"All the anxiety is starting," Swift told a group of reporters in Nashville last week. "When the anxiety starts, the writing happens right after, usually."

But that doesn't mean the process will happen overnight � or that we'll necessarily see a new album anytime soon. "Whatever I write in the first year is going to get thrown away," Swift admitted. "I'm going to like it, but it's going to sound like the last record. The second year usually sounds like the next project."

For Swift, the period between albums has so far been a straight-up two years. Red was released Oct. 22, 2012, while her previous album, Speak Now, was released Oct. 25, 2010. With that schedule in mind, we can expect her fifth studio album in the fall of 2014.

The comment about material getting "thrown away" is also consistent with what Swift told Radio.com last year. Regarding the process for Red, she said, "I wrote for two years. And I wrote until I couldn't write anymore. That was the stopping point." She said she recognized that stopping point "when I couldn't think of one more thing that I needed to write about, couldn't conjure up one more emotion that hadn't already been conveyed on the album somehow."