We are taking it back to 2006.
On this day, in 2006 (back when she was still country), Taylor Swift dropped her iconic debut single, “Tim McGraw,” the lead single from her self-titled debut studio album.
Man, what an era it was when Taylor Swift made country music. The now-pop star still had quite the impact on the industry, with many artists covering her classic country songs today (including Megan Moroney’s recent cover of “Picture To Burn”).
Swift wrote the song when she was a freshman in high school, thinking about her relationship with her then-boyfriend, a senior. She knew their time together was coming to a close as he prepared to leave their hometown for college.
Of course back when a young Swift wrote this tune in high school, she had no idea that it would lead her into the career path of mega-stardom that it has. The song that took the teenager and her co-writer, Liz Rose, twenty minutes launched a career that’s led to record-breaking tours for one of the biggest artists of any genre today.
However, at the time of the song’s release, Tim himself was a bit hesitant about the song’s title.
He told Billboard back in 2021:
“Well, when I first heard ‘Tim McGraw’ by Taylor Swift, I mean, I thought it was a good song. I was a little apprehensive about it when I first heard it.
Then I thought, ‘Have I gotten to that age now where they’re singing songs about me? Does that mean I’ve jumped the shark a bit? Is everything still cool?'”
Tim McGraw himself also took to TikTok last year to reminisce on the 15th anniversary of the song coming out, and said that he now sees it as an honor to be in the song’s title.
Whether a Swift fan today or not, there is no denying that Swift knew what she was doing writing one of her first tunes about a country superstar.
She knew she wanted to make it in this industry, and came out of the gate ensuring that was the case.
