Update: Monday afternoon, Republic Records added Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood” to its official radio promotions website. Monday evening, in the wake of media attention about plans for the new single, the label removed those listings.
The single was listed under the website’s hot adult contemporary and rhythmic radio listings. The Hot AC listing was innocuous; it simply said “Bad Blood” would impact Hot AC radio on May 18. Since the video is premiering during the May 17 Billboard Music Awards, many had treated a 5/18 Hot AC impact as a given.
The rhythmic listing was of the more newsworthy variety. While it did not mention a rhythmic impact date, it did note that the single would be shipped on 5/17 and “made available” on iTunes following that night’s Billboard Music Awards. Since the original version is already available on iTunes, the clear implication was that a new/remixed version of “Bad Blood” is set to launch that night.
Serious talk of a “Bad Blood” remix began when Republic posted a listing for the track on the pop section of its radio website in early April. The note claimed that a “Bad Blood” remix would hit pop radio on May 19.
That listing, too, was hastily removed.
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In early April, Republic’s radio promotions website announced that a remix of Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood” was scheduled to impact pop radio on May 19. Once news of the listing began to circulate, Republic quickly pulled the announcement from its website.
Headline Planet sources maintained that “Bad Blood” was scheduled to be the fourth single from “1989.” Sure enough, Swift–and the producers of the Billboard Music Awards–confirmed the news last Thursday. The celebrity-heavy video for “Bad Blood,” which was identified as her new single, was due to open the annual BBMA.
Swift did not, however, outright confirm that the new single would be a remix of the popular “1989” album cut.
A Republic announcement on the song’s planned hot adult contemporary radio push similarly refrained from using the term remix. It simply said “Bad Blood” impacts the Hot AC format on May 18.
Those anticipating an updated version of “Bad Blood” should not, however, lose faith in that prospect.
Republic also lists “Bad Blood” as one of its upcoming rhythmic radio focuses. In accordance with that listing, the label’s radio team notes that “Bad Blood” “ships May 17th” and will be “available on iTunes after the BBMAs.”
The original, album version of “Bad Blood” is already available on iTunes and already being spun by some radio programmers. By specifying that the single will not be made available until the day of the Billboard Music Awards, Republic seems to be hinting that a new version is indeed on its way.
Whether that new version involves any other artists — or is tantamount to more than a “radio edit” — remains to be seen.
