Taylor Swift Heading for Australia
February 2, 2010 by m.coonce · Leave a Comment
Taylor Swift leaves for Australia this week on a tour. Her managers are happy that she’s going because, back here in the States, they’re worried about her being over exposed. Or people burning out on her, not the other way around.
“The Australian dates had been planned all along, but it actually worked out great,” says Scott Borchetta, who runs Big Machine Records, Swift’s label, and co-manages her career.
“The next time you see her will likely be on the ACM (Academy of Country Music) awards show” in April, Borchetta says. “During that time, we’re going to have a new video, but as far as the talking head of Taylor Swift, that one’s gone into hiding for a little bit, at least on this continent.”
Avoiding overexposure isn’t the only issue the 20-year-old faces. Critics have panned her recent live TV performances as pitchy. The Grammy duet with Stevie Nicks was no exception. “Now, everybody knows that Taylor Swift can’t sing,” influential blogger Bob Lefsetz wrote after the performance.
“They’ve got to figure out how to get this girl to sing on TV and sound right,” says former Spin magazine editor Alan Light. “That’s becoming more of a limitation as she’s flying at that altitude.”
Borchetta says Swift is working on her live TV performances.
“She’s a very intelligent girl,” he says. “She’s going to keep addressing it and keep getting better.”
But Light also points out that in an era when many stars lip-sync, Swift’s less-than-pitch-perfect television performances humanize her. “The fact that it’s not perfect, in some ways, has been an asset,” he says. “That makes it all the more believable, to a certain point.”
