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TAYLOR SWIFT knew early on that the odds were against her getting noticed in this town, filled as it is to the Stetson brim with men and women chasing dreams of stardom.
That was apparent to her on her first trip here six years ago, when she began knocking on doors in hopes of landing a recording contract.
"I realized that there are thousands of girls going up and down Music Row who are gorgeous and who have amazing voices and who can sing higher and louder than me," she said during an interview in a bunker-like basement office of her label, Big Machine Records. "Somehow I had to find a way to stand out and be the different one."
She knew she had to stand out, rather than up: She was 11 years old at the time and probably 4 feet tall. Yet, about a year later, convinced of her talent and commitment, her parents moved the family from Pennsylvania to Tennessee. At 14, she won a publishing contract for her songwriting and at 16 got a record deal with the fledgling Big Machine.
Her debut single last fall took as its title the name of one of her own favorite singers. "Tim McGraw," took her straight into the Top 5 of the country singles chart and propelled her debut album, "Taylor Swift," to gold status (for sales of 500,000 copies) in just three months.
Swift is 17 now, and if there's a word to sum up this newly minted country star, it would have to be "driven." And...