Taylor Swift has dominated pop music so thoroughly in the past few years that it’s hard to believe she’s only “officially” been doing it for a decade. Sunday, Oct. 27, marks the 10th anniversary of 1989, the album that cemented her place in pop music.
Back in 2014, Taylor was wildly successful in the country genre and had racked up several crossover pop hits, including “You Belong With Me,” “Love Story” and “I Knew You Were Trouble.” But with 1989, Taylor jumped fully into pop and was rewarded with three #1 hits — “Shake It Off,” “Blank Space” and “Bad Blood” — plus her second Album of the Year Grammy and worldwide sales of more than 14 million copies.
In 2014, Taylor did an interview with her record label in which she discussed her decision to switch to pop, noting that it wasn’t that surprising.
“My friends have always known that my music had a lot of crossover happening. I was always at the pop awards shows. I was always at the pop radio shows,” she said. “So, I don’t think it was really a big shock to anyone who knows me.”
“This was something I clearly have been dying to do for so long,” she added. “I’ve just been wanting to challenge myself as a writer and to kind of switch lanes … and [to] have people … just embracing it — it’s really cool.”
1989 also marked a different mindset than the one Taylor had when she wrote her previous album, 2012’s Red. “Red is very much an album that I made about one breakup that really kind of leveled me emotionally,” she said while comparing the two. She noted, “This is the album that I wrote once I was past it.”
1989 remains Taylor’s bestselling album.
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