To me, “FEARLESS” is not the absence of fear. It’s not being completely unafraid. To me, FEARLESS is having fears. FEARLESS is having doubts. Lots of them. To me, FEARLESS is living in spite of those things that scare you to death. FEARLESS is falling madly in love again, even though you’ve been hurt before. FEARLESS is walking into your freshmen year of high school at fifteen. FEARLESS is getting back up and fighting for what you want over and over again… even though every time you’ve tried before, you’ve lost. It’s FEARLESS to have faith that someday things will change.

FEARLESS is having the courage to say goodbye to someone who only hurts you, even if you can’t breathe without them. I think it’s FEARLESS to fall for your best friend, even though he’s in love with someone else. And when someone apologizes to you enough times for things they’ll never stop doing, I think it’s FEARLESS to stop believing them. It’s FEARLESS to say “you’re NOT sorry”, and walk away. I think loving someone despite what people think is FEARLESS. I think allowing yourself to cry on the bathroom floor is FEARLESS. Letting go is FEARLESS. Then, moving on and being alright…That’s FEARLESS too. But no matter what love throws at you, you have to believe in it. You have to believe in love stories and prince charmings and happily ever after. That’s why I write these songs. Because I think love is FEARLESS.

FEARLESSLY, LOVELOVELOVE -T- ("Fearless" Prologue)

“Jump Then Fall” is a song about falling in love and Taylor reassuring her boyfriend that she'll never leave him. It is the opening track from the Platinum Edition of "Fearless."

Taylor wrote "Jump Then Fall" in the summer of 2009 and produced it together with Nathan Chapman. The song’s lyrics are a reassuring message from Taylor to a boy she likes. She tells him that she will never leave him, and that she’ll be there for him during times of difficulty. After thinking over their relationship, she realizes that there isn’t anything to dislike about him, and that she just wants to be with him.

"It’s probably the happiest, bounciest, most fun song to drive down the street listening to. It's one of my favorites on the Platinum Edition. It's just really fun and happy and takes me back to a good place." -- Taylor Swift

"Jump Then Fall" was one of five new songs on the Platinum Edition of her sophomore album, "Fearless". It debuted at #10 on the Hot 100 in its debut week. It was re-released on the soundtrack for the film "Valentine's Day", in which Taylor stars.

Taylor has performed "Jump Then Fall" a few times over the years, most notably at her first ever stadium show in 2010 at Gillette Stadium on her "Fearless Tour" and in 2018 on her "reputation Stadium Tour".

In “Untouchable” Taylor sings that she dreams about her crush in her sleep and that she wishes they were together. It was originally sung by Luna Halo, a rock band formed in 1999. Taylor got a writer credit on the song because she changed the melody and verses a lot.

Taylor covered the originally upbeat rock song as a slow and soothing ballad and added it to the Platinum Edition "Fearless." Upon its release, many have been wondering, how "Untouchable" made on the album in the first place, since it is a cover and not a song originally written by her.  Nathan and Cary Barlowe, the members of Luna Halo and co-writers of "Untouchable", talked about how Taylor ended up covering the song.

"It originally happened when Scott Borchetta, who’s the president of her label, gave her (our) CD to listen to. Then, when she was doing a TV show called "Stripped", he told her she had to come up with a cover. She could have chosen any cover in the world, but that’s what she chose. And we had heard from other people that she was a fan of Luna Halo, so I think it was a combination of those things. We lucked out, really. She covered the song and it sounded amazing, so from there, there were so many YouTube hits on it, and so many people watching it and doing imitations of it, that’s when the label decided that they should put it on the record." -- Nathan Barlowe

Regarding the changes Taylor made to the song, Nathan Barlowe said the following:

"She changed the verse quite a bit. The chorus is still pretty true to what it was. When I first heard it, it caught me off guard because I didn’t even recognize the melody of the verse and some of the arrangement. But she’s one of, if not the biggest artist in the world right now, and when she wants to change a little thing about your song, I’m fine with it, you know?" -- Nathan Barlowe

The "Forever & Always (Piano Version)" is simply a stripped down piano version of Taylor’s song “Forever & Always” from "Fearless".

