Shania Twain congratulates ‘unstoppable young female country artist’ Taylor Swift on beating her record

Shania Twain is still all about female empowerment, even when it means celebrating a fellow female artist for dethroning her as the reigning Queen of Country.

The five-time Grammy-winning Canadian crooner took a moment this past weekend to congratulate Taylor Swift, who officially surpassed Twain’s record as the female artist with the most weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Country Albums Chart. Twain previously spent 97 weeks in that spot, while Swift’s albums have now reached an impressive 99 weeks.

“Let’s Go Girls!!!! Proud of you @taylorswift13,” Twain tweeted on January 8. “Historical records are meant to be made and then broken. The baton is meant to be passed on to new generations. Unstoppable young female country artists are [fire] in spite of the hurdles.”

So what she’s saying is, Swift impressed her much? Well obviously. But the show of love gave lots of people the feels, as they rejoiced over queens celebrating queens. And now the race is on to see who will surpass Garth Brooks, a.k.a. the overall artist with the most weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard Country Albums Chart with 169 weeks in the top spot. Alabama has the second-most with 125 and Willie Nelson rounds out the Top 3 with 106 weeks.

For now, this record is only Swift’s latest following the release of Red (Taylor’s Version). As 2021 wrapped, her 10-minute version of “All Too Well” became the longest number one entry on the Billboard Hot 100, surpassing Don McLean’s “American Pie,” which was released in 1971.

Both the new Red and the re-recorded album Fearless (Taylor’s Version) gave Swift a boost in surpassing Twain’s record, having spent three and seven weeks at No. 1, respectively. The fact that Swift now holds this record can’t be lost on her, given the nice words she’s shared about Twain in the past.

“I remember when I was a little kid, I used to see Shania Twain and I just remember thinking if I ever got a chance, by some crazy streak of luck, to be on a stage, I’d want to do as much as I could to say thank you,” Swift said back in 2010 at the CMA Music Festival.

While the discourse has been mostly positive, some have questioned whether Swift can truly still consider herself a country artist. It’s a fair question, given her transition to pop music and then back into the pop-country space over the years. 

But Swift is far from the only artist who has walked that line. In fact, it’s worth noting that “pop-country” is also a genre Twain knows well. So much so that Swift even celebrated the “Man! I Feel Like a Woman!” singer in a TikTok video tackling the “Mama Said” trend last September. 

In turn, Twain thanked Swift and paid homage to her own hero, Dolly Parton.

“I have ceased to be a person anymore. I have exploded into a cloud of confetti hearts,” Swift responded when she saw Twain taking her video and paying it forward.

Something tells us the feeling is mutual.

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