I Prevail first broke through in 2014 with a viral cover of Taylor Swift's song "Blank Space." If you're wondering whether the pop superstar ever heard the RIAA Platinum-certified metalcore spin on her 1989 single, so is former I Prevail vocalist Brian Burkheiser.

"We never heard anything from her," Burkheiser tells ABC Audio. "Although I do lowkey think that there's no way that she didn't hear the 'Blank Space' cover."

"I gotta imagine [Swift] at least jammed it once or twice throughout her career," Burkheiser says. "I always had that question in the back of my head, too. I think she probably did, but no evidence of it, at least."

In a fitting full-circle moment, Burkheiser covered another Swift song, "Look What You Made Me Do," to launch his Scatterbrain solo project following his departure from I Prevail in 2025.

"Some people might have been like, 'You're really gonna do Taylor Swift again?'" Burkheiser says. "But no one's in my body, and no one knows what it's like to remember that moment as a 20-year-old kid working at Domino's and that cover blew up and changed the course of my entire life."

Burkheiser released "Look What You Made Me Do" as the first Scatterbrain song because he wasn't able to put out original music at the time due to a since-resolved dispute with I Prevail. With that in mind, he says he chose to cover that particular song intentionally.

"It was a way for me to make art," he says. "It was a way for me not to say, 'I'm just gonna make a random cover and hope it, you know, goes well.' It's, 'Hey, I'm kinda taking back my life.'"  

Burkheiser has since released two original Scatterbrain songs, "Phases" and "Fast Lane."

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