Taylor decided to show a different side to one of the fan-favorite songs on "Fearless" and recorded a version of the song that captures the raw emotions behind the lyrics. During an interview with iTunes in 2009, she said it's one of her favorites on the Platinum Edition:

"There's a version of my song "Forever & Always" that's just piano and cello. It's song on the record that I feel has a lot of different sides and it has a lot of different emotions all poured into one song. And so this version of the song really addresses the sad parts of that song. On the record the way it is, it's produced and it seems angry and frustrated and confused. But this version of the song is just really sad." -- Taylor Swift

In regards to the original version of the song, she said:

“Forever & Always” is about when I was in a relationship with someone and I was just watching him slowly slip away. I didn’t know why, because I wasn’t doing anything different. I didn’t do anything wrong. He was just fading. It’s about the confusion and frustration of wondering why? What changed? When did it change? What did I do wrong? In this case, the guy I wrote it about ended up breaking up with me for another girl. Guess now I know why he was fading." -- Taylor Swift

In "Come In With the Rain" Taylor talks about letting go of hope and trying to move on from a difficult relationship, while still having that person in her heart and being willing to accept him back in her life if he put in an effort.

To “Come in with the rain” is an old expression meaning that when bad times come, people come to their senses and realize what they wanted was there the whole time. In this song, Taylor sings she'll always have her window open for one guy but she’s tired of the games he plays. He probably doesn’t realize that the things he does hurt her. So she’s just going to stop caring, hoping that he’ll just naturally come back to her.

“Superstar” is a song about Taylor’s celebrity crush, and how much she is infatuated with him.

The song talks about Taylor liking someone who is very famous, or rather a heartthrob, and who has many other girls chasing after him. She says she is "no one special", just another simple girl hoping that this guy will like her back. Although she knows that she’s just another fan of his, and that he’ll probably never notice her, she still dreams about him feeling the same way about her, as she does with him.

“The Other Side Of The Door” is a song that describes the aftermath of a fight of two people in a relationship.

The song was written by Taylor and talks about an extremely dramatic case where her and her boyfriend have fought, screamed, and miscommunicated with each other. Technically, that’s not a healthy relationship, and Taylor admits in the end that she just needs him. In an interview with iTunes in 2009, Taylor said:

"'The Other Side of the Door' is one of my favorites listening to because it talks about when you’re in a fight with someone you’re in a relationship with and you slam the door and you’re like [acts dramatic], “Leave me alone, I never wanna talk to you again, I hate you!” But what you really mean is “Please go buy me flowers and beg that I forgive you and stand at the door and don’t leave for three days” It’s like all about the dramatics of relationships where you’re like [acts dramatic], “I hate you so much, I never wanna talk to you again”, and you mean the opposite. So that’s a fun one that I’m really excited about getting out there.” -- Taylor Swift

“Fearless” is a song about the "best first date" Taylor hadn't had yet. It's about the feelings present when a new relationship begins. It is also the title track of the album.

Taylor composed the song while traveling on tour to promote her eponymous debut album, "Taylor Swift". She got this song off the ground with her frequent songwriting partner, Liz Rose. She then called on songwriter Hillary Lindsey, who is best known for Carrie Underwood's hit "Jesus, Take The Wheel" to complete it. Taylor explained what the song means to her on her label's website:

"This is a song about the fearlessness of falling in love. No matter how many break up songs you write, no matter how many times you get hurt, you will always fall in love again. When I wrote ‘Fearless,’ I wasn’t dating anyone. I wasn’t even in the beginning stages of dating anybody. I really was all by myself out on tour and I got this idea for a song about the best first date. I think sometimes when you’re writing love songs, you don’t write them about what you’re going through at the moment, you write about what you wish you had. So, this song is about the best first date I haven’t had yet." -- Taylor Swift

"Fearless" received acclaim from contemporary critics, many of whom complimented it for appealing to different age groups.

In the United States, "Fearless" debuted and peaked at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was certified platinum by the RIAA. When the song became the fifth track from "Fearless" to reach the country chart top 10, Taylor became the first solo female to collect five top 10s on the chart from each of her first two albums. The only previous acts to achieve this feat were Brooks & Dunn and the Dixie Chicks.

Footage from the "Fearless Tour" performances were used to comprise a music video for "Fearless", directed by Todd Cassetty. The video features both footage of the tour itself and backstage.

