Taylor’s Look At the Industry

Taylor Swift has opened up about her split with Big Machine Records and her role as a self-appointed artist advocate in a new interview with Music Week.

In the interview, Swift sketched out her deal with Universal’s Republic Records, which includes ownership of her future masters, as well as a share of the proceeds from UMG’s equity stake in Spotify. Swift told Music Week that artist rights were at the forefront of her mind when she made a decision to exit from her longtime label home at Big Machine.

“I’m one of the only people in the artist realm who can be loud about [Artist rights],” she said. “People who are on their fifth, sixth or seventh album, we’re the only ones who can speak out, because new artists and producers and writers need to work. They need to be endearing and likable and available to their labels and streaming services at all times. It’s up to the artists who have been around for a second to say, ‘Hey guys, the producers, and the writers and the artists are the ones who are making music what it is’. And we’re in a great place in music right now thanks to them.”

Swift also said that she felt constrained creatively while at Big Machine and that her transition to Republic has left her feeling unencumbered. “That meant so much to me because it was given over to me so freely,” she said. “When someone just looks at you and says ‘Yes, you deserve what you want,’ after a decade or more of being told, ‘I’m not sure you deserve what you want’ – there’s a freedom that comes with that. It’s like when people find ‘the one’ they’re like, ‘It was easy, I just knew and I felt free’. And that made me feel I could make an album that was exactly what I wanted to make.”