Review: "Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour (2023)"
Mother's Eras Tour
By Kate Gaspa, Staff Writer
November 8, 2023
An outstanding experience is going on for fans all around the world at AMC theaters near you. The Taylor Swift concert film is the best thing you will ever see. The movie came out on Friday, October 13. The 13th is a monumental date for Taylor since 13 is her favorite number and everything she does is calculated.
Swift self-directed the movie with the help of her backup dancers and everyone involved in the tour. The film costs 20 dollars for tickets and 20 dollars for the popcorn, drink, and candy combo that fans are picking up right and left. The collectible popcorn bucket and drink cup are selling out worldwide with fans fighting to get one.
In the song "You're On Your Own Kid," Taylor sings, “So make the friendship bracelets / take the moment and taste it”, as her fans heard this, they went crazy and made over 1 million bracelets for the concert and the concert film itself. If you see a Swiftie you can almost guarantee they will have friendship bracelets to trade!
The movie is a 2-hour and 49-minute amazing experience. It's like you are on stage with Taylor while she is performing the concert. The start of the movie is exactly the same as the concert. The clock pops up with 10 seconds on the clock and the crowd goes wild. The countdown starts and the dancers come out with their fans to cover Taylor so she can pop up, and begin her first song. The singer sings for 17 years of her music and her 10 albums “eras.”
The clock countdown till Taylor is on stage. Kate Gaspa / The Mustang Gazette
The concert starts with the Lover Era. Swift pops up singing “Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince.” As she rises to the top of her platform on stage, the camera zooms in on her for the fans to see her up close. She is alone on stage for the first two songs “Miss Americana” and “Cruel Summer.” She stops to quickly ask the fans to scream the most known bridge she has ever written, the "Cruel Summer" bridge. After the crowd goes feral to "Cruel Summer" she sings “The Man” with her amazing backup dancers as well as “You Need to Calm Down”.
Swift then walks up to the mic in the middle of the stage to sing “Lover.” Before she sings, she welcomes the fans to 17 years of music and thanks them for always being there for her. She then introduces herself to the crowd as if we don't know who she is. After she finishes talking, she starts singing the soulful song that went viral in 2019 and was a staple throughout the COVID-19 years. That's the end of the amazing Lover set as she dives down under the stage to quickly change into her Fearless outfit.
Following the Lover era comes Fearless. Swift comes out with her sparkling gold dress as she dances whilst playing the guitar. She starts off with the Fearless set playing her hit song “Fearless.”
She dances with her band members throughout the set as well as gets the crowd up and on their feet when she plays her absolute banger "You Belong With Me," Fearless is the most nostalgic album one could ever listen to.
It takes us all the way back to little high school Taylor talking about her crushes.
She ends this spectacular set with her hit song “Love Story" talking about the Shakespeare play Romeo and Juliet. She references her first heartbreak that almost every girl can relate to in this song.
Fearless gets followed up by evermore. Now this album came out in 2021 during the COVID years. This album is gut-wrenching and brings up so many emotions that fans try to hide deep down. I witnessed girls crying in the audience during this soulful set. In the film, she starts the set off by singing "Willow" and dancing with her cape and dancers.
Next, Swift takes off her cape and sings one of the saddest songs you will ever hear from Taylor. She sings a song called "Marjorie" named after her grandmother who passed away. It talks about how she wished she spent more time with her grandma and wished she asked more questions about her grandma's life. It makes everyone shed a tear anytime they hear it.
She then makes her way over to the piano and sings and plays her song called "Champagne Problems" with the audience screaming the lyrics back at her as everyone can relate to this song. Some people will say that this is one of Taylor's most relatable albums along with "Fearless".
To conclude this amazing set she has performed she sings "Tolerate It" while sitting at a table with one of her dancers playing her boyfriend. This song is painfully relatable talking about how the man or woman in your life only tolerates all the good things that you do for them and the effort that you put in is wasted.
Next comes her comeback album "Reputation." If you're not sure about the backstory with "Reputation" let me fill you in.
Kim Kardashian and Kanye West taped a phone call with Swift without her consent and edited a voice recording of her to make it look like she was lying about not approving of West talking about her in his song "Famous."
She left social media after this because of all the hate she was receiving. But fans quickly realized it was all a lie and Taylor didn't lie about the voice recording. She came out with this banger of an album that we call her comeback album. She starts this snake-filled set with the first song on the album, "Ready for It." Following "Ready for It" she sings "Delicate" and the crowd chants 1,2,3, Let's go B***h at Swift and screams this song back at her. "Don't Blame Me" comes on next and the crowd erupts when Taylor gets raised on the platform and hits the perfect high note. Finally, Swift sings "Look What You Made Me Do" and has all of her different eras on stage. After this electric set, she runs off stage to change into her gorgeous "Speak Now" dress.
