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TAYLOR SWIFT
+ Sabrina Carpenter
@ Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG)
Melbourne, Australia
16th February, 2024
(Live Review)

Review by Linda Memphis (@lindamemphismusic)

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Photo Credit: TAS Rights Management

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The Ten Acts of Taylor Swift:
the Eras Tour Hits Melbourne

By Linda Memphis

I’ve seen Taylor Swift on many tours over the years – Red, 1989, Reputation – but nothing she’s done to date comes even remotely close to the epic proportions of her first Eras Tour show at the MCG. Three and a half hours of performance, 44 songs, and a record-breaking 96,000 fans made it the biggest concert of her career so far. Her Melbourne show – the first of seven across the country – not only broke records, but cemented Taylor Swift’s reputation as a verified music superstar.

By its’ very definition, the Eras Tour is a greatest hits show of massive proportions. This is an all eras, all ages, all albums, all styles, greatest hits show. But it’s more than that, because it takes the greatest hits concept and elevates it to a whole other level, by embracing the feel and atmosphere of each album and celebrating it in a way that makes each Era a show within a show. Better still: the Eras Tour is not just something for fans to sit back and see – it’s an event where they can join in and be, by turning up in era-replicated, or era-inspired, outfits. On show night at the MCG, there are tributes to every Taylor Era imaginable: sparkly cowboy boots and tassle dresses (circa Fearless); one-legged diamante snake encrusted jumpsuits (Reputation); Red-era t-shirts, shorts and heart sunglasses; and long flowing green gowns inspired by Evermore. And more! The first Melbourne show of the Eras Tour provides fans with an opportunity to go beyond their celebration of Taylor Swift and her music, to an expression of all that it means to be a ‘Swiftie’ – a move that elevates them from the fandom of simply celebrating their love for Taylor, to playing an active role in expressing how they relate to her music, her songs, and her art. Let the games begin!

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Photo Credit: TAS Rights Management

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Support act, American songster Sabrina Carpenter, hits the stage early in a shimmery purple glitter dress and matching boots – she’s definitely giving the Taylor vibe! “Melbourne, is that you?” she calls out. The crowd respond with screams and cheers. The sun is glaring and the sounds are pumping, and Carpenter is the embodiment of summer pop and joy. She opens with ‘Read Your Mind’, and hits us with a mix of songs that perfectly embody her pop/dance ethic, including ‘Feather’, ‘Nonsense’, and her controversial ‘Because I Liked a Boy’. But it’s her sweet cover of Olivia Newton-John’s timeless ‘Hopelessly Devoted to You’, that’s her real hit of the evening. It’s the perfect warm-up, and she’s as grateful as we are to be here. “It’s happening and it’s real!” she tells the crowd. Don’t we know it.

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SABRINA CARPENTER / Photo – Vince Aung

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It’s 7.30pm on the dot when Taylor Swift arrives to the sounds of ‘Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince’ in sequins and silver boots, amid choreography, video visuals, and purple billows that parachute along the length of the stage. This is her Lover Era, and as she dons a sequinned jacket for ‘The Man’ a couple of songs in, the crowd roars their approval. It’s a vibe like no other. Welcome to Melbourne, Taylor! The putting on of the jacket is symbolic of a song that is an anthem for all the girls who know what it feels like to exist as a girl in a man’s world. In many ways Taylor Swift is a symbol representative of so many of the things that her audience are grappling with – there is a lot that is anthemic about her songs, and this translates exceptionally well live. On ‘You Need To Calm Down’, the “Shade never made anybody less gay” line is a more direct reference, and as she sings it, it becomes almost a hundred thousand voices strong as the crowd scream it in unison. Now that’s powerful. “I’m losing my mind that there are over 96,000 people here” Swift confesses quite early on. “This is the biggest show that we have done of this tour, or any tour.” Yes, this is a show of shows: a record-breaker and a complete sell out.