In “Fifteen,” Taylor looks back at her freshman year at Hendersonville High School, Tennessee. She wrote the song about her and her best friend, Abigail Anderson, who she met during ninth grade and is still best friends with.

Taylor and Abigail first encountered heartbreak during their freshman year at Henderson High. In an interview, Taylor said:

"I wrote this around the story line of my best friend from high school, Abigail. I started everything with the line ‘Abigail gave everything she had to a boy who changed his mind’ and wrote everything else from that point, almost backwards. I just decided I really wanted to tell that story about our first year of high school because I felt in my freshman year, I grew up more than any year in my life so far. The thing about high school is, you don’t know anything. You don’t know anything, but you think you know everything." -- Taylor Swift

After writing the song, Taylor asked Anderson for authorization to record the song (due to personal references in the song); Abigail affirmed and it was ultimately included on "Fearless."

The song's music video was directed by "You Belong With Me" director Roman White. Abigail and Taylor both appear in the video, in which the two friends go through various situations of teen life. White told MTV News that for the clip he wanted to capture the essence of the song without getting too literal.

"Well, I think I really wanted this video to kind of be an evolution for Taylor. I mean, obviously it's a high school song, but the last thing I wanted to do was shoot it in a high school. So I wanted to try something different, and I actually said to her, 'I don't think we should shoot in a high school.' And I don't think she wanted to either. I kind of came up with this idea like, let's take the literal meaning of this song and watch it evolve in front of us...almost as a memory in your head. And create this world, so you walk in on this desolate desert and you start to sing about all these great memories you have...of everything you love [blooming] around you, and so we literally grew this garden around her. But also we added these surreal elements that came from the memory. It's kind of this cross between this surreal garden and this memory [and] she's at the heart of this memory." -- Roman White

"Fifteen" was released as a single in 2009 and peaked at number 23 on the Billboard Hot 100.

The song was a critical success, with reviewers commending its thoughtful and effective lyrics concerning teenage relationships and adjusting to high school. Jody Rosen of Rolling Stone compared Taylor's songwriting to the talents of "Swedish pop god" Max Martin. An interesting comparison, considering Taylor started working with Martin in 2012. Together they created some of the most successful pop songs of the 2010s.

Taylor was inspired to write “Love Story”, the album's lead single, when she was going through a difficult situation with a boy she liked, whom she wasn’t “officially” dating. It talks about Taylor's father was not approving of the relationship, and her desire to go somewhere far away with her boyfriend, to escape the people who look down on them.

Like most of Taylor's songs, this song is based on a real experience. It was written about a love interest of her's who was not popular among her family and friends. She wrote the song in 20 minutes on her bedroom floor after she had an argument over this boy with her parents. Because of the scenario, Taylor related to the plot of William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" (1597) and used it as a source of inspiration to compose the song. The lyrics are from the perspective of Juliet. However, she replaced Romeo and Juliet's original tragic conclusion with a happy ending.

"I used to be in high school where you see [a boyfriend] every day. Then I was in a situation where it wasn’t so easy for me, and I wrote this song because I could relate to the whole Romeo and Juliet thing. I was really inspired by that story. Except for the ending. I feel like they had such promise and they were so crazy for each other. And if that had just gone a little bit differently, it could have been the best love story ever told. And it is one of the best love stories ever told, but it’s a tragedy. I thought, why can’t you… make it a happy ending and put a key change in the song and turn it into a marriage proposal." -- Taylor Swift

Taylor added that the song was met with indifference from her record company and her parents, but she fought for it, which she says was a fun experience because she had something to prove. 

At a surprise gig at the famous Bluebird Café in Nashville (where she was discovered), Taylor admitted that she was supposed to write the song with country writer Craig Wiseman. The two had a writing session when Taylor was seventeen, and Wiseman wasn’t interested in her ideas for the track. They wrote a different song that day, but Taylor went home and finished the song. It became one of the biggest country hits of all time. At the gig, Taylor joked:

"I couldn’t stop thinking about the idea. I thought there was something to it. I really liked it." -- Taylor Swift

“Love Story” was released as the lead single of "Fearless". It peaked at #1 on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs, and at #5 on the Billboard Hot 100, just weeks after its release.

"Love Story" was the first country song to top the Mainstream Top 40 chart in that tally's history. The previous highest ranking on that chart for a country song, was the #3 placing of Shania Twain's "You're Still the One" in 1998. Internationally, "Love Story" became Taylor's first number one single in Australia. The song is one of the best-selling singles worldwide, with worldwide sales of more than 6.5 millions of units (according to the IFPI).

