Taylor Swift's Business Savvy Is Inspiring This A-List Singer To Follow Suit

The moves that Taylor Swift has made in Hollywood in the last year has one A-list singer taking serious notes. It’s not easy to be a woman in the music industry, but Sheryl Crow believes that the “Shake It Off” singer has unlocked a key that is going to help future generations snag their fortune. 

The 62-year-old singer has high praise for her 34-year-old music peer. In an Esquire essay entitled “What I’ve Learned,” Crow shared the knowledge she’s acquired from the younger pop star’s business moves. “You and you alone are responsible for your art,” she wrote. “The fact that [Taylor] came up with solutions for how to not allow her music to be a moneymaker for other people when she should be owning it.” 

Swift notably began re-recording her music, one album at a time, that are famously given the label “Taylor’s Version.” She made this ground-breaking move after Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings company purchased the label that owned Swift’s master tracks, Scott Borchetta‘s Big Machine Label Group. Fans have rebelled against listening to the first six albums, Taylor Swift, Fearless, Speak Now, Red, 1989, and Reputation, unless they are “Taylor’s Version.” (Taylor Swift and Reputation are the two albums she has yet to re-record.)

Besides the fans pushing back on Braun’s ownership of Swift’s masters, Crow is also explaining why her new recordings are important. “There’s not a handbook for how to navigate, as a woman, a business that is predominantly run by men. Or for when you have a strong woman, how that challenges men and their feelings of importance,” she added. And Swift’s actions were all based on a suggestion from another female force in the music industry, Kelly Clarkson. 

In 2019, the American Idol superstar tweeted, “@taylorswift13 just a thought, U should go in & re-record all the songs that U don’t own the masters on exactly how U did them but put brand new art & some kind of incentive so fans will no longer buy the old versions.” Swift happily borrowed her idea and told Billboard that it was about “regaining a freedom and taking back what is [hers].” And now, Crow might be taking a page from the Swift playbook.

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