For my first Taylor Swift Eras Tour show, my very best friend flew from Canada to London, and then to Dublin (the only location we’d been able to secure tickets at the time) for me. It was a huge expense and commitment, but something we’d been dreaming about throughout our decade-long friendship. For over a year, we shared a countdown on our phone screens, meticulously planned our outfits, theorised our dream surprise song pairings and made countless friendship bracelets (then giggled at our inevitable manufacturing errors). Every morning after a show, we’d scroll TikTok with gritted teeth; would the songs we’d manifested remain off Swift’s lips? Would the few we desperately didn’t want be checked off her 274-track discography before ‘Dublin Night Two’? The anticipation was near exhausting, but filled with joy and creativity and excitement. Mostly, because I was shared it all with my best friend.
At my final Eras Tour show, I’d been nursing a headache and begrudgingly debating selling my ticket. However, in the midst of Reputation (Taylor’s Version) announcement rumours I opted to attend anyway. Instead of missing the highly anticipated closing night of the European leg, I simply hung around the back of the crowd, enjoying the show at a leisurely pace. To my surprise, the south of the arena was as filled with love as the front. Numerous women and girls approached me, adorned with bracelets, welcoming me to join their own friendship groups. It didn’t matter that we were total strangers; we had Swift’s lyrics, costumes and our unrivalled excitement to bridge the gap. Not to mention, an endless flow of kindness and a shared sense of ‘girlhood’ in common.
As many will know all too well, the demand for Eras tickets was dramatically higher than the number available, despite Swift’s record-breaking number of performances across the world. With Swift’s global appeal, it’s also fair to assume that thousands of fans reside in cities and even countries that the Eras Tour couldn’t reach. What they have been afforded, however, is a sense of community via the bustling community of Swifties online, as well as via touring Swift-related events like the esteemed travelling club night, Swiftogedden.
‘There is something about Taylor’s fandom that is inherently welcoming, friendly and positive,’ says Swiftogedden founder, Dave Fawbert. ‘We’ve had lots of stories of people going to Swiftogeddon on their own and quickly being invited into other people’s groups to sing along to the songs together. It’s sort of been forgotten, now that she is a huge megastar, that her songs all come from a sense of being an outsider, of not being the one picked for sports, of not being the cool one. I think people like that tend to look out for other people and welcome them in.’
‘I think on a very simple level too just seeing someone else who loves something as much as you do immediately gives you a connection. I see it all the time at Swiftogeddon and you saw it in the crowds at the Eras Tour too: a group of people who all have this love for the same thing, being unapologetic in their enthusiasm and joy for it. It [Swiftogeddon] is truly welcoming, there’s no sense of ‘cool’ or having to act a certain way, or any sense of being judged. The Eras Tour was her victory lap and a victory lap also for all of those fans who’ve been there since the beginning and joined along the way.’
Alongside the joy of witnessing the Eras Tour first-hand, or attending one of the many Swift-inspired events along the way, the sense of community that has emerged via social media has been a unifying factor for Swifties oceans away. From ranking Taylor’s latest 31-track project, The Tortured Poets Department, to guessing which hue of the rotating Versace co-ords she’ll wear at her next show (thanks to a fan-made app amply-titled ‘Mastermind’), TikTok has connected millions of fans at an entirely new scale. The best part? The discourse is rarely focussed on Swift’s personal life nor relationship with American football player, Travis Kelce.
While fans worldwide have been bonding and exchanging friendship bracelets, a trend born from lyrics in the Midnights track ‘You’re On Your Own, Kid’, Swift herself has also shown off blossoming friendships throughout the Eras Tour. Whether you look at her roster of opening acts (close friends Hayley Williams and Phoebe Bridgers, and emerging artists and life-long fans Sabrina Carpenter and Gracie Abrams) or spy the enthusiastic celebrity attendees in every show’s VIP tent, the Eras Tour has not only been a momentous display of ‘girlhood’ for fans, but it has also proven that the wider world looks on Swift’s close friendships with a kindness it didn’t historically. While the 1989 album cycle saw the singer make endless negative impressions for the reception of her exclusive ‘clique’, the Eras Tour has been an endless celebration of female unity from the stage to the stands.
While some have theorised that the singer’s next re-record is just around the corner, others have encouraged the 34-year-old to finally take a well-deserved break following this last leg. Whichever occurs first, it’s safe to say that the approaching final Eras Tour show in Vancouver on December 8 will be the last, and will definitely leave void in many fans lives and routines. However, if there’s any one thing that can be taken away from Swift’s most successful near two-year tour, its that where she goes, Swifties will follow – as will the many millions of friendships made along the way.
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Read the original article in ELLE UK.
