Marc Maron Happy to Pay a Hefty Price to Use Taylor Swift Song Snippet in New Stand-Up Special: ‘It Had to Happen’

Marc Maron knew that he needed to use a very specific Taylor Swift song at the end of his upcoming comedy special Marc Maron: Panicked. The comedian and pioneering podcaster opened up on the Good One podcast this week about what it cost him to get a snippet of Swift’s 2022 Midnights bonus track “Bigger Than the Whole Sky” into the special due out on Friday (Aug. 1) on HBO Max.

“I think it came out to $50K, around that,” Maron, 61, said. “I did everything I could to get the joke in front of her.” And while he didn’t know how one goes about securing such a deal, he is somewhat friendly with the song’s producer, Jack Antonoff, so he said he texted him for some advice.

“I know Jack Antonoff enough to text him, and he’s the co-writer on that song,” Maron said. “I said, ‘I don’t know what’s proper or how to do this, but we’re running out of money on this thing. It’s probably going to come out of my pocket. Is there anything you can do about this song or talk to Taylor?’”

Antonoff counseled Maron to go through official channels first and see if he could get a proper sign-off, which he did at a reported cost of $50,000 for less than a minute of the track.

“It was doable,” he said of the price. “We made enough money. It was tight, but because of the ticket sales for the special, we were able to get that song.” Maron said. For the record, he could only afford the one minute, so he got together with the band from the special to write some intro and outro music to fill in.

Maron noted that his “relationship” to that song is so strong — as evidenced by the fact that he holds his phone up to play it during the special — that “it had to happen… the real fear is that she don’t let you use it,” he said. 

There was the possibility that Swift would say no and he would have to cut the bit, but Maron said he thought the singer would like the joke. “They can always say, ‘I don’t want him to play that.’ And then if you do, they sue you,” he said. “But they signed off on it. I have no idea if Taylor Swift saw the bit.” 

Check out Maron talking about locking down the Swift song below.