“Eighteen years of music, one Era at a time” Taylor continues, and the crowd respond with a roaring cheer. “My goal,” she explains, “is after tonight, when you hear these songs you’re going to think about the memories we made.” And this truly is what Taylor Swift is about: connection. Like all the best writers, she writes without worrying about what people will think. Her songs are not about creating hits – they’re about being real, they’re about honest connection. She takes the simple and the beautiful, and she celebrates it (regardless of how cliché it may be deemed). She takes the heartbreak and she lays it out and allows us to wallow in it (because that’s what everyone needs sometimes). And she takes the angry, the ugly, and the unspoken, and she brings them out into the open (because she can). She resonates our thoughts out loud, and it’s cathartic for us all. This is how her songs work, and it’s why so many connect with her so strongly. And regardless of the vastness of a venue, she makes her shows about connection too. Live, she connects through the music, but she doesn’t only use her songs – she connects through symbolism and settings that emphasise the songs, and however she can, she connects directly with the audience too. Her performance is designed to reach people – and that includes the fans at the MCG who are sitting even in the farthest seats from the stage. For those lucky enough to be closer up, she makes eye contact, she smiles, she waves, she reaches down. During ‘22’ she actually gives her hat to a little girl in the front row (and the crowd go nuts!). These are her people, and you can feel that she has as much love and adoration for them as they do for her. These are the memories that will be made: this is the connection that they have, Taylor and her Swifties.

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Photo Credit: TAS Rights Management

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With the show begun in earnest, we’re introduced to Taylor’s Fearless Era – her country/pop breakthrough. “Are you ready to go back to high school with me?” she asks the crowd. Although it’s only a brief stop, it’s a memorable one. Her hits ‘You Belong With Me’ and ‘Love Story’ are a throwback to a more youthful, innocent Taylor Swift that still resonates well with the thousands of young teens in the audience. What’s refreshing about Swift is that, no matter how much she’s grown, no matter how far she’s travelled from these songs, and no matter how magnificently successful she’s become, she’s still comfortable with where she’s from. She’s truly at home with these songs and she sings them from a place of joy and appreciation. It’s this – this unaffected humbleness about her, both as a performer and as a person – that is one of the main reasons the crowd adore her so much. She’s grateful to those who have travelled the road with her, and she’s welcoming of those new to the journey.

Each successive Era is marked with the same full acceptance and joy by Swift, and each is marked by its’ own highlights. The hauntingly evocative and vocally powerful ‘My Tears Ricochet’, from Folklore, with its’ stunning imagery – Swift, in a swirling green gown, surrounded by a dark and solemn group of dancers – is a definite fan favourite, and leaves a lasting impression on the crowd. During the Evermore Era, the thousands of Swifties in the audience are true to form in following Taylor’s lamentful ‘Champagne Problems’ with the ‘champagne problems cheer’ – an extended ovation that has become an established tradition at her shows. It’s a definitive and much anticipated highlight; a (long) moment for Swifties to show their love, and for Swift to lean back and feel the appreciation from the crowd too. And feel it she does! Were those tears in her eyes we could see up there on the big screen? “I love you so much,” she tells the crowd. “Do you know how lovely that is to do for someone?” The audience respond by cheering even louder. And the highlights keep coming.

‘Tolerate It’, also from Evermore with it’s beautiful “I know my love should be celebrated, but you tolerate it” (a lyric which says whole worlds in just two lines) is a personal favourite, and it’s delivered with a dark, melodramatic vibe; played out like a soap opera, the deep bass punctured by screams from across the stadium – pain perfectly expressed. The pain turns dark for the Reputation Era – heralded by the hiss of a giant snake across the back screen – with Taylor and her posse arriving on stage like a dark warning with the iconic ‘Ready For It’. In complete contrast, Red’s ‘22’ is the perfect expression of a young woman on the threshold of success beyond her wildest dreams, and it’s a giant party as the crowd look back and celebrate along with her. And the fairytale ‘Enchanted’ from the wonderful Speak Now album, performed in a storybook mauve ballgown, is just beautiful: a perfectly idealised vision of everything that wishful romance should be. It’s representative of an idealism that Swift has been criticised for in the past, but as the guy from The Beatles used to say, “You’d think that people would’ve had enough of silly love songs…I look around me and I see it isn’t so”. Sometimes a little hope and a little romance is exactly what we need – even if it is idealistic. Paul McCartney understood this, and Taylor Swift, does too. 1989’s ‘Style’ is another crowd favourite, perhaps because it gives us such an iconic embodiment of everything that Taylor Swift is identified with (“I got that red lip classic thing that you like”) – and of course, she plays up to it, perfectly.

