Taylor Swift Eras Tour pt. 2

Less than a week after returning from Arizona, I’m still swimming in my memories of the opening night of Taylor Swift Eras Tour.

As I mentioned previously, the process of positioning myself to go was not an easy one, which made me more nervous about the delivery of the actual experience.

Taking work off, driving out, getting there on time, securing merch etc. etc.. “And don’t forget to have fun” I thought to myself like my own parent in my head.

The drive from LA took about 8 hours due to a traffic buildup on a rural city street that Waze put me on. I remember sitting still next to small-town businesses that looked like facades for about an hour, unaware that a stalled train had obstructed the freeway onramp that I needed to take to get back on my way. I felt like Lightning McQueen in Cars. I had to go!

I finally arrived to my best friends house around 8 pm the night before. She and her boyfriend graciously let me stay with them, knowing that this was an important show for me, and sparing me one more expense that this concert might cause. They’re not “Swifties.” I explained to them that I don’t even consider myself as such, but this was such a historically significant music event, and I’d latched onto Taylor more and more during pandemic and there Evermore.

The day of the concert, both of my friends worked, so I ran around town trying to stay busy and not let my nerves consume me. I bought drinks to pregame and water for after, got a portable phone charger (which turned out to be extremely necessary) and made a stupid shirt with Hotpress stones that took hours. I’ll protect my brand of being annoying at all costs, even into my 30’s.

Driving about an hour to the venue, my nerves subdued with the reminder of what I was doing. Why I was there. Road signs above advocated safety with a wink of a hint about where the traffic was headed as I drove into Glendale Arizona, which was named “Swift City” for the weekend.

I parked at a nearby shopping plaza for $30 and downed a few shots before taking a breath, closing my eyes and listening to one last song before I headed in. My eyes were watering and I took a shaky breath before telling myself “I’m fucking here.”

I booked it toward the stadium past crowds of people lined up outside of bars. “What the heck?” I thought. It was a Friday, but it was only about 4 pm. Then I remembered it was St. Patrick’s Day. Who cared.

I got in the venue without incident and immediately decided to buy a shirt, which took about an hour. I used the restroom, grabbed a beer and got comfy in my section on the floor, section H

GAYLE performed and thanked Taylor for the opportunity with some tears. Paramore came out and crushed their set, playing just the hits and nothing unfamiliar. Hayley Williams, dressed suspiciously like Amy Winehouse, told stories of meeting Taylor back in Nashville at the start of her career and how amazing it was to see her music explode into the machine that it is now. She thanked her for the opportunity before going into a song that they “stopped playing for a while, but brought it back:” The Only Exception.

Shortly thereafter a countdown clock appeared on screen and everyone began to panic and fly to their seats. It was only 8, but she started exactly on time. I though that was exceedingly early, but we’d find out that it was a necessary move for a concert that would last 3 hours and 15 minutes covering 44 songs.

Dancers walked out with giant wings of sort, giving them the proportion of a butterfly or a peacock. They marched in line on the stage before regathering at a point and layering themselves into a mound. We waited through a rumbling and 3…2…1… They unfurled themselves to reveal Taylor. The shrieks were immeasurable. A crowd of 69000 filling the same stadium where the Super Bowl had been held just weeks prior collectively rang out in hysteria. All at once the balloon of the struggle, the fight, the turmoil just to BE there burst, and she began her first song of the night, her live debut of Miss Americana & the Heatbreak Prince. It seemed fitting that she’d begin with the Lover Era, being that it was where she left off. Lover Fest, the tour that never was, fueled this chapter, and she sang six songs from the album, also live debuting Cruel Summer and my weird-boy favorite, The Archer.

She leveled with us and referenced that those of us in attendance for opening night had to go through a considerable amount of effort to be there, saying “I’m about to say something that I’ve been dreaming about and scheming about and planning and plotting for years… Welcome to the Eras Tour.”

She skipped along right into Fearless, hitting the title track, You Belong With Me (which is hard to sing without running out of breath as I’ve discovered at karaoke) and Love Story.

After, the beautiful on-screen transition took us to the forest and directly into the Evermore era, which holds a very special place in my heart, hitting five songs (four as live debuts) but skipping over my three favorite from the album. I knew I wouldn’t hear them that night and I made peace with that fact before showing up at the stadium. That’s the cost of having unpopular favorites. Those are songs that I enjoy in solitude anyhow.

The video transition into the Reputation Era was electric, starting with a red bedazzled leg and loud heel crossing a floor with a thud at each step. A snake slithered across screen and Taylor reappeared with …Ready For It?. That song and Look What You Made Me Do were designed for stadiums and were absolutely thrilling. One thing that TikTok and Instagrammers have repeatedly remarked after the initial two shows of the tour is that many of the songs that she’d perform that night were not “stadium songs,” but she made them work in such a setting seamlessly. It all felt appropriate, purposeful and intentional. The arc of storytelling was a thoughtful and joyful journey to behold. You never knew what Era was coming next, and that was half the fun.

The only song from Speak Now that she’d perform was Enchanted. It’s an old track. It’s not her most popular song. It doesn’t get all the soundtrack and wedding playlist treatment that it deserves, but at the Eras Tour, it was perfect. It was my favorite song of the night.

Red is a super valuable album to me, but that Era sucked. She played the lame singles that people like to forget about, like 22, I Knew You Were Trouble and We Are Never Getting Back Together. I’m glad for the All too Well die-hards that she performed the entire 10-minute version, but I’ve never loved that track. My favorite TS song State of Grace was only referenced, along with the Red title track at the intro of the era. Luckily, I went to the tour of that album, so I’m thankful that I’ve experienced them both in concert before, and I can’t be too mad.

Folklore was stunning to see performed, starting with the recital of the lyrics to Seven in a poetic fashion “Although I can’t recall your face I’ve still got love for you. Your braids make a pattern. Love you to the moon and to Saturn. Passed down like folk songs…” I was so touched to hear Invisible String and Cardigan, which was the first track given to us off of that album in the worst of the pandemic. It was a familiar escape that I forgot how much I needed.

The last two Eras gave us all of the good feels and got us dancing. As opposed to the lame singles of Red, 1989 had nothing but bangers. It felt like a party hearing Style, Blank Space, Shake it Off and Wildest Dreams.

And as our dessert, the fond send-off was the Midnights era. The final piece of the 10-block puzzle that formed a house on-screen throughout the show, each representing a distinct yet important time in Taylor’s discography and life.

This victory lap started as Taylor dove into the stage, “swam” through the floor and climbed up a latter into a purple cloud. Enter Lavender Haze. We also were given Anti-Hero and Bejeweled among others. The night ended with the first song that I fell in love with on that album and the one I love singing the most. The kiss-off to the negativity that may have followed us in our pasts and the celebration of the good fortune that may have befallen us since then: Karma.

I left feeling grateful, and ran into a friend whom I’d not seen in a few years, unaware that she’d moved to Arizona since then. “I’d recognize your walk anywhere” she said, and we laughed. As much as Everything Has Changed, some thing will always stay the same, like me going to a concert solo and chewing it over for days, months and years thereafter. It was everything that I wanted, and there was Happiness.