Taylor Swift’s latest accolade is one that only Dolly Parton has managed to do before her.
This week, Swift’s re-recording of “Love Story,” named “Love Story (Taylor’s Version)” debuted atop Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart, joining Dolly Parton’s iconic “I Will Always Love You” as the only songs to have hit No. 1 on the chart as originals and then as revisions by the same artist.
Swift’s original rendering of “Love Story” topped the Hot Country Songs chart on Nov. 22 and Nov. 29, 2008. The re-recording marks Swift’s first time debuting at the top of the Hot Country Songs chart and marks her eighth No. 1 hit on that chart overall. This is the first time Swift has topped the chart since her 10-week chart-topping smash “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” in 2012-2013—although Swift did earn a No. 1 on Billboard’s Country Airplay chart in June 2013 for her role in Tim McGraw’s “Highway Don’t Care.”
Swift told Billboard in a statement: “This is my first time having a No. 1 debut on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart and I’m so grateful to the fans for making this a possibility. They’re the ones who emboldened me to reclaim my music and they really showed up this week to see it through.
“It blows me away that they’ve sent a song to No. 1 that had its first life over a decade ago,” she added. “I couldn’t be happier that it happened now, and in this way.”
In doing so, she replicated Dolly Parton’s country chart success with “I Will Always Love You,” which first reached the top of the Hot Country Songs chart in 1974, and then topped the chart again in 1982, via a new version Parton recorded as part of the movie The Best Little Whorehouse In Texas. Parton entered the country charts with “I Will Always Love You” a third time in 1995, though this version was a duet with Vince Gill.
Since officially launching her pop career with the 2014 album 1989, Swift has had several songs reach the upper echelons of the Hot Country Songs chart, including 2017’s “New Year’s Day” from her reputation album, “Soon You’ll Get Better” featuring The Chicks (from her Lover album), folklore’s “betty,” and her Haim collaboration “no body, no crime,” from her evermore project.