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Photo Credit: TAS Rights Management

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As the Eras progress, the highlights continue, but the greatest highlight of the night surely has to be the Grammy-nominated ten minute version of the Red Era’s ‘All Too Well’. This song is perfectly-crafted poetry, set to music – and what some would consider Taylor Swift’s greatest work to date. The imagery, the allegory, the melody – all are beautiful and brilliant – and to see it performed live is nothing short of an honour.

To switch things up and keep the show fresh, each night Taylor does a short acoustic set of surprise songs – a much-anticipated part of the show. Tonight’s set features something old and something new – the title track from the Red album, joyfully received; and a never before performed live ‘vault track’ from Midnights – the beautiful ‘You’re Losing Me’. This is a particularly rare treat for the crowd, who go absolutely nuts. The massive Melbourne crowd are also blessed with the news that the release of Taylors’ forthcoming album, The Tortured Poets Department, will feature a brand new additional track, namely, ‘The Bolter’. Maybe not a big deal for most, but ground-breaking news for Swifties, who respond with a roar of approval.

What makes the Eras Tour truly great is that each Era really is a unique incarnation, a different world, a completely new experience. The show could almost be called ‘The Ten Acts of Taylor Swift’, because each mini-set is so individual and so distinct that each invokes a completely different feel from the next. And in some Eras, Evermore for example, this is taken to its’ ultimate limit, so that we are experiencing something close to a full-blown theatrical performance rather than just a pop concert. Swift uses not only backdrops, but also giant 3D props, along with interpretive dance, lighting, and costumes, to transport us into that whole other world.

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Photo Credit: TAS Rights Management

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The incredible ability Taylor Swift has to evoke feeling and connectedness in her performance –  through songs, through costume and dance, through light and sound and props – is even further enhanced by her clever adaptation of pop culture referencing into her shows in order to create a greater whole for her audience than what we simply hear and see onstage. So many of Taylor Swift’s songs have references that, while not overtly obvious, are still innately understood. Swift’s talent as a songwriter means that even if the listener can’t exactly pinpoint or explain a reference, it’s felt and understood nevertheless – and Swift brings this referencing to her live performances also. During Midnights ‘Vigilante Shit’, for example, she draws on choreography from the classic 1972 movie ‘Cabaret’. This is probably lost on most of the younger audience, but the vintage vibe of it is still felt, providing an added layer of depth to an already brilliant performance. Similarly, in Midnights ‘Karma’, the big screen video shot from above the stage features a kaleidoscope choreography and monochrome colour scheme that is a very clear throwback to early 20th century motion picture choreographer Busby Berkley. Again, this is something that most of her younger audience won’t recognise, but nevertheless, it’s a technique that adds to the depth of the performance. Swift embraces a multitude of talents and techniques to transform each Era so that each of the Eras is a new incarnation, bought to its’ full reality onstage. The production on this tour is testament to Swift as an artist – it’s truly next level – and to experience it in a stadium as vast as the MCG, amongst almost a hundred thousand other likeminded souls, is something that will last in our collective memory for many decades to come.

Taylor’s hit ‘Karma’ from her latest album Midnights, heralds the end of the show. It’s a fitting finale: a F– You to her critics but at the same time, a warm embrace for her fans (“Karma takes all my friends to the summit” she reminds us). And to the very last note, every moment of her show is powerful – she gives her all. “Melbourne, I’m never going to forget tonight, you are unbelievable” she tells the audience before bowing on her way out. As confetti descends onto the massive crowd below, the lights come up. Taylor has left. The show is over. But the connection remains.

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Photo Credit: TAS Rights Management

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Follow TAYLOR SWIFT
Website – Facebook – Instagram – Twitter

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TAYLOR SWIFT
AU FACTS 

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Press Release 14th February 2024 (below) HERE

TAYLOR SWIFT | THE ERAS TOUR

New Melbourne and Sydney tickets
on sale today

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THE REVIEWER

WEBSITE – INSTAGRAM

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AMNPLIFY – DB