Taylor Swift vinyl mispressed with rare ‘90s UK electronic music compilation, fan freaks out
Rare sounds from acts including Cabaret Voltaire instead play out on the fan's ‘Speak Now (Taylor's Version)’ vinyl
A Taylor Swift fan was left shocked earlier this week when it transpired her vinyl copy of the artist's album ‘Speak Now (Taylor's Version)’ had been mispressed with a compilation of rare UK electronic music from the '90s.
Swift fan Rachel Hunter discovered that her orchid marbled vinyl copy of the pop titan's re-recorded version of her 2010 album was not as advertised. When she spun it for the first time, the sounds of Thunderhead's ‘True Romance’ and Cabaret Voltaire's ‘Soul Vine (70 Billion People)’ from the recently released ‘Happy Land: A Compendium Of Electronic Music From The British Isles 1992-1996 Vol. 1’ played out.
The first volume of the archival compilation was released by label and distributor Above Board in March, and featured tracks by Matthew Herbert, Ultramarine and others. Its second volume followed in April with music by Aphex Twin under his Strider. B. alias as well as acts including The Black Dog.
Hunter shared the surprising find in a video posted to her TikTok earlier this week. By Tuesday (11th July), her video had gained more than 2.7 million views on the platform. “What is this?” she asks in the clip, laughing at her misfortune.
The mishap was brought to the attention of Above Board, whose founder Dan Hill told Resident Advisor that he doesn't know “what the hell has happened”.
“Taylor Swift's records seem to have been mispressed with our album,” he said. “Swift fans on TikTok are calling it ‘the cursed version’. It's a massive collision of worlds as the music featured is from such different musical spheres. Mistakes happen all the time, we've certainly made a few, but I hope the fans enjoy their surprise mix of electronic music. I'm sure it's going to be a Discogs rare pressing classic in years to come.”
Above Board said in a press release at the time that its ‘Happy Land’ compilation celebrates “dizzying sonic diversification” and “brings together some truly adventurous and original electronic music from this period, much of it very hard to find”.
So far there have been no reported repeats of the mispressing as experienced by Hunter.
In a statement shared with DJ Mag, UMG said: “We are aware that there are an extremely limited number of incorrectly pressed vinyl copies in circulation and have addressed the issue. If you have purchased one of the affected goods, please contact customer service at your respective retailer for a replacement or refund.”
‘Speak Now (Taylor's Version)’ was released on 7th July and has already broken the Spotify record for the most single-day streams for any album in 2023.
The re-recording of the singer's third record is part of her ongoing project of reclaiming ownership of her music. Several of her album masters were sold off in 2020 by her former label Big Machine in a deal that was widely viewed as controversial.
