We are just weeks away from Taylor Swift’s 10th studio album, Midnights, however, fans are already excited for Swift’s next big move. According to a report from The Sun, Swift has begun re-recording her sixth album, Reputation, which was originally released in 2017.
Swift started re-recording her first six albums in 2020, after Scooter Braun acquired the rights to her master recordings the year prior. So far, she has only released re-recorded versions of her 2008 album, Fearless and her 2012 album, Red, and in each of the re-recorded albums, she has included re-recordings of songs “from the vault” that were recorded during those album sessions, but never officially released.
The Sun is reporting that Swift recorded a song with Drake in 2017 during the Reputation sessions, however, the song didn’t make the final tracklist, as it was reportedly “deemed to be too direct about their foes at the time.” Swift apparently wants to re-record the track with Drake and include it in the new version of Reputation.
Who is Taylor Swift and Drake’s rumored diss track aimed at?
Much of the Reputation album is rumored to be about Kanye West and Kim Kardashian, with whom Swift had been publically feuding during that time. Swift and West’s feud dates back to 2009, when West interrupted Swift’s acceptance speech for Best Video By A Female Artist at that year’s MTV Video Music Awards. Though they briefly patched things up in 2015, their feud reignited the following year upon the release of West’s seventh studio album, The Life Of Pablo.
The Life Of Pablo features the song, “Famous,” on which West raps, “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex / Why? / I made that b*tch famous,” though leaked versions of the song contain the lyric, “I feel like Taylor Swift still owes me sex / Why? / I made that b*tch famous.”
Taylor seemingly responded to the lyric on the Reputation cut, “I Did Something Bad,” on which she sings, “If a man talks sh*t, then I owe him nothing.”
Meanwhile, Drake and West’s relationship has been rocky for the past decade, however, around the time of The Life Of Pablo‘s release, Drake released a standalone track called “Summer Sixteen,” on which, he raps, “Now I got a house in LA / now I got a bigger pool than Ye / And look, man, Ye’s pool is nice, mine’s just bigger’s what I’m saying.”
Some believe the line was innocent, while some believe it was indicative of a beef between the two parties.
Days after the release of The Life Of Pablo, Swift accepted the award for Album Of The Year at the 2016 Grammys for her fifth studio album, 1989. In her speech, she said, “As the first woman to win Album Of The Year at the Grammys twice, I want to say to all the young women out there there are going to be people along the way who are going to try and undercut your success or take credit for your accomplishments or your fame. But if you just focus on the work and you don’t let those people sidetrack you, someday when you get where you’re going you’ll look around and you will know that it was you and the people who love you that put you there. And that will be the greatest feeling in the world. Thank you for this moment.”
Though Swift didn’t call anyone out by name, fans immediately suspected she was referring to West.
The feud was only made worse in July of 2016, when Kim Kardashian shared a video of West on the phone with Swift attempting to clear the use of the line, “I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex.” Swift took to social media that day, explaining that while she did clear the line, she did not clear West saying, “I made that b*tch famous.”
Over the course of the next year, Swift would maintain a relatively quiet social media presence and stay out of the spotlight, but that November, Drake shared a picture with Swift taken at his 30th birthday party, sparking rumors of a collaboration.
To this day, a Drake and Taylor Swift collaboration has never received a proper release, however, if the news shared by The Sun is true, we may hear the rumored track soon.