Taylor Swift was a little girl from West Reading, Pennsylvania who had a dream of showing the world what she loved.
She moved to a new state with her heart filled with hope and determination to take a chance in one of the most insecure, uncertain, and high-risk industries around. Now, her name is known by most generations and nationalities on the planet. Her name is an echo in one’s mind.
However, it definitely did not come easy. From dealing with body dysmorphia, an identity crisis, people pleasing, getting taken advantage of, not getting credited for what she does, getting blamed for “ruining everything”, and on top of that, having her own written music stolen and sold WITHOUT her even knowing, Swift has been through it all!! Having overcome all of these struggles, her perseverance, determination, courage, and strength serve as an inspiration to many.
All that said, Taylor Swift being Taylor Swift, she decided to take a leap into the lake of chance and challenged herself on March 17th 2023, starting the very first Eras Tour Concert, not knowing how much of an impact it would have on not only her, but the whole world.
The Eras Tour covered all of her musical hits, from the start of her career to her new album that was released while she was on tour. It starts out with her album Lover, which was supposed to have its own tour but unfortunately, the pandemic arose, forcing the whole world to shut down. Then comes Fearless, where the nostalgic songs for many “Love Story” and “You Belong With Me” come from. Then comes Red, where the 10 minute version of the song “All Too Well” comes from. After comes Speak Now, where everyone was “Enchanted” to see Taylor in the stunning purple dress, coming after is Reputation, where she says “Don’t Blame Me” for making the stadium go wild. Then, a change that was made more recently to the tour was Folkmore, where two of her albums “Folklore” and “Evermore” were combined together to make room for her new album addition, TTPD. Which leads to 1989, her birth year which the album was named after! Then comes the newest out of all, The Tortured Poets Department, or better known as TTPD, where her visuals took the world by awe. Then to have a closer connection with her audience, she plays mashups of surprise songs in an acoustic format, and last but not least comes Midnights, where songs like “Anti-Hero” make her fans feel heard and seen.
Now all of this may sound impressive enough, but the impact this tour had on the world is record-breaking — literally! Taylor Swift broke attendance records in stadiums such as The Nissan Stadium in Nashville, Melbourne’s Cricket Ground, and even our own state, New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium! Overall, the Eras Tour became the highest grossing tour in history, earning Swift over $2 billion in ticket sales, leading her to be one of the only artists to become a billionaire from music alone and lead her to become Time Magazine’s person of the year for 2023!
Taylor Swift’s tour also immensely helped the world economically, so much so that the Federal Reserve credited her for boosting the U.S. economy with a contribution of about 4.3 billion, which went towards the GDP of the nation. Accompanying this, during the time of inflation, she created over 3,000 jobs for people around the world and generated $160 million in local business revenue!
However, with all of this, not everything with the tour was smooth sailing. Needing to cancel an entire tour destination because of a possible terrorist attack gave humanity and Taylor Swift herself, a new sense of fear. Furthermore, extreme temperatures lead to losing the lives of innocent people and caused problems to everyone attending including Taylor herself made this a bumpy ride at times. But people going through all of this shows the strength that human-kind can have when human beings share emotions and experiences, which is exactly what Taylor does with her music and performances.
When Taylor Swift entered the public view, she changed the course of not only the music industry, but the world as a whole. Her natural and relatable personality, her thought-provoking songs, and the showmanship she exhibits on her tours her is something to be applauded, regardless of whether you view her in a positive or negative way. Moreover, the fact that she performed each of her 149 shows across 5 continents with her entire heart and energy AND performed for 3 hours non stop each time? That is something that will be remembered across eras.
