FILE – Taylor Swift performs during “The Eras Tour” in Nashville, Tenn., May 5, 2023. According to Spotify Wrapped, Swift was 2023’s most-streamed artist globally. (AP Photo/George Walker IV, File)
VIENNA (AP) — Organizers of three Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna this week called them off on Wednesday after officials announced arrests over an apparent plot to launch an attack on an event in the Vienna area such as the concerts.
Swift was scheduled to play at the Austrian capital’s Ernst Happel Stadium on Thursday, Friday and Saturday as part of her Eras Tour.
Event organizer Barracuda Music said in a post on its Instagram channel late Wednesday that “we have no choice but to cancel the three scheduled shows for everyone’s safety.” It cited government officials’ “confirmation” of a planned attack at the stadium.
Earlier Wednesday, authorities said they had arrested two suspected extremists, one of whom appeared to be planning an attack on an event in the Vienna area such as the upcoming concerts.
The 19-year-old main suspect was arrested in Ternitz, south of Vienna, and the second person in the Austrian capital.
Franz Ruf, the public security director at Austria’s interior ministry, said that authorities were aware of “preparatory actions” for a possible attack “and also that there is a focus by the 19-year-old perpetrator on the Taylor Swift concerts in Vienna,” the Austria Press Agency reported.
Ruf said the 19-year-old had pledged an oath of allegiance to the Islamic State group.
The Austrian citizen is believed to have become radicalized on the internet. Ruf said that chemical substances were secured and were being evaluated. He didn’t give more details.
The cancelation came hours after authorities said security measures for the Swift concerts would be stepped up. Ruf said that there would be a special focus among other things on entry checks and concertgoers should plan a bit more time.
Vienna police chief Gerhard Pürstl said at the same time that, while any concrete danger had been minimized, an abstract risk justified raising security.
Barracuda Music said that “all tickets will be automatically refunded within the next 10 business days.”
Millie Bobby Brown, best known for her role in Stranger Things, opened up about her love for Taylor Swift during an appearance on The Kelly Clarkson Show. The young actress revealed the extent of her fandom, saying, “I am like hardcore. Like, I know exactly where she is at all times kind of thing.”
This statement was made in response to host Kelly Clarkson’s playful remark that “some might call that a stalker,” to which Brown joked, “It’s like loosely based.”
Brown’s feelings for Taylor Swift go beyond casual admiration. She described her experience on Swift’s Eras Tour as “the most amazing experience.” Brown shared her connection with other Swift fans, saying, “The fans there are the same as me. We love her that much.”
Brown’s love for Taylor Swift is meticulous. She and her sister keep a detailed list of every surprise song Swift performs during her tour dates as per PEOPLE. She said they have a board, she and her sister like to cross out the songs that Swift has done so they know which songs are left. This system allows them to anticipate what she’s going to do next.
Brown stated her own experience on the Eras Tour, saying that when she went to her show in Ohio, she flew there solely for Taylor, and when she played Evermore, Brown collapsed on the ground. She added that it was quite crazy, but it was an incredible experience.
Taylor Swift’s influence on Brown extends into her personal life as well. Brown, who turned 20 in February, referred to this milestone as the beginning of a “new era,” which was inspired by Swift. This sentiment reflects the profound impact Swift’s music and persona have had on Brown’s perspective and personal growth.
Brown’s admiration for Swift is also evident in pivotal moments in her life. When she announced her engagement to Jake Bongiovi on Instagram in April 2023, she used lyrics from Swift’s song Lover as a caption. “I’ve loved you three summers now, honey. I want ’em all 🤍,” she wrote, alongside a photo of her and Bongiovi on the beach. Swift’s approval was clear; she liked the post.
Months later, Brown continued to express her love for Swift in a lighthearted way. She posted selfies wearing a T-shirt saying, “I’m in love with a married woman…My wife!” The photos also included a phone case with lyrics from Swift’s song Anti-Hero that read, “It’s me, hi, I’m the problem, it’s me.”
Millie Bobby Brown, best known for her role as Eleven in Stranger Things, has made significant progress in her acting career. She made her TV debut in Once Upon a Time in Wonderland in 2013 and later appeared in Intruders in 2014. Brown’s acclaimed performance in Stranger Things earned her many award nominations and wins.
She appeared in the films Godzilla: King of the Monsters and its sequel, as well as Enola Holmes and its sequel, which she also produced. Brown also launched her beauty line, Florence by Mills, and released her debut novel, Nineteen Steps, in 2023. She expanded her repertoire with new projects such as Damsel and The Electric State.
How is it already August? As we enter the final month of the summer, we’re gearing up for even more new music to come our way. It’s the month of new albums from stars like Sabrina Carpenter, Post Malone, A$AP Rocky, and more…which means singles will be left and right.
But that’s not all, we’re shifting into the fall releases for new music…and fans are speculating that a certain Taylor Swift will re-release Reputation (Taylor’s Version) very soon. So, there’s a lot to look forward to with the quickest summer ever coming to an end.
