A cause for celebration! Taylor Swift honored her 13-year-long career with a touching Instagram tribute on Thursday, October 24.
Swift, 29, marked the career milestone by reflecting on her early days in the industry, before finding success and becoming one of the biggest acts in music today. She led her post with a throwback pic of her performing at a small gig in Nashville, followed by a photo of her headlining a packed arena tour.
“I said in an interview 13 years ago ‘I’m just hoping that I have a second album that does as well as the first and someday get to be a headliner, and always be the same person that I started out as.’ Scrolling through your posts today has me feeling all the feelings & I want to thank you,” she recalled, giving a shout out to fans commemorating her big day across social media. “Because of you, there was a 2nd 3rd 4th 5th 6th and 7th album. You guys made me into a headliner because you wanted to see me play.”
The “Archer” songstress then acknowledged that fans’ “support all these years is what’s helped me stay true to that kid I was when I started out,” concluding with the hashtag “#13yearsoftaylorswift.”
Swift dropped her self-titled debut country album in 2006 at age 16 — a record that helped her to find early crossover success with the hit “Teardrops on My Guitar.” She’s since become a 10-time Grammy winner based on an impressive 32 nominations, making her among the most honored artists. The decorated singer has also racked up several wins and nods from the MTV VMAs, CMAs and Billboard Music Awards, to list a few.
The Pennsylvania native later transitioned into being a full-on pop star — a style most recently seen on her latest offering, Lover.
Speaking to Ryan Seacrest for “On Air With Ryan Seacrest” in August, she opened up about her growth over the years and how that has impacted her as an artist.
“I think part of me growing up has been realizing my fans have been so generous to me. They’ve given me the opportunity to be able to change things up every once in awhile, if it’s feeling like it’s too much of a pressure situation, because I never want to ‘phone in’ a show,” she explained. “I never wanna be like, ‘this wasn’t what I wanted.’ … I want to give them 113 percent every show so I need for it to be in a way that feels right.”
Swift, who Forbes named as the world’s highest-paid artist earlier this year, also spoke about dropping the rather gritty Reputation in 2017 after releasing 2014’s 1989. “Reputation was interesting, because I’d never before had an album that wasn’t fully understood until it was seen live,” she told Entertainment Weekly in May.
“When it first came out, everyone thought it was just going to be angry,” she continued. “Upon listening to the whole thing, they realized it’s actually about love and friendship, and finding out what your priorities are.”