The song's accompanying music video was directed by Trey Fanjoy, who directed the majority of Taylor's prior videos. Taylor said the video's plot was a timeless scenario that "could happen in the 1700s, the 1800s, or 2008." It is a period piece that draws influences from the Medieval, Renaissance, and British Regency (1813) eras. It follows Taylor and model Justin Gaston as they meet in a university campus and imagine themselves in a prior era. The video won the CMT Music Awards for “Video of the Year,” as well as “Female Video of the Year.”

The song “Hey Stephen” was a song Taylor wrote for her crush Stephen Barker Liles from the country music duo Love And Theft, who were an opening act for her in 2008.

The song’s hidden message in the album booklet for "Fearless" was “Love and Theft,” confirming the mysterious Stephen’s identity. Taylor explained its meaning to Philadelphia Magazine:

"This is a guy I had a crush on. I wrote about all these reasons he should be with me instead of other girls. ‘Hey Stephen/I could give you 50 reasons/Why I should be the one you choose/All those other girls are beautiful/But would they write a song for you?’ This guy has absolutely no idea I had a crush on him. It’s gonna be kind of interesting when he finds out." -- Taylor Swift

Little did Taylor know, Stephen returned her feelings. She sent him a text message when the album came out, saying “Hey, Track 4.” He then sent her a long e-mail saying “Oh, my God!” He even wrote a song for her called “Try To Make It Anyway!”

Country singer Martina McBride's children lend finger snaps at the end of this upright-bass-propelled groove. Taylor explained to That's Country how she got the kids involved:

"We were recording at John McBride's (Martina McBride's husband's) studio and he was like, 'My kids are dying to meet you. Do you think that you could say hi to them?' I said, 'Sure, have them come and hang out while we're recording.' So his daughters and their friends from school -- there were about ten of them there -- they all came into the studio when we were recording 'Hey Stephen' and they loved it. They were singing along with it by the end of it." -- Taylor Swift

"White Horse" uses sparse production to emphasize vocals. Lyrically, the track speaks of disillusionment and pain in a relationship, drawing references to fairytales. 

Taylor and Liz Rose composed the song about one of Taylor's ex-boyfriends, when she discovered he was not what she had perceived of him. It focused on the moment where Taylor accepted that the relationship was over. She told Billboard:

“It’s one of the songs that I am really proud of on the record because it’s so sparse -- it’s guitar, piano and cello. It talks about falling in love and the fairy tales that you are going to have with this person, and then there is that moment where you realize that it is not going to happen. That moment is the most earth shattering moment.” -- Taylor Swift

Taylor told CMT that this song was an example of her fascination with fairy tales. She explained:

"I am completely fascinated by the differences and comparisons between real life and fairy tales because we're raised as little girls to think that we're a princess and that Prince Charming is going to sweep us off our feet. And that we're going to ride off into the sunset on a white horse. We're not really expecting to get blown off or ignored or broken up with or cheated on. I think it's really interesting when you come to terms with that reality: 'Maybe that's not gonna happen with this guy because this guy's a jerk.' But there's still that core of us that believes that it's true and that if you find the right person, you can have that love story and it can work out. So there are different examples of fairy tales, and sometimes I believe in them and sometimes I don't. And moments on the record like in "White Horse," it's a song about, 'Wow, this is not a fairytale, is it? Awesome. Great.' It's (about how) I'm coming to this realization that this is not a fairy tale at all -- this is real life." -- Taylor Swift

She admitted in a since-deleted post that was on her label’s website that she actually wasn’t going to put this song on the album and was going to wait for the third album ("Speak Now") because she felt like she already had the "sadness" represented on this record.

