For many fans it was no surprise Taylor Swift announced the release of her “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” album at her final Los Angeles show on Aug. 9.
August is the 8th month of the year and Wednesday was the the 9th day of the month, the last two digits of the album, so how could the news not be coming? Not to mention the last day of the initial U.S. leg of the Eras tour. Also, the “I Can See You” music video from her “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version)” album, which came out last month, featured a subtle street sign that read “1′-9” – 8.9tv.”
“It was the 20th stop of the tour. And it would have been almost too poetic for it to have been the 19th week,” said Eric Cmar, a 33-year-old Swiftie from LA.
Fans know by now that dates and numbers carry far more meaning in the fandom. Nearly every decision Swift makes can feel like it comes with an extra layer of foreshadowing as she has a history of hiding cryptic clues in her work. And while fans don’t have a 100% accuracy in solving these mysteries, their guesses can’t be overlooked.
Taylor Version:Taylor Swift reveals ‘1989’ as next rerecorded album at Eras tour in LA
Once “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” releases on Oct. 27, the record-breaking artist will only have two more albums to re-record so she can own all her work, bringing Swifites to the resolution of their favorite guessing game. This includes her debut 2006 album “Taylor Swift” and her 2017 record “Reputation,” her sixth album and the last made under Big Machine.
“We think ‘debut (Taylor’s version)’, and then ‘Reputation (Taylor’s Version)’ is going to come out in that order,” said Brandy Kaminsky, a 25-year-old Swiftie from Colorado. “In a lot of her new music videos, she’ll have curlier hair like when she was in her earlier eras.”
Kaminsky posted a video on TikTok Thursday she made with a friend at work of them sharing their idea for the order of the next albums.
In the video, they point at fan made artwork of the elevator in the “Bejeweled” music video, released on Oct. 24, 2022, where Swift enters an elevator with 13 buttons, each color coded and properly sequenced to represent an album she made, including “Red (Taylor’s Version)” and “Fearless (Taylor’s Version)”. The 13th elevator button was purple foreshadowing the release of “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version)” before officially announcing it.
Except the fan made art from Kaminsky’s video includes 17 buttons representing the rerecordings for “1989”, “Taylor Swift”, “Reputation” and her next original album, especially in that order. Kaminsky said the Aug. 9 announcement confirmed that the fan art theory is accurate in predicting the next few albums.
However, Cmar argues “Reputation (Taylor’s Version)” would be the next to drop and also predicts she will complete her recording journey by dropping her debut album on her birthday Dec. 13, 2024.
“Debut last just like an exclamation point on owning her masters. Like I finally own my name. Yeah,” Cmar said. “Dec. 14, 2024, is a Friday new music is released on Fridays so it would be almost all too poetic for her to release her version of her debut album on her birthday.”
Swifites live for being detectives
Kaminsky said she believes Swift always has the next five to ten years of her music planned out so she finds ways to make the promotion of it as exciting as possible.
“Swifties are crazy but most of the time we’re right because we know her. We’ve known her, we watched her and loved her and sang along with her since 2006,” Kaminsky said. “So those little Easter eggs she drops, there’s so many of us that come together and say ideas that most of the time the fandom is right.”
While Cmar understands some fans can get overwhelmed by the amount of effort to analyze clues, he said he’s grateful the singer attached this thrilling adventure to her fan culture.
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“It’s fun for us. It costs nothing for us but our time and we already enjoy doing it anyway,” Cmar said. “What’s cool about any fan interaction with any artist is that you can take whatever you want out of that interaction. Whether it’s just their music, or their persona, or their personality, or fun little Easter egg hunts in messages, captions, music videos, tour outfits.”
What is Taylor Swift’s rumored lost ‘Karma’ album?
Fans have long suspected Swift was supposed to release an album titled “Karma” in 2016 but chose to release “Reputation” in 2017 where she lyrically addressed her public perception following celebrity drama.
Fans noticed Swift changing her appearance by bleaching her hair and chopping it short after releasing “1989” leading theorists to believe she was insinuating a new era. However, when “Reputation” dropped in 2017 the aesthetic of the album and her look did not match. Also, in the music video for the lead single “Look What You Made Me Do,” Swift wore an orange jumpsuit in a cold cage and later sang in the lyric “All I think about is karma.”
“There’s this Taylor that’s in the video. That’s like cutting off the wings of an airplane that was supposed to be an album that she spray paints reputation on,” said Moriah Childress, a 29-year-old Swiftie from Texas. “So, there was this album that was supposed to come out before ‘Reputation,’ but she had to scrap it and made ‘Reputation’ instead.”
In the fan art from Kaminsky’s music video, a 17th orange elevator button sits at the top as fans theorize the color orange will be the visual theme for the album. Kaminsky said she always ends her performances on the Eras tour with the song Karma before exiting through an orange door, signifying that concept.
Cmar said one of the most notable indicators of a Karma album is the music video for the song “The Man,” where there’s a scene of a man peeing in front of a wall with the names of multiple albums spray painted on as well as the word “Karma” twice. Swift later released a song titled “Karma” in her 2022 album “Midnights.”
“With the man wall music video moment, that karma being on there twice to me alluded to it’s more than just this like single,” Cmar said. “It’s on there twice, like it’s extra emphasis.”