And while we’re still in the middle of a heat wave, I’m looking forward to heading to the beach and getting some much-needed vitamin D…but that means I’m going to need a good playlist filled with new music released this week. Luckily for everyone involved, I create a weekly playlist filled with just that!
I find the best of the best when it comes to new songs. I listen to new albums, read through every press release, and search every Spotify playlist for what’s actually worth listening to. Plus, the playlists aren’t terribly lengthy…so it’s a really manageable listen too!
We’ve already wasted enough time here, so I want to get to the point. To enjoy a nice weekend, you need a weekend playlist. Let’s get listening!
Charli XCX, Billie Eilish- “Guess (Remix)”
If there’s one thing for certain, it’s that Charli XCX’s BRAT album inspired our summer. You may have heard about having a BRAT Summer, which includes partying as much as humanly possible and living your life…but Charli isn’t finished teaching us how to be a BRAT. Now, she’s partnered up with an unexpected collab: Billie Eilish.
The remix is sure to be a hit. “Guess” on its own was enough to send Charli into the mainstream, but adding Billie’s flirtatious lyricism to the mix makes it a surefire radio play. It’s both pop and house, which is super timely considering a few popstars are heading to house music. BRAT summer continues, Billie style.
Jessie Murph ft. Teddy Swims- “Dirty”
Two powerhouse vocalists join to create a soulful, cutting breakup anthem about a partner who has cheated on you. It’s every bit as vengeful and catchy as you’d imagine. It fully sums up when you’re done with a partner who’s treated you wrong while showcasing the vocal prowess of Jessie Murph and Teddy Swims.
With two big names in the music industry whose star power continues to grow exponentially, “Dirty” is an exciting development from the pair. Ahead of Jessie Murph’s debut album, this is just the beginning for two rising stars in the industry.
Gryffin- PULSE
With new album, PULSE, Gryffin goes back to his house roots. He gears up with heavy hitter collaborations like John Newman, Rita Ora, Whethan, and more, all while creating catchy dance tracks that fit perfectly with the summer. An album made to be played on the dancefloor while surrounded by friends and music lovers alike, there’s not one song that’s a skip.
PULSE is a great listen for those who need to start a pregame off the right way. With lots of synths, great beat drops, and strong lyricism, Gryffin continues to blaze his own path in creating pure EDM with his own, fun twist.
Maren Morris- “Intermission”
Maren Morris has a cathartic, lilting voice that carries through her EP, Intermission. Surprisingly honest, a delight to listen to throughout its entirety…Intermission is a loving, honest submission into Morris’ catalogue. She’s impressive, but we already knew that. And that’s what makes her music so easy to listen to. About the EP, Morris states,
“Here’s my heart journey and gamut of emotions packaged into 5 songs. Covering loss, catharsis, sexuality and gratitude, I hope you hear the light coming back to me in them and somewhere perhaps see it mirrored in you.
RUFUS DU SOL- “Lately”
“Lately” is the first track from legendary EDM group, RUFUS DU SOL, since 2021 when they released “Music is Better.” Now, three years later, they’re here to remind us what makes them an essential group in music. Their sounds are light, sending you straight to a rooftop in the city somewhere.
A borderline transcendental experience, “Lately” is both calming and upbeat at the same time. Soft in all the right places and explosive in others. If you needed a lesson on how the band can create magic in a song, listen to “Lately.”
Carlita, SG Lewis- “The Moment”
Carlita is on the verge of her big moment. With her debut album coming in November, Sentimental, and a subsequent leading single with SG Lewis to showcase it, there’s no stopping her. “The Moment” is a thrill from the very start, combining every little skill Carlita has learned along the way of her already illustrious career with SG Lewis’ ability to make any song a hit.
If this gives us a taste of the new album, then we’re in good hands. “The Moment” is everything we’ve been wanting in a song so far.
David Guetta, AFROJACK- “Raving”
Two titans in the industry: David Guetta and AFROJACK have united to release their highly anticipated new single, “Raving.” The song title is a little self-explanatory, but it makes you want to go rave. It’s fun, and specifically in time for BRAT Summer. We’re loving the hard house music lately, and this track is made by some of the best in the EDM industry.
“Raving” is what we needed to close out the summer: an electric single that gets you moving. It’s a fun track that just keeps getting better as time goes on.
Sonny Fodera, Jazzy, D.O.D- “Somedays”
Sonny Fodera has already made many hits, but this song proves he can do it time and time again. It’s no shock that his production is borderline seamless and his collaborative efforts are always a success. “Somedays” is no different. It’s fun-filled and captivating, replay worthy even.
Alongside Jazzy and D.O.D, Sonny Fodera pairs vocal talent with bass-heavy beats. A summer anthem without a doubt, “Somedays” will be a great addition to any playlist.
LONDON — Police investigating the deadly attack on a children’s music event in a seaside town of Southport, United Kingdom, said they would interview the 17-year-old suspect as they searched for a motive.
“The investigation is in its early stages and the motivation for the incident remains unclear,” Merseyside Police Chief Constable Serena Kennedy said on Monday.
Officers responded just before noon local time to reports of a stabbing at a property on Hart Street in Southport, a seaside town about 20 miles north of Liverpool, according to Merseyside Police.
