Swiftology 101: Music has always been there for me

Good morning, class! Today we’re going to study a bit. We all love school, don’t we?

Wait, come back here! This is not really school. Pretend school. Too cool for school. That kind 🙂 Stayyyy!

Swiftology, as often said by men with lab coats that play experts in TV (no, we don’t have those but let’s imagine we do, ok?), is the study of the music and artists endorsed by Taylor Swift, either directly or indirectly. Yes, we made it up. Yes, I’m only one guy. No, I’m not crazy. Let’s move along.

The first place to start with music endorsed by Swift would be her origins.  She’s obviously a fan of both Tim McGraw and Faith Hill. She also both listened and sang to The Dixie Chicks, Lee Ann Rhymes and Shania Twain, and her first demos included covers of these songs. She’s also a confessed fan of Dolly Parton. She’s also a fan and has opened for Kenny Chesney, Rascal Flatts, Brad Paisley, Keith Urban, George Strait, Tim McGraw and Faith Hill.  She’s been known to tweet or blog when one their albums comes out.

She’s never been one to stick to one genre, as evidenced by her tastes in her iTunes playlist, which you can buy and download. Here’s the list in case you’d rather find these songs yourself:

• Damn – Lee Ann Rimes *
• Can’t Tell Me Nothin – Tim McGraw *
• Lullaby – The Dixie Chicks **
• Revolution Song – Fefe Dobson
• Unbroken Ground – Gary Nichols
• Breathe – Faith Hill ***
• Lose Yourself – Eminem
• Closer to You – The Wallflowers
• 4ever – The Veronicas
• Joey – Concrete Blonde
• Our Last Night – Better Than Ezra
• You Get Used To Somebody – Tim McGraw *
• This Kiss – Faith Hill ***

(*) They only appear if you’re logged into the US store or the Australian store
(**) Only appears if you’re logged into the Canadian store
(***) Only appears when logged into the Australian store

The Fearless One (an unofficial title given to Mrs. Swift by the University of All Things Cool) is also very well known for her video blogs, in which she’s used tunes by different artists as background music:

• Stolen – Dashboard Confessional
• Sugar, We’re Goin Down Swinging – Fall Out Boy
• Hot N Cold – Katy Perry
• About A Girl – The Academy Is…
• Catch My Disease – Ben Lee
• Wannabe – Spice Girls
• Here – Hellogoodbye
• Closer to Love – Mat Kearney
• One Time – Justin Bieber
• Use Somebody – Kings of Leon
• Wild At Heart – Gloriana
• Waking Up In Vegas – Katy Perry

She has also performed covers or sung vocals for several artists:

• Lose Yourself – Eminem (she covered the start of this song when she first started touring)
• Breathe – Taylor Swift with Colbie Callait (Fearless)
• Untouchable – Luna Halo (cover on Fearless, partial author credit for re-writing some of the lyrics)
• American Girl – Tom Petty (cover for Verizon)
• Crossroads with Def Leppard special
• Two Is Better Than One – Boys Like Girls (collaboration)
• Half Of My Heart – John Mayer (collaboration)
• The Best Days Of Your Life
• Breathless – Better Than Ezra (cover on Hope for Haiti)

Taylor’s also friends with the one and only Mallary Hope. Go ask your radio station to play Blossom In The Dust! On a Nashville Christmas party, Tay and Mal covered Miranda Lambert’s Gunpowder and Lead, singing karaoke! Thanks to MallaryHopeFans for posting!

Taylor’s also friends with Hayley Williams from Paramore and has gone to see them in concert. Don’t believe me? Ok, this is Taylor with Liz Huett, her backup singer, rocking to Paramore! Thanks to restlesschick15 for posting!

Of course Taylor has also mentioned or endorsed several artists via web, interviews, video blogs and  Twitter:

• Better Than Ezra
• Butch Walker (he made a cover of You Belong To Me then sang with her on the Grammys)
• Civil Wars
• Five For Fighting
• Gloriana
• Jaron Lowenstein
• Lady Antebellum
• Needtobreathe
• Chad Gilbert of New Found Glory
• Owl City
• Haley Williams from Paramore
• The Script
• Stevie Nicks from Fleetwood Mac (yes, WAY before the Grammys, check her blog)

Now you have a ton of great music to listen to and cool artists to follow, thanks to the Fearless One 😀

It’s time to vote for Taylor Swift for the ACM Entertainer of the Year! GO GO GO!

(Sources:  iTunes, Taylor Swift, Big Machine Records, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube)