Jake Gyllenhaal Better Watch Out For Swifties

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Taylor Swift’s album photoshoot. Credit: https://www.nme.com/reviews/album/taylor-swift-red-taylors-version-review-3093107

Victoria Betancourt, Editor in Chief/Sports Editor

The day Jake Gyllenhaal has been fearing has finally come: Red (Taylor’s Version) is finally here.

You may be asking the significance of this album, but when you truly deep dive into this, Taylor Swift wouldn’t be Taylor Swift without this album. Her younger albums are seen more as childish narratives rather than songs that truly tell a story (I care to differ about this opinion, but that’s a discussion for another time.), and this the album is where she finally breaks through not only as a singer, but also as a songwriter.

Red (Taylor’s Version) is a re-recording of the original album Red, but with songs from the vault and the long anticipated 10 minute version of “All Too Well.”

Before listening to this album, a Swiftie truly asks how can a perfect album get any better? Somehow Swift delivers. Her grown up voice on tracks such as “Red,” “Treacherous,” and “Holy Ground” truly effect the impact of the songs and makes the artist sound older and wiser when singing about her past relationships rather than like a naïve and impulsive child as many used to think of her.

When hearing her re-recorded upbeat pop classics such as “22,” “Trouble,” and “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” you get an instant touch of nostalgia back to your age at the time. Hearing these songs now in their new versions shows me how much time has passed since I first became a Taylor Swift fan and that I’m finally all grown up.

The tracks “Better Man,” “Nothing New,” (feat. Phoebe Bridgers), “Babe,” “Message in a Bottle,” “I Bet You Think About Me,”“Forever Winter,” “Run,” (feat. Ed Sheeran), and “The Very First Night,” are all vault tracks that were meant for the album but were never ultimately on the album. Hearing these for the first time now makes you wonder how different the tracks would’ve sounded in 2012 with the original album release.

Speaking of vault tracks, “I Bet You Think About Me” got a surprise music video which is currently up on Swift’s YouTube channel.

Another song that got a YouTube upload was “All Too Well,” in short film version this time. Currently, the 15 minute video has about 30 million views and counting. Ever since the release of the original song, fans have been wanting an explanation as to what truly happened in this mysterious relationship and this what the short film is for. It explains what happened behind closed doors and what the public didn’t get to see. To add on, Swift uses actors Sadie Sink, age 19, and Dylan O’Brien, age 30, to show the age gap between her and Gyllenhaal when they were dating.

Continuing with this “All Too Well” discussion in the 10-minute version of this song, Taylor Swift didn’t come to play. She sings statements such as, “He’s gonna call it love, you never called it what it was,” “and he said ‘It’s supposed to be fun turning twenty-one,’” and “’I’ll get older, but your lovers stay my age’”.

Swift didn’t hold back in this version of the song and fans went wild with her amazing storytelling.

After demolishing Jake Gyllenhaal, John Mayer better watch his back because it looks like he’s next.

For now though, let’s grab our red scarves and a Taylor’s Latte at Starbucks (Yeah, you read that right. Starbucks and Taylor Swift collaborated for this album release.), and bask in the autumn air as we listen to the masterpiece that is Red (Taylor’s Version).