It’s official, I’m back on the Blondie train.
The Eras Tour film premiered this past weekend and despite my best efforts to ignore it, I somehow found myself seated in anticipation on opening night. The main reason why I was hesitant to attend is because Swifties were all over social media stating that they’d be treating the movie like a concert and honestly, that sounds like my biggest nightmare. Thankfully, my particular theater was tame in comparison to what I saw on some TikToks.
You + Me & Chisme has a complicated relationship with Taylor Swift and though we’ve always been quick to criticize her, we must still celebrate the talent that she is. The Eras Tour was a phenomenon and now the movie is bringing the show to everyone who wasn’t lucky enough to win the Ticketmaster raffle. A tour that encompassed her entire music career sounded like a large feat, at the end of the day we are talking about a 19-year career that has produced 10 albums and 3 re-recorded albums. Yet, Taylor Swift found a way to celebrate every significant musical moment in her life on a tour that made history.
She’s a pop star, she’s a songwriter, she’s a director but more importantly, she’s a storyteller and never has that been more evident than while watching this concert. I have attended and written about many shows, so I know a good show when I see one and Taylor Swift put on a good show. Concerts can be such an exhilarating experience, the energy in those rooms can often feel cathartic and somehow Taylor Swift and Director Sam Wrench found a way to capture all of that energy into the film. There’s no way that you’d be able to notice every nuance while attending the show in person, the film allows all of the little moments to exist under a magnifying glass. The great moments were immense throughout the film, but my personal favorite had to be the performance of “Tolerate It”. With the help of her dancer, Raphael Thomas they both created a heartbreaking story right in front of our eyes.
Taylor Swift created an immersive experience of her career with this tour. Each song blended perfectly into the next, with each era being aptly represented by the songs that she chose to perform. It’s easy to dismiss Taylor Swift as another silly little pop star, but you really have to see the magnitude of her stage on the tour to realize that only an artist of epic proportions would be able to command it the way that she does. Even when alone on that stage does she make the entire room shake with energy and that deserves the respect that the general audience has refused to give her throughout her career. You can no longer deny her talent and impact, there’s no way to diminish an opening weekend of almost 130 million.
I recently watched an interview that Taylor Swift did when she was 22, Katie Couric asks her what she sees herself doing in 10 years and Taylor responds that she just hopes that in 10 years people haven’t gotten tired of her yet. 10 years have passed since that interview, Taylor is at the height of her career and there’s no indication that her massive fanbase will be getting tired of her any time soon. I, for one, can’t wait to see what the next era brings.
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