Lyric: “I guess you’re in New York today/And I don’t wanna need you this way”

Listening Location: Riverside Park

“Girl at Home (Taylor’s Version)” — Upholding social code by not cheating, because you know how awful it feels. 

Favorite Lyric: “Call a cab, lose my number”

Listening Location: College Walk

“State of Grace (Acoustic Version) (Taylor’s Version)” — “State of Grace,” with a breathiness that leaves you feeling slightly haunted. 

“Ronan (Taylor’s Version)” — A deeply reflective song Taylor wrote for a boy named Ronan, who died of pediatric cancer. 

“Better Man (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

Favorite Lyric: “Sometimes, in the middle of the night, I can feel you again/But I just miss you, and I just wish you were a better man”

Listening Location: Max Caffe

“Nothing New (feat. Phoebe Bridgers) (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

“Babe (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

Favorite Lyric: “I hate that because of you, I can’t love you/Babe”

Listening Location: Courtyard in front of Wien

“Message In a Bottle (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

“I Bet You Think About Me (feat. Chris Stapleton) (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

“Forever Winter (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

“Run (feat. Ed Sheeran) (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

“The Very First Night (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

“All Too Well (10 Minute Version) (Taylor’s Version) (From the Vault)”

I hope everyone enjoys listening to this mosaic masterpiece of an album. Don’t be surprised if you see a few Swifties shedding tears next Friday. Let us feel our feelings, just as Taylor always encourages.

Taylor Swift via Jars McLucien

Smiley Taylor via Wikimedia Commons