Taylor Swift releases upbeat new single and video ‘ME!’

(Reuters) – Grammy-winning singer Taylor Swift on Friday released a cheerful pop duet called “ME!” along with a colorful video filled with pastel-drenched images of butterflies, rainbows and a young couple in love.

“ME!” features Brendon Urie, the lead singer of Panic! at the Disco, who at the video’s start is fighting with Swift in a conversation in French. The video turns upbeat as the music starts. “I promise that you’ll never find another like me,” Swift sings.

“I’m the only one of me. Baby that’s the fun of me,” she adds.

Swift, 29, had been teasing an announcement for days on social media with pastel images that turned out to be scenes from the new video.

“‘ME!’ is a song about embracing your individuality and really celebrating it and owning it,” Swift said hours earlier during an interview with ABC TV host Robin Roberts on the network’s broadcast of the National Football League draft in Nashville.

“With a pop song, we have the ability to get a melody stuck in people’s heads and I just want it to be one that makes them feel better about themselves,” she said.

Swift began her career as a country singer in Nashville, Tennessee, at age 15 before branching out with pop hits such as “Shake It Off” and “Bad Blood.”

On Thursday afternoon, Swift surprised hundreds of her fans by joining them at the unveiling of a butterfly wing mural in the Gulch area of Nashville. “ME!” was written in the center of the mural as a hint to her evening announcement.

The new video and single provided a stark contrast to her last album, 2017’s “Reputation,” which included songs such as “Look What You Made Me Do” that took aim at people who had attacked her personally and professionally.

(Reporting by Lisa Richwine and Brendan O’Brien; Editing by Paul Tait and Christian Schmollinger)