"Then my agency out in LA set up a meeting with executive producers Betsy Beers and Shonda Rhimes at Grey’s Anatomy because that’s my favorite show. It would just be a dream come true to have a song on it. So, I played them ‘White Horse.’ It was just me and my guitar and they freaked out. They loved it. They said, ‘We’ll get back to you as soon as possible.’ For a while, we didn’t know if we were going to put it on the record because if it wasn’t going to be on the show, then we weren’t going to put it on the album. Then they called and said they were very interested in the song. We recorded it right away, sent it off to them, and they put it in!" -- Taylor Swift

Critically, "White Horse" garnered generally positive reception. At the 2010 Grammy Awards, "White Horse" won the Grammy Awards for "Best Country Song" and "Best Female Country Vocal Performance". The song also performed well commercially, although it did not duplicate the success of its predecessor, "Love Story". In the United States, it peaked at number thirteen in the Billboard Hot 100 and number two on Hot Country Songs.

The song's accompanying music video was directed by Trey Fanjoy, who directed the majority of Taylor's prior videos. The video features her as she decides to end a relationship via phone call. In the video, Taylor recalls multiple memories with her love interest, both positive and negative.

“You Belong With Me” tells the story of a boy who is too wrapped up in a toxic relationship to see how much another girl likes him.

Taylor was inspired to write "You Belong with Me" after overhearing a male friend of hers arguing with his girlfriend through a phone call; she continued to develop a story line afterward. The song contains many pop music elements. Taylor said the following about the track on a page on Big Machine Records' website, which has since been removed:

"I had overheard a friend of mine talking to his girlfriend and he was completely on the defensive, saying [things like] ‘I love you more than anything! Baby, I’m so sorry.’ She was just yelling at him! I felt so bad for him at that moment. So I came up with the first line ‘you’re on the phone with your girlfriend, she’s upset, she’s going off about something that you said,’ and I ran that into the storyline that I’m in love with him and he should be with me instead of her." -- Taylor Swift

Liz Rose has said that "You Belong With Me" was written at the very end of the recording sessions for "Fearless."

"Taylor said, ‘I’m finishing the record on Monday. Let’s write an uptempo song.’ We wrote ‘You Belong With Me’ in one or two hours. It’s amazing to go back to the work tape and listen to it, because you wouldn’t believe the nuances that show up in the album version, too. When she’s writing something, she’s already producing in her head. She hears it all." -- Liz Rose

The song received nominations for the Grammy Awards for "Song of the Year", "Record of the Year", and "Best Female Pop Vocal Performance". "You Belong with Me" enjoyed commercial success as well; in the United States, the song became Taylor's highest-charting single on the Billboard Hot 100 at the time. It managed to gain the largest crossover radio audience since Faith Hill's "Breathe" did in 2000.

The song's accompanying music video was directed by Roman White. The video features Taylor portraying two characters, a nerd (the protagonist and narrator) and a popular girl (the antagonist and girlfriend), while American actor Lucas Till portrayed the male lead. The video's plot centers on the protagonist secretively loving the male lead, although he has a girlfriend.

The video won the MTV Video Music Award for "Best Female Video" at the 2009 MTV Video Music Awards, but during Taylor's acceptance speech, rapper Kanye West interrupted, protesting in support of Beyoncé. The incident caused a reaction in the media, with many coming to Swift's defense.

"Breathe" is a song that was written about the end of a friendship. Colbie Caillat provides background vocals for the track.

The song was written by Taylor and Colbie Caillat and produced by Nathan Chapman with Taylor’s aid. The lyrics for "Breathe" are about heartbreak and the loss of a person the narrator spent much time with. In the song's verses, the narrator acknowledges that people change and grow apart, though she is upset because she knows the person "like the back of her hand." In the song's chorus, she realizes the need to remain strong and breathe in order to live without the person. Taylor explained to That’s Country:

"['Breathe' is] a song about having to say goodbye to somebody, but it never blames anybody. Sometimes that’s the most difficult part. When it’s nobody’s fault." -- Taylor Swift

Taylor was very fond of Caillat's 2007 debut album, "Coco". Taylor explained, "When it came out, I fell in love with the way that she makes music." She later contacted Colbie's management and asked if she could write a song with her. They confirmed Caillat would be available due to a then upcoming concert in Nashville, Tennessee and, coincidentally, on the same day, Taylor had a vacation day. Taylor explained:

"It was total therapy because I came in and I was like look, 'One of my best friends, I'm gonna have to not see anymore and it's not gonna be part of what I do. It's the hardest thing to go through. It's crazy listening to the song because you would think its about a relationship and it's really about losing a friend and having a fallout."

