The Full Scoop on CountryHound's Exclusive Taylor Swift Fearless Interview

Taylor Swift was 11 years old when she first performed in front of a large crowd. “…I got picked to sing the national anthem for a 76ers game…” Swift explained during an exclusive interview with CountryHound. “I stood in the middle of this huge arena, there were 20,000 people there, and I sang the national anthem a capella in front of all those people. I was so nervous, but every single time you do that it gets easier and easier.”  Now, seven years later, 18-year-old Swift is a Country Music sensation with two No. 1 singles off her debut album, which was also certified triple platinum, meaning sales of more than 3 million. In 2007, she was the Country Music Association’s 2007 Horizon Award winner, and today marks the release of her sophomore album, Fearless, with 13 brand new songs, eight of which she wrote solo.   “I think the biggest different between [my first] album and Fearless is that with Fearless I wrote eight of the songs by myself, so that’s a big majority of them that I didn’t co-write with anybody,” Swift said. “…for Fearless, I was on the road, that was my job – on the road non-stop – and so when I would get a great idea for a song, I didn’t have anybody around to write it with; I just wrote it myself.”  It seems that process has worked out well with the first single from the album, “Love Story,” currently at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart and still going strong. “‘Love Story,’ is basically your modern-day fairy tale of what every single girl wants – a guy to say ‘Marry me, I don’t care what anyone says, you never have to be alone,’” Swift commented. “That’s my ideal happy-ending song.”  According to Swift, the fairy tale versus reality theme is constant on the album. “White Horse,” another song on the album that was also used in a Grey’s Anatomy episode, conveys the same topic. “When we’re growing up and we’re little girls, we read story books, and we think that Prince Charming is going to come sweep us off our feet and put us on a pedestal and never take us off that pedestal, and that doesn’t happen in reality,” Swift said with a laugh. “The song ‘White Horse’ is written about that moment where you realize that the guy that you thought was your Prince Charming really isn’t.”  Between tour dates and interviews to promote Fearless, Swift rarely sees any down time. But when she does, the singer finds herself spending time with friends, including fellow Country singer Kellie Pickler, listening to “sad songs,” and, like any other young adult, she also spends time on the social networking site, MySpace.“I go on MySpace a lot, and that takes up a lot of my free time,” she said. “I love to make videos and edit them together and put them up on my MySpace, so that’s what I do a lot of the time.”  Swift also listens to her favorite “songs of the minute.” “I like to go song-by-song; I love to have a new favorite song of the minute. Like Paramore, they have a new song called, ‘When It Rains,’ that I have on repeat right now,” she said. “I’ll go song-by-song and those favorite songs of the minute are my favorite songs playlists.”On Thursday nights, Swift can be found watching her favorite television show, Grey’s Anatomy. “I couldn’t live without it, I’m obsessed!” she said. “Having a song on Grey’s Anatomy was basically the best thing ever.”  While Swift’s main concern is music right now, the singer finds crime scene investigation fascinating. “When something happens, like just a simple conversation or whatever and I don’t have a conclusion to it, I draw all these different conclusions in my head and all these different ways that it could’ve gone,” Swift said. “My mom and I call that ‘paranoid thinking’ because we both do it. I think that could really help in that line of work.”  But, Swift has found her passion in music, and she’s stickin’ to it. “If I hadn’t discovered music I’m sure I would be doing something else that I would fall in love with, like criminal investigation or something. But I think that music is going to be it for me.”   Starting today, visit CountryHound for your opportunity to win Taylor Swift autographed merchandise by telling us about a time when you were “fearless.”  Swift said, “My definition of the word fearless is not that you’re not afraid of anything. It’s not that you don’t have fears. I think that being fearless is having a lot of fears but jumping anyway.” Tell us about your experience for your chance to win! Watch the Exclusive Taylor Swift Interview here.