A Marvelous Time With Taylor Swift on the Eras Tour
Taylor Swift has been touring the US on her much anticipated Eras Stadium Tour since March of 2023. This past weekend, she played three nights at Houston’s NRG Stadium to very enthusiastic crowds. The writer of this article was lucky enough to snag tickets to the Friday, April 21st concert, so in case you couldn’t be there, I’ll recap it for you. Before going to the show, my friends and I made sure to make bracelets as it was something many fans were doing for a tradition, but also as a memento to give out and trade. It’s quite adorable, honestly.
The openers for the show were Gracie Abrams and beebadoobee, and they slayed, but I know you want to hear about Taylor. I don’t know how much readers have read up on the tour so far, but Ms. Swift puts. On. A. Show. Her setlist featured forty-four songs and lasted longer than three hours. Blondie is insane. She said it was called the Eras Tour because she wanted to take us on a journey through all ten of her albums “one era at a time.” She does this, although not in order, but in a way that flows well for the ebb and flow of the night's energy. Forty-two of the songs are the same every night, with two of the songs being surprise acoustic performances. Typically, those songs are not repeated in the tour unless she feels she could do a better job on a different night or if it’s a song featured on Midnights. While she said one era at a time, the era of her debut album is not featured unless she pulls a song from it for an acoustic song.
She started with the Lover era singing “Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince,” which I thought was an interesting choice before I went, but now I understand. The first words she sang were “It’s you and me/ That’s my whole world,” while pointing at the crowd, so the song choice makes sense for setting the tone for a night of singing her songs to her biggest fans. Obviously, she then went into “Cruel Summer” because there’s no way she would do a tour and not include that on the set list, only if she wanted the fans to riot. After that, she performed four more songs from Lover: “The Man,” “You Need To Calm Down,” “Lover,” and “The Archer.”
After Lover’s era, she had an outfit change and came back for Fearless. She sang the three biggest songs from Fearless: “Fearless,” “You Belong With Me,” and “Love Story.” After two very upbeat sections, she calmed us down by entering the evermore section, which included five songs. I appreciated the significant inclusion of evermore as it is one of her most underrated albums, in my opinion. She also played my two favorite songs from that album, “champagne problems” and “tolerate it,” so I felt like I won the night. The other three songs from evermore were “‘tis the damn season,” “willow,” and “marjorie.” After five slower songs, it was time to pick things back up with the reputation, Speak Now, and Red eras. She only featured one song from Speak Now, “Enchanted,” but she included four songs from both reputation and Red. Many people commented on the lack of Speak Now representation and speculated whether that meant anything concerning when Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) would be released. In the reputation set, she sang “... Ready For It?,” “Delicate,” “Don’t Blame Me, and “Look What You Made Me Do,” while for Red, she sang “22,” “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together,” “I Knew You Were Trouble,” and, of course, “All Too Well (10 Minute Version).”
Once she had given us three more sections of upbeat music, she brought us back down to Earth again for the Folklore era. She just had to include the three trilogy songs, “cardigan,” “august,” and “betty,” because they are some of the most popular from the album, and the album is famous partially for that trilogy. The other four songs were “the 1,” “the last great american dynasty,” “illicit affairs,” and “my tears ricochet.” Let me just say she went from the end of “august” into the bridge of “illicit affairs.” Then at the end of that, she was lying on the ground while “my tears ricochet” started playing, and the dancers mimicked a funeral procession. I was amazed. It was so good. It should also be noted that “invisible string” was previously in the folklore set instead of “the 1.” That change happened during her Tampa show dates.
She brought us into the upbeat mood again with 1989 and did five songs from her Grammy Award-winning fifth album. Those were “Style,” “Blank Space,” “Shake It Off,” “Wildest Dreams,” and “Bad Blood.” These sounded so good live, and it really got me excited for 1989 (Taylor’s Version). Then, it was time for the acoustic surprise songs. For my show, she performed “Wonderland” from 1989 and “You’re Not Sorry” from Fearless. I was very happy with both of these choices. I love “Wonderland,” and as someone with green eyes, I was pleased hearing her sing about them. One of my absolute favorite songs from Fearless is “You’re Not Sorry,” so once again, I won.
The last set of the night, but certainly not least, was the Midnights set. She performed seven of the tracks from her latest album, starting with “Lavender Haze,” then doing “Anti-Hero,” “Bejeweled,” “Midnight Rain,” “Vigilante Shit,” “Mastermind,” and she rounded out the night with “Karma” to end on a great note. She truly took us through (almost) every era and gave us a show we will never forget. Happy songs, sad songs, vengeful songs, etc., she did them. Keep your eyes peeled for what she does next because she loves keeping us on our toes.