-- Taylor Swift

Colbie and Taylor said one of the beauties of the song was that many people would be able to relate to it because it is never specific as why the departure is occurring or whose fault it was. Taylor desired for Colbie to sing background vocals but in a loud manner, enough for audiences to recognize who sang backup. Originally they were only to harmonize in the chorus, but as Colbie recorded, Taylor decided to include her voice more throughout the track because of how impressed she was. Taylor first recorded the entire song, and Colbie then recorded background vocals separately. Taylor was very pleased with the finished product: "I think she sounds beautiful on it. I'm so excited to have her voice on my album." Colbie talked about how they collaborated:

"I went to Nashville about a year and a half ago, and she wanted to write with me, and I flew there and she had this beautiful song started and it’s about having to let someone go and say goodbye to a really good friend. And we became friends after that. She is so sweet, so beautiful, so talented and honestly just a really intelligent young woman. She knows what she is doing and she knows how to handle her career and take charge. I love her."

-- Colbie Caillat

"Breathe" was released on October 21, 2008, as a promotional single from "Fearless", exclusively through Rhapsody. 

The song received favorable responses from contemporary music critics. “Breathe” was nominated for the Grammy Award for "Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals", but lost to Jason Mraz and Caillat’s “Lucky”.

"Tell Me Why" is a song that was inspired by Taylor's frustration at a boy that she liked acting up.

Taylor co-wrote the song with her frequent collaborator Liz Rose and produced it together with Nathan Chapman. She explained:

"I walked into Liz’s house, and I said, ‘I can’t believe what’s going on right now, I’ve gotta tell you about this.’ I told her all about it. She goes, ‘If you could say everything you were thinking to him right now, what would you start with?’ I would say to him, ‘I’m sick and tired of your attitude, I feel like I don’t even know you’…and I just started rambling, and she was writing down everything that I was saying, and so, we turned it into a song." -- Taylor Swift

“You’re Not Sorry” is a power ballad inspired by an ex-boyfriend of Taylor's who was revealed to be opposite of what he appeared to be.

The song was solely written by Taylor and produced by Nathan Chapman with her aid. She wrote "You're Not Sorry" in an emotional state, which she described as "the breaking point". Taylor realized that her wayward boyfriend was not sincere in his apologies and was a first-class liar. She explained that this tune is an "angry, 'you know what, you're not sorry for anything you did' song. Someone can apologize and you know it's not sincere.":

"It is about this guy who turned out to not be who I thought he was. He came across as Prince Charming. Well, it turned out prince charming had a lot of secrets that he didn’t tell me about. And one by one, I would figure them out. I would find out who he really was. I wrote this when I was at the breaking point of, ‘You know what? Don’t even think that you can keep on hurting me.’ It was to a point where I had to walk away." -- Taylor Swift

"You're Not Sorry" was released on October 28, 2008, by Big Machine Records as a promotional single from "Fearless". A remix version for the television episode of "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation" that Taylor made an appearance in was later released. In the United States the song peaked at number eleven on the Billboard Hot 100.

In “The Way I Loved You,” Taylor finds herself missing the passionate, albeit unstable, relationship she had with her ex. She acknowledges how perfect her current relationship is, but her feelings for him don’t compare to the fireworks she used to feel.

This song was co-written by John Rich. Taylor got the idea for the song by being in a relationship with a nice guy who was punctual and opened up the door for her and brought her flowers…but made her feel nothing.

"The whole time you’re with him, you’re thinking about the guy who was complicated and messy and frustrating." -- Taylor Swift

Taylor called John Rich out of the blue and asked him to work on "The Way I Loved You" with her. She had some of the verses completed already, so they worked on the chorus together. He said the whole process took less than two hours. Taylor told That's Country about their collaboration:

"It was always one of my goals to write with John. I had heard so many things about him. I just wanted to see what it was like to get into a room with him because I know I'm a very opinionated writer and I knew he was a very opinionated writer. So I knew this was either going to be the best thing in the world or was just going to be a complete train wreck." -- Taylor Swift

“Forever & Always” is a song Taylor wrote about her breakup with Joe Jonas in 2008.

Taylor wrote the song near the end of the recording process after she broke up with Joe Jonas. She had to plead with the president of her record label, Scott Borchetta, to let her add it to the album a day before the final version was due to be turned in. She described it as a song about a relationship with a man who she could feel was “slowly slipping away.”

