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The magic’s still here: Taylor Swift’s re-recorded “All Too Well” debuts atop Billboard 100

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TAS Rights Management

Looks like America really needed a good cry last week because Taylor Swift‘s newly rerecorded version of “All Too Well” is the top song in the country.  The tearjerking ballad dethroned Adele‘s “Easy on Me,” which falls to second place, and debuted atop the Billboard 100 — marking Taylor’s eighth official chart topper.

The song is featured on the recently released Red (Taylor’s Version), which offers two versions of the heartbreak anthem — a regular, radio-friendly length song and the mythical 10-minute version.  Fans spent years begging Taylor to release the latter, and she did so in abundance by directing a short film to accompany the single and, just last week, gave it a folklore facelift with the “Sad Girl Autumn” remix.

Billboard combined the data from the long, short and the “Sad Girl Autumn” version of “All Too Well,” which helped propel the single to the top of the Hot 100.  Its new ranking smashes the previous record it held when the song appeared on the chart in 2012 — at number 80.

This also means that Taylor has accomplished a new feat: she is now the proud owner of the longest-running song to top the Hot 100.  She dethrones Don McLean, whose eight minute and 37 second “American Pie (Parts I & II)” held the record since 1972.

She also is the first artist to send a cover of her own song to the top since Elton John did with his 1973 single, “Candle in the Wind.”  Two covers of that song, recorded in 1988 and 1997, went on to number one.

Billboard notes the last time a cover dominated its Hot 100 was in 2001, when Christina AguileraPinkMya and Lil’ Kim performed Labelle‘s 1975 hit “Lady Marmalade” for the movie Moulin Rouge!

 

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