Taylor Swift Makes Unannounced Appearance at Nashville Butterfly Mural
Taylor Swift showed up at a Nashville mural she commissioned to tease fans with details of her anticipated new music. Before getting out of the car on Thursday (April 25) just before noon local time, she revealed that the butterfly mural holds clues to her new song and music.
On Instagram Stories, Swift finally admitted that she did commission the mural — a giant butterfly with cats, hearts and other pretty things — from artist Kelsey Montague after seeing her work in New York City. Clues about her songs and new music are within the wings.
She turned up in person, as most expected she would (news crews were on hand). On social media, Swift has long been teasing April 26 as the day a release is coming.
Swift's next album will be her third purely pop project. After growing her career in the country music world, Swift released her first full-on pop album, 1989, in 2014. Reputation followed in 2017.
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Swift's new music is her first with Universal Music Group's Republic Records. After her deal with Big Machine Label Group — her first record deal — ended with the release of her Reputation album, Swift announced her UMG signing in November of 2018. Under her new deal, Swift owns all of the master recordings of her music from here on out; additionally, her contract stipulates that any sale of UMG's shares in the streaming platform Spotify will result in a distribution of money to all of UMG's artists.
The latter stipulation is Swift's latest move to advocate for songwriters. In 2014, she pulled her entire catalog — including her then-new album 1989 — from Spotify, after speaking out against the streaming platform's model for paying songwriters in a Wall Street Journal op-ed.
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