Why Was Taylor Swift’s ‘Now That We Don’t Talk’ Not On The Original ‘1989?’

Uproxx’s Josh Kurp ranked “Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault]” at No. 9 among all of Taylor Swift’s 26 vault tracks across her four re-recorded albums. “Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault]” arrived today (October 27) on 1989 (Taylor’s Version), and Swift explained why it wasn’t included on her original 1989 album, which not-so-coincidentally released on October 27, 2014.

“‘Now That We Don’t Talk’ is one of my favorite songs that was left behind,” Swift said in a 26-second audio recording posted to Tumblr, where she also spoke on “‘Slut!’ (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault]” and “Is It Over Now? (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault].” “It was so hard to leave it behind, but I think we wrote it a little bit towards the end of the process, and we couldn’t get the production right at the time.”

She continued, “But we had tons of time to perfect the production this time and figure out what we wanted the song to sound like. […] I think it’s the shortest song I’ve ever had, but I think it packs a punch. I think it really goes in. For the short amount of time we have, I think it makes its point.”

“Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault]” comes in at two minutes and 31 seconds, which is all the time Swifties needed to attach to it and surmise that Swift is likely referencing her past relationship with Harry Styles.

https://twitter.com/folkloremel/status/1717811753336422657?s=20

As for Swift saying “Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault]” is one of her favorite left-behind tracks, she said something similar when announcing 1989 (Taylor’s Version).

“Surprise!! 1989 (Taylor’s Version) is on its way to you [soon arrow emoji]!” Swift wrote across her social channels on August 9. “The 1989 album changed my life in countless ways, and it fills me with such excitement to announce that my version of it will be out October 27th. To be perfectly honest, this is my most FAVORITE re-record I’ve ever done because the 5 From The Vault tracks are so insane. I can’t believe they were ever left behind. But not for long!”

Listen to “Now That We Don’t Talk (Taylor’s Version) [From The Vault]” above.