Taylor Swift's Label Defends Her Off-Key Grammy Performance (VIDEO)

Taylor Swift at the 2010 Grammys. INFDaily.com.

Big Machine Records claims "technical issue" in Stevie Nicks duet.

People feel bad saying this, but people still say it: Taylor Swift can't sing. She's sold millions of albums and has legions of fans, but after her big Grammy night -- including four awards and a duet with Stevie Nicks -- Taylor Swift's actual performance talent has come under big fire. Now her label is stepping in to say why you should keep buying into the Taylor Swift brand.

We first started to pick up on her out-of-tuneness when she hosted SNL in the fall, but her live Grammys performance in front of thousands of stars and music execs finally sent her falling. We have video below for you to check it out for yourself (again), but here's what Big Machine Records CEO Scott Borchetta is saying to defend the label's golden girl:

"She is the voice of this generation. She speaks directly to [her fans], and they speak directly back to her ... This is not American Idol. This is not a competition of getting up and seeing who can sing the highest note. This is about a true artist and writer and communicator. It's not about that technically perfect performance."

So technically, the label's CEO isn't claiming that Taylor Swift is a great singer either...but he does offer this excuse as to why Taylor may have sounded off-key to us: "We had a volume problem in the ear. So, she was concerned that she wasn't able to hear everything in the mix. That's just part of live TV. ... So you're going to have difficulties on occasion. Unfortunately, on one of the biggest stages, we did have a technical issue. She couldn't hear herself like she had in rehearsal." Borchetta added that he felt criticism of Taylor Swift's Grammy performance was "just over the top."

It did get nasty -- as Huffington Post noted: The Washington Post quipped: "To borrow a phrase from Montgomery Burns, it was more 'off-key caterwauling.'" Entertainment Weekly's Web site EW.com said: "There's no doubt that someone was badly off-key ... I'm afraid my money's on Taylor."

Yikes. Check out Taylor Swift's Grammy performance below...our friends at PopEater called think that Taylor Swift is going to start hearing from haters.