Mine
In a live chat through Ustream.tv
on July 20, 2010, Swift said about the song: "It's a song that is about
... [Swift's] tendency to run from love." She added that every
relationship she has been in "has ended in goodbye, has ended in
breakups," and that "Mine" is "sort of about finding the exception to
that."
Sparks Fly
"Sparks Fly" is about falling for someone who you maybe shouldn't fall
for, but you can't stop yourself because there's such a connection and
chemistry. This is a song I wrote a few years ago and I have been
working on it ever since. It's been awesome to see it change over the
years. The fans have heard it before in concert, but there have been
some really cool changes that I am very proud of and can't wait for them
to hear.
Back to December
"Back to December" addresses a first for me, in that I've never
apologized to someone in a song before. In the good, or bad, or the
apology, the person I wrote the song for deserves this. This is about
somebody who was incredible to me, just perfect to me in a relationship,
and I was really careless with him, so these are the words that I would
say to him -- that he deserves to hear.
Speak Now
This song was inspired by one of my friends who was telling me about
her childhood sweetheart, crush guy. They were kind of together in high
school and went their separate ways, and it was kind of understood that
they were gonna get back together. Then, she one day comes in and tells
me he's getting married. He had met this girl who was just this mean
person who made him completely stop talking to all of his friends, cut
off his family, had him like so completely isolated. And I just, kind of
randomly, was like, "So, you gonna speak now?" She was like, "What do
you mean?" And I was like "Oh, you know, like storm the church, speak
now or forever hold your peace? I'll go with you. I'll play guitar. It
would be great." She was just kind of laughing, and later on I just was
wrapping my mind around that idea of how tragic it would be if someone
you loved was marrying somebody else.
Later I had a dream about one of my ex-boyfriends getting
married, and it just all came together that I needed to write this song
about interrupting a wedding. For me, I like to think of it as good
versus evil, and this girl is so completely painted as the evil one. So
this is "Speak Now."
Dear John
The song "Dear John" is sort of like the last email you would ever send
to someone that you used to be in a relationship with. Usually people
write this venting last email to someone and they say everything that
they want to say to that person, and then they usually don't send it. I
guess by putting this song on the album I am pushing send.
Mean
The song "Mean" is about, well, when you do what I do, which is you put
yourself out there for a lot of people to say whatever they want about
it, there are a million different opinions from a million different
people.
I get it that not everyone is going to like everything that you do,
and I get that no matter what, you're going to be criticized for
something. But I also get that there are different kinds of ways to
criticize someone. There is constructive criticism. There's professional
criticism. And then, there's just being mean. There's a line that you
cross when you just start to attack everything about a person, and
there's one guy who just crossed the line over and over again. Just
being mean, and saying things that would ruin my day.
This happens... no matter what you do, no matter how old you are,
no matter what your job is, no matter what your place is in life.
There's always going to be someone who's just mean to you. Dealing with
that is all you can control about that situation, how you handle it.
"Mean" is about how I handle it, and sort of my mind set about this
whole situation.
The Story of Us
The "Story of Us" is a song that I wrote about an awkward situation
where, well… Let me just preface by saying that I have happened to run
into exes in strange places lately. This is about one of those
situations where the strange place that I ran into him was an awards
show.
I was seated a couple of seats away from him and there was so much
that needed to be said, and neither one of us was willing to say it. We
were both acting like we were engaged in conversations with people that
we don't even know. It was just miserable. I was telling my Mom about it
later, and I said I felt like I was standing alone in a crowded room.
And then I was like, "Gotta go. Bye!" And my Mom is used to that at this
point so, that's what this song is about.
Never Grow Up
"Never Grow Up" is a song about the fact that I don't quite know how I
feel about growing up. It's tricky. Growing up happens without you
knowing it. Growing up is such a crazy concept because a lot of times
when you were younger you wish you were older. I look out into a crowd
every night and I see a lot of girls that are my age and going through
exactly the same things as I'm going through. Every once in a while I
look down and I see a little girl who is seven or eight, and I wish I
could tell her all of this. There she is becoming who she is going to be
and forming her thoughts and dreams and opinions. I wrote this song for
those little girls.
Enchanted
I wrote "Enchanted" about a guy who I was enchanted to meet,
obviously. He was somebody that I had talked to a couple of times on
email, and then I was in New York and went to meet him.
I remember just the whole way home thinking, "I hope he's not in
love with somebody." It was just wonderful, that feeling. Like, "Oh my
gosh. Who's he with? Does he like me? Does he like somebody else? What
does it mean?" I got home and he had emailed me and said something like,
"Sorry I was so quiet. I was just wonderstruck meeting you." And so I
incorporated the word wonderstruck, into the song as a, "Hey this one's
sorta for you."
Better than Revenge
The song
"Better Than Revenge" is about a girl, who a few years ago, stole my
boyfriend. I think she probably thought I forgot about it, but I didn't.
Innocent
The song "Innocent" is about something that really intensely affected me
emotionally. It took a while to write this one. I was fortunate enough
to get a chance to perform this song on the VMAs, and that's the first
time that anyone ever heard it. Putting out an album called Speak Now
where you're supposed to say what you feel when you know how you feel, I
felt that performing that song on that particular award show was
appropriate. I hope everybody likes this one.
Haunted
"Haunted" is about the moment that you realize the person you're in love
with is drifting and fading fast. And you don't know what to do, but in
that period of time, in that phase of love, where it's fading out, time
moves so slowly. Everything hinges on what that last text message said,
and you're realizing that he's kind of falling out of love. That's a
really heartbreaking and tragic thing to go through, because the whole
time you're trying to tell yourself it's not happening. I went through
this, and I ended up waking up in the middle of the night writing this
song about it.
I wanted the music and the orchestration to reflect the intensity of
the emotion the song is about, so we recorded strings with Paul
Buckmaster at Capitol Studios in Los Angeles. It was an amazing
experience - recording this entire big, live string section that I think
in the end really captured the intense, chaotic feeling of confusion I
was looking for.
And... Last Kiss and Long Live.