Reputation is followed by her classic album "Speak Now". She comes out in the gorgeous flowy ruffled purple dress as the theme of the album is purple. She sings the hit song "Enchanted" talking about how life is sparkling and begging her crush not to be in love with someone else.
As a teen myself, I can heavily relate to this song and begging in your mind for your crush not to be in love with someone else. This set is a one-song set making this her shortest set in the movie and in the real-life concert if you haven't been. Taylor then walks off the stage to change into her Red album.
After the nostalgic album "Speak Now" Taylor performs her hit album "Red". She comes out in her classic outfit with her shirt saying “a lot going on at the moment”. She sings her hit song 22 and at the end she walks down to the very end of the stage and gives one of her fans at the concert her 22 hat. Every concert a different fan gets the hat and at the concert they filmed Kobe Bryant's little daughter getting the classic 22 hat.
Then she starts to sing her hit song "We are Never Getting Back Together" talking about her ex who broke up with her because he wanted space but realized he needs and misses her. She comes to life in this song. "I Knew You Were Trouble" talking about an ex of hers that she knew was bad news but still made the decision to date him and he left her in the dust like he does to all the girls before her.
She then asks the crowd if they have time for one more song in the Red set and asks if they can spare about 10 minutes for this song. She starts to play on the guitar "All Too Well (the 10 minute version)". The crowd was screaming this song at Taylor as she knows this was the song we begged for her to release for years and years. That concludes the Red set when she finishes singing "All Too Well".
Continuing the concert comes "Folklore". Taylor came out on the roof of her folklore cabin that she created during COVID brought as one of the amazing sets she has on the tour. She starts by singing the one and has a world famous note change that can make the hair on your neck stand straight up. After she plays the one she grabs her guitar and starts singing "betty" which is a song about a high school love triangle. As the guy realizes he lost the love of his life he tries to get her back and apologize.
She then sings her song about "the last great American dynasty" which is talking about her Newport, Rhode Island house she bought back in 2012. Her dancers are dressed in old Victorian dresses dancing around the stage.
Next comes her hit song "august" which is in many movies and hit TV shows. She runs across the stage half-way through her bridge. She switches up from a happier song to her most gut-wrenching sad bridge of her song "illicit affairs" which everyone can relate to. She sings "my tears ricochet" which is another song that everyone can scream to. She ends this beautiful set with her #1 song "cardigan".
After folklore comes the hit album 1989 She comes up on stage wearing the cutest two piece set singing her hit song "Style." She then takes us all the way back to 2015 when she was on tour for this album with her "Blank Space" performance and smashes the car on stage. She hits us with her killer dance moves and then sings her happiest upbeat song "Shake It Off" talking about if someone hates on you then you should shake it off and be better. She then sings "Bad Blood" to conclude her 1989 set. Everyone is screaming the chant for "Bad Blood" which is “you forgive you forget but you never let it go” sung by Kendrick Lamar who is featured on this track.
Following 1989 is the acoustic surprise song set that everyone loves and looks forward to. She comes out in a gorgeous dress and grabs her guitar.She thanks her fans for always being there for her and tells us that she is going to play a classic. She starts to play a classic song called "Our Song" from her very first album she ever made. After the acoustic song on the guitar she walks over to her piano covered in flowers and starts singing her song "You're On Your Own Kid" while she's singing this song the crowd erupts. This song is so sad but it's so good.
The last album is her latest album "Midnights" to conclude the best 2 hours and 49 minutes of your life. She starts this set off with purple clouds that her dancers are pushing around on stage. She then pops up on stage and starts singing lavender haze. She dances around the stage in a glitter shirt and fluffy purple coat. At the end of this song she takes off the coat and transitions into anti hero. She sings anti-hero and during the song she shows the crowd her garter she has on while singing the lyrics ``everyone is a sexy baby”.
She transitions beautifly from Anti-hero into her song midnight rain where her dancers come on stage in dark blue glitters bodysuits and umbrellas. She moves from that onto her song "Vigilante Shit" where she does a dance with her dancers with chairs which was called this year's sexiest taylor dance. She stays on the chair finishing the song and then you hear the jingles of a happy song called "Bejeweled". She does her famous dance during the chorus as people in the movie theater get up and do the dance with her. She moves on to one of her serious songs called "Mastermind" which is telling her fans she has a plan for everything and that everything she does is calculated.
To finish this amazing concert she ends the song with "Karma". She has a fringing glitter coat and dances around the stage singing. She concludes the show by thanking her dancers, band and backup vocals. She thanks her amazing fans and gets dropped down below the stage.