'Speak Now (Taylor's Version)' Vault Tracks Ranked

Another New Music Friday, another Taylor Swift release! Although “Karma” is keeping the Midnights era chugging along and “Cruel Summer” is continuing its ascent across radio and streaming, Taylor Swift has finally unleashed her next re-recording: Speak Now (Taylor’s Version).

Released back in 2010, Speak Now, a stunning, solely self-written rumination on love and heartbreak in your late teenage years, served as Taylor’s third studio album, and her first to debut with over one million copies sold in its first week of availability. Featuring hits like “Mine” and “Back to December,” as well as fan favorites such as “Better Than Revenge” and “Enchanted,” Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) arrives as one of Taylor’s most-anticipated re-recordings.

Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) predictably loses the youthful luster and verve of the original’s vocal performances. The biting anger in “Better Than Revenge” is notably muted, and “Dear John,” which is still a fantastic rendition, misses the anguish that characterized the original. Regardless, recreating emotions that are over a decade old would be both an impossible ask and an impossible task. Nonetheless, Taylor’s matured vocals offer some interesting and welcome new textures that spruce up her old lyrics — except, of course, the silly edits to “Better Than Revenge.”

As much as the Taylor’s Versions project has been about reclaiming her work, the endeavor also allows Swift to mine her vault and treat fans to songs that didn’t make the cut for the original albums. Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) boasts six new “From The Vault” tracks, and The Bulletin ranks each of them below:

6. Foolish One

Speak Now was Taylor’s last album before pop music started to take up legit real estate on her records, and “Foolish One” is a great reminder of that. A tender mixture of drums, guitar, and Taylor’s lightly melancholic vocals, “Foolish One” finds her getting introspective. In the world of “Foolish One,” heartbreak is inevitable, and “checkin' your mailbox for confessions of love” is, well, a fool’s errand. It’s a nice peek at how Taylor streamlined her country-pop sound, as well as valuable insight into how her own self-mythology has evolved over the years.

5. I Can See You

Speak Now was easily Taylor’s darkest album — both sonically and thematically — before Reputation came along, and it’s cool to hear how that darkness ebbs and flows across the vault tracks. On “I Can See You,” that darkness manifests as a funky electro-rock-pop mélange that recalls the best of Maroon 5 and Bruno Mars’ rock-minded early-mid ‘10s output. Throughout the song, Taylor stays in her lower register to strong results — it’s as if her folkmore vocal approach were placed over more robust instrumentation. The choice does drag, however, making for a slightly underwhelming final chorus, but a solid overall listen.

4. Electric Touch (with Fall Out Boy)

In the spirit of beefing up the rock edge of Speak Now, Taylor recruited Fall Out Boy for this vault track. Simultaneously a song about surrendering to the unknown of a promising new love and navigating your first sexual experience with your lover, “Electric Touch” is a pitch-perfect fusion of both Taylor and Fall Out Boy’s styles. Her and Patrick’s voices pair surprisingly well, and while it’s nice to hear Patrick manipulate his vocals so he doesn’t overpower Taylor, this song would be even greater if they went just a little bit harder.

3, Timeless

One of the more traditional country vault tracks, “Timeless” (if it was really written back during the Speak Now sessions) is an interesting time-warping link to Taylor’s Folklore and Evermore. On those pandemic sister albums, Taylor opened up about her grandparents unlike ever before. “Epiphany” and “Marjorie” — dedicated to her grandfather and grandmother, respectively — were quiet, contemplative tracks in a way that “Timeless” is not. “Timeless” banks on the whimsy that carries Taylor’s most headstrong love songs. She croons of a love that transcends time and space over classic country production that highlights the earnestness of her vocal performance.

2. Castles Crumbling (with Hayley Williams)

Fall Out Boy isn’t the only band to appear on a vault track. Paramore also appears by way of frontwoman and longtime friend of Taylor’s, Hayley Williams. “Castles Crumbling,” a string-laden rumination of the inevitability of the world turning its back on you, is gorgeous. The song finds a smart balance between histrionic imagery and the very real, vulnerable feelings of losing control and power of yourself, your place in the world, and how the world perceives you. Hayley dials back her powerhouse vocals and employs a vocal approach similar to the one she took on her two solo albums — quieter, but still incredibly urgent. “Castles Crumbling” is kind of a surreal listen in 2023, given the arc of Taylor’s career and the rare air she is in right now in terms of notoriety and commercial success — as are most of the songs on Speak Now.

1. When Emma Falls In Love

From the twinkling piano in the opening to the full-out country instrumentation that unfolds as the song progresses, “When Emma Falls In Love” is a stunning track. Of course, the song gets some bonus points for the intricate storytelling in the lyrics; Taylor sings of a girl named Emma who isn’t quite aware of power and majesty, but everyone around her is changed by it, especially those that are lucky enough to be loved by her. Taylor’s breathless vocal delivery expertly conveys both Emma’s anxiety and allure when it comes to love and her capacity to give and receive it. Nothing is better than when Taylor Swift takes a decidedly meta approach to popular music’s most frequently traversed lyrical tropes.

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