"It’s about watching somebody fade away in a relationship. They said they were going to be with you forever, that they loved you, and then something changed in the relationship and you don’t know what it is, but you’re watching them slowly drift. That emotion of rejection, for me, usually starts out sad and then gets mad. This song starts with this pretty melody that’s easy to sing along with, then in the end I’m basically screaming it because I’m so mad. I’m really proud of that." -- Taylor Swift

The song talks about holding on to every moment with her boyfriend, since things won’t last. On the Platinum Editon of the album, the song was redone with a softer piano melody. Taylor told The Los Angeles Times that on this song, she felt as though she achieved something authentic and raw. She explained:

"When I go into the studio, it's really more about portraying the song in a way that gets the feeling across, rather than every phrase being exactly perfect. I think it's the writer in me that's a little more obsessed with the meaning of the song than the vocal technique. All that stuff is like math to me. Over-thinking vocals and stuff -- I never want to get to that point." -- Taylor Swift

Joe Jonas told the June 2009 issue of Seventeen Magazine that he wasn't bothered about Taylor writing about the break-up of their relationship. He said: "It's flattering. It's always nice to hear their side of the story."

"The Best Day" is a love letter Taylor wrote to her mother, Andrea Swift. It was a Christmas gift for her put into a video format with photos and videos from Taylor's childhood.

Taylor CMT Radio the story of this song, which she wrote out on the road and kept as a secret from her mom until Christmas:

"In the first verse, I was talking about being five years old, so as a writer, it was really fun to go back to that place of the way that I used to talk when I was five. I wrote the song from that perspective, and I starting thinking, 'What would I be thinking if I was five and I was remembering this?' And it goes, 'I'm five years old/It's getting cold and I've got my big coat on.' It had language like that -- that makes me really think back to that time. I actually wrote that song without telling my mom and recorded it without telling my mom. Complete secret session. Then I got the track back and synced up all these home videos of me when I was a little kid and made this video and played it for my mom on Christmas and said, 'Merry Christmas!' She had no idea that it was me singing for the first half of the song. And then she just broke down crying when she realized I had done this whole thing to surprise her. It was a really cool moment." -- Taylor Swift

In an interview with Taste of Country, Taylor talked about how special her mom is to her:

"She would just take me on these adventures and we would drive around and go to towns we’d never seen before. Those adventures and those days of just running away from my problems -- you’re not supposed to run away from your problems, but when you’re 13 and your friends won’t talk to you and they move when you sit down at the lunch table, and your mom lets you run from those problems, I think it’s a good thing…my mom was my escape in a lot of ways." -- Taylor Swift

Taylor had to drop this touching song from her "Fearless Tour" setlist as her mother burst into tears backstage every time she heard it. Andrea explained, "She had to drop it from the set because I kept breaking down." However, when Taylor has a show on Mother's Day she always performs "The Best Day".

"Change" was written about Taylor's hopes and aspirations in regards to succeeding in the music industry, although being signed to the smallest record label in Nashville at the time.

At age sixteen, Taylor was signed to the emerging label Big Machine Records, which was the smallest record label in Nashville. There were only about a dozen employees, and she was the only artist. Despite the unpromising situation, she trusted that the label would eventually rise. After writing the beginning of the song, Taylor let the track rest for a while, waiting for a significant moment in her life that could conclude it.

That moment came in 2007 when she won the "Horizon Award" at the CMAs. After looking out into the audience and seeing her family and her label head, Scott Borchetta crying, she felt like she could finally finish the song, and did so the following day.

"That’s when I finished it, because I knew I couldn’t finish it until something like that happened. It was absolutely the most amazing night of my life, getting to see the emotion of all the people who worked so hard for me."

-- Taylor Swift

The song's original title was "Champions Tonight" and was later changed to "Change". It was released on August 8, 2008, as part of the compilation album "AT&T TEAM USA Soundtrack" with all proceeds being donated to the United States Olympic team. It was also featured as the background music to the daily TV montage of the Olympic highlights, shown at the end of the show.

"Change" debuted and peaked at number ten on the Billboard Hot 100, becoming Taylor's first song to reach the top ten on the chart.

The music video for "Change" was directed by Shawn Robbins and features Taylor performing with a band in a ballroom. An alternate version of the video features footage of the United States Olympic team at the 2008 Summer Olympics.