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On July 7 at midnight, Taylor Swift released her latest “Taylor’s Version” album–Speak Now. It originally came out in 2010. Taylor dated both Taylor Lautner and John Mayer while she was writing songs for that album, and Back To December is widely believed to be about Lautner. (I have also always maintained the belief that Swift cheated on Lautner when John Mayer came calling. My God, he’s gross.) While there are obviously some exes still on her sh-t list, namely Jake Gyllenhaal, Taylor is friends with her ex Joe Jonas and apparently Taylor Lautner, too, who is married to a woman also named Taylor. It’s confusing. Anyway Taylor Lautner is part of Swift’s new music video for one of her ‘from the vault’ tracks, “I Can See You.” For 2010-era Taylor it’s quite the sexy little track. But the music video treatment is a bank heist where Lautner, Joey King, and Presley Cash conspire to break Swift out of a vault, carrying the Speak Now album with her. It’s clearly meant to be a metaphor for how Swift is taking control of her back catalog by re-recording her masters. It’s kind of a tonal mismatch for me between the mood of the song and the mood of the video, but it’s not my party, as they say. On Friday, Swift brought Lautner, Joey, and Presley onstage at her concert in Kansas City to celebrate the new music video. The Taylors had sweet things to say about each other.
It was Taylor times two at Taylor Swift’s Kansas City Eras Tour performance on Friday evening, when the singer brought ex-boyfriend and good friend Taylor Lautner onstage to celebrate his role in her new music video, “I Can See You.”
Joined by Joey King and Presley Cash, both of whom appeared in Swift’s 2011 music video for “Mean” and appear in the new video alongside Lautner, Swift told the crowd how influential Lautner, 31, was on her life back when the couple dated in 2009.
“He was a very positive force in my life when I was making the Speak Now album, and I want to say he did every single stunt that you saw in that music video,” Swift, now 33, told the massive audience at Arrowhead Stadium. “He and his wife have become some of my closest friends, and it’s very convenient because we all share the same first name.”
The new video shows Lautner, King, and Presley breaking into a vault to steal a Speak Now version of Swift back — a nod to Swift finally owning her own version of the album following the controversial sale of her masters to Scooter Braun.
Lautner echoed Swift’s sentiments, speaking to the singer in front of the crowd.
“I respect you so much. Not just for the singer you are, the songwriter, the performer — but truly for the human you are,” Variety reported. “You are gracious, humble, kind and I’m honored to know you.”
Taylor Lautner’s stunt work in “I Can See You” is pretty impressive, and the music video is cute. It’s not my favorite of the ‘from the vault’ tracks but most of them have been hit or miss for me across Taylor’s re-releases. I wasn’t too excited for this one anyway because of Taylor’s recent antics with Matt Healy–who she may or may not be seeing again on the down low, ugh. Taylor seems to crave chaos and bad boys–no tea no shade, I am that way too. But Healy crosses the line from guy-who-smokes-American-Spirits-and-never-calls-when-he-says-he-will, to flaming racist misogynist! And I just can’t understand why she’d go back to him or was with him in the first place. Back in ye olden days, Taylor Lautner was probably too reliable for her to stay interested, and then John Mayer, in between a breakup-makeup cycle with Jessica Simpson, made his move, like the Pied Piper. It’s sweet that the Taylors are friends now. I’ve been listening to Taylor Lautner’s podcast he does with his wife and he comes across as a compassionate, thoughtful dude.
photos credit: Getty and Andrew Shawaf / Pedro Andrade, PacificCoastNews.com / Avalon, Backgrid
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