Taylor Swift said a TikTok trend motivated her to release 'Wildest Dreams (Taylor's Version)'
- Taylor Swift released "Wildest Dreams (Taylor's Version)," a re-recording of her 2014 song, on Friday.
- On social media, she said she thought fans should have her version for the song's TikTok trend.
- The TikTok trend uses the app's "Slow Zoom" filter, with people lip-syncing the song's bridge.
On Friday, recording artist Taylor Swift dropped "Wildest Dreams (Taylor's Version)," a re-recording of the track on her 2014 album "1989." On Twitter, she linked the release to a massively viral TikTok trend around the sound, saying that she thought fans should have her version of the song.
Swift announced her plans to re-record her first six records in 2019 after Scooter Braun's Ithaca Holdings LLC acquired Nashville-based Big Machine Label LLC, which owned Swift's catalog. In November 2019, Variety reported that Braun sold those masters for over $300 million.
In April, Swift released "Fearless (Taylor's Version)," a re-recording of her second studio album "Fearless" that was released in 2008. The album also featured a slate of new, previously unreleased "From The Vault" songs. Her next full re-recorded album "Red (Taylor's Version)" is set for release in November.
In the interim, and completely by surprise, Swift released "Wildest Dreams (Taylor's Version)" as a single on Friday, building on the momentum of a TikTok trend that utilizes the song.
"Hi! Saw you guys got Wildest Dreams trending on tiktok, thought you should have my version," Swift tweeted on Friday morning, accompanied by four kiss-blowing emoji.
'Wildest Dreams' accompanies a slow zoom, lip-syncing TikTok trend
On TikTok, the "Wildest Dreams" trend is concentrated under an audio that was uploaded on June 6 by TikTok user @khritics. Hitting the bridge of the song, the audio clip falls on the lyrics "You'll see me in hindsight / tangled up with you all night / burnin' it down." The audio has been used in over 678,500 videos.
Early iterations of the "Wildest Dreams" trend were more narrative-focused. Before the lyrics hit, people would put a caption on the screen that was typically a claim that you were over a person or incident. At "you'll see me in hindsight," they'd then turn a different direction and add a caption that contradicted the claim.
In one of the most viral videos under this format, uploaded on August 24, TikTok user @urfavblondeshawty mouths the words "I don't think I like him anymore" as they appear on screen. When Swift sings "you'll see me in hindsight," they turn back as the on-screen caption "*sees him in person*" appears.
https://www.tiktok.com/@urfavblondeshawty/video/7000195249133882629?_d=secCgYIASAHKAESPgo84BHezDhHMI85sUuX2xTHKBQ2GoWK42VQciYmvNt5Ws3kszsnod1RUlzFcL4BBP4aEOG8056MwPD6GXqUGgA%3D&checksum=9c2b1d0eedea7dec15e0ef97d2a217479fb93e4b248410e08dca3ad9dd09bef2&language=en&preview_pb=0&sec_user_id=MS4wLjABAAAAYi4flqtsqutbJtQwlc0OzJESdYib06i4rvIo4Ro4daMbIpLAwZtB3FGQjci8DIIk&share_app_id=1233&share_item_id=6970778385161145605&share_link_id=D256C0B9-25EB-4541-85C1-EF5BDE18939C&source=h5_m×tamp=1631908062&tt_from=copy&u_code=aia5ieefmim7l&user_id=236721550278823936&utm_campaign=client_share&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=copy&_r=1&is_copy_url=0&is_from_webapp=v1&sender_device=pc&sender_web_id=6891259809896056326In September, however, the trend shifted to rely on a "Slow Zoom" filter that was recently added to TikTok. Now, the trend predominately involves lip-syncing Swift's lyrics as the filter zooms in the user's face.
Swift uploaded a clip of 'Wildest Dreams (Taylor's Version)' to TikTok
On Friday, the day of the single's release, Swift posted a TikTok video putting her own version of the sound on the platform.
"If you guys want to use my version of wildest dreams for the slow zoom trend, here she is!" Swift wrote in an on-screen caption, accompanied by a GIF of herself.
"Someone said slow zoom makes you look like the main character I said make it Taylor's Version pls," she wrote in the video caption.
Fans have enthusiastically embraced the new sound, and less than eight hours after Swift's uploaded it's already been used in over 13,000 videos. Swift even posted her own take on the trend, cheekily referencing her "Red (Taylor's Version)" plans for later in the year.
"Wildest Dreams" isn't the only "1989" song that's in the spotlight on TikTok. As Insider video producer Irene Kim noted on Twitter, "Wonderland" - a song off of the deluxe version of the album - is having a TikTok moment as well. If trends are any indication, maybe it's next.
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