Three children were killed and nine others were injured in a stabbing attack at an event at a dance school in the seaside town, police said. Five of the wounded children were in critical condition, along with two adults, who were also stabbed, police said.
Alice Dasilva Aguiar, 9, died early Tuesday from her injuries, and Elsie Dot Stancombe, 7, and Bebe King, 6, died Monday, police said.
“Keep smiling and dancing like you love to do our princess,” Aguiar’s parents said in a statement released by police. “Like we said before to you, you’re always our princess and no one would change that.”
King’s family said no words could describe their devastation at the loss “of our little girl Bebe.”
“We believe that the adults who were injured were bravely trying to protect the children who were being attacked,” Kennedy said Monday.
The children had been attending a Taylor Swift-themed event, police said.
The “horror” of the attack was “washing over me continuously,” Swift said in a post on Instagram. She said she was “completely in shock.”
“The loss of life and innocence, and the horrendous trauma inflicted on everyone who was there, the families and first responders,” she said. These were just little kids at a dance class. I am at a complete loss for how to even convey my sympathies to these families.”
A 17-year-old boy from Banks, a coastal village in Lancashire, just outside Southport, was arrested on suspicion of murder and attempted murder, police said.
The suspect, whose name was not released, was born in Cardiff, Wales, police said.
The “full circumstances” were still being investigated, she said, adding that the attack wasn’t being investigated as a terror-related. Police were not searching for additional suspects, they said.
A group of Swift’s U.K. fans calling themselves “Swifties for Southport” launched an online fundraiser to help families of the victims. It raised over 100,000 pounds ($128,000) within 24 hours.
Britain’s worst attack on children occurred in 1996, when 43-year-old Thomas Hamilton shot 16 kindergartners and their teacher dead in a school gymnasium in Dunblane, Scotland. The U.K. subsequently banned the private ownership of almost all handguns.
In less than a week, Swifties have turned their community into an online election headquarters for US vice president Kamala Harris—and the campaign wants in on the effort.
After President Joe Biden announced that he would not seek reelection last week, Emerald Medrano, 22, flipped on the news. As he watched pundits yap about the Democratic ticket, he felt he had to do something. He had never been politically involved, but he had a popular Swift stan account. Not sure of what to do, he posted on X: “I feel like us U.S. swifties should mass organize and help campaign for Kamala Harris and spread how horrendous project 2025 would be to help get people’s butts down the polls.”
The response was immediate and overwhelming. Medrano received hundreds of replies and direct messages from other Swifties offering their support, largely motivated by civil rights, trans rights, and reproductive health care. Some had a background in politics. Others operated massive Swift stan accounts or worked in social media professionally. The fandom served as a social lubricant for the politically-curious Swiftie to get involved and leverage the skills they learned in the community for electoral means.
“The shared interest and knowledge of the fandom is definitely a really great way to bridge that connection over to civic engagement and political activism,” Madeline Miner, 22, a Swifties-for-Kamala social media coordinator, tells WIRED.
Since Medrano’s tweet, Swifties for Kamala has grown to more than 300 members, with thousands more applying to join their Discord server. The group has grown so quickly that it’s already undergone three “restructurings.” Now, it has more than 80,000 followers on TikTok, 48,000 on X, 16,000 on Instagram, and a Substack titled “Paint the Town Blue,” in reference to a Swift lyric. (Other pro-Harris Swiftie accounts have cropped up over the past week, but Swifties for Kamala is the largest.)
The group has four teams: communications, finance, outreach, and social. For social, the teams are assigned to platforms, each with its own lead. Rohan Reagan, 21, who already ran a successful Swiftie account on Instagram, leads the group’s efforts there. For years, Reagan was posting edits he made of Swift; now he’s making them of Harris.
“The reels, the posts, all of those are either created by me or I outsource it from someone else,” Reagan said. “We have a post online on the page right now that someone just did on their own and created all the research infographics on their own. So they brought it to me. I fixed it up a bit, and then posted.”
Before Reagan or any other social lead could create the edits, Leigh Bauer, 23, a social media coordinator, started building out the brand and voice of the account. Bauer drew inspiration from the fandom—specifically the official Swift fan account, @taylornation13, on X.
“They have this very distinct voice that shares news and updates and tells us when merch is happening and when albums are coming out and whatnot. But they also are really, really great about engaging with fans online,” Bauer said. “And so wanting to go off of that to continue to be another familiar voice that fans will understand … but also being a respectable voice.”
Taylor Swift issued a statement on Instagram Tuesday expressing her “horror” and “shock” after three children died following a mass stabbing Monday at a Swift-themed dance and yoga class in Southport, England. Several other children are injured or in critical condition after the attack, as well as two adults.
“The horror of yesterday’s attack in Southport is washing over me continuously, and I’m just completely in shock…” Swift wrote on her Instagram Stories Tuesday. “The loss of life and innocence, and the horrendous trauma inflicted on everyone who was there, the families, and first responders. These were just little kids at a dance class. I am at a complete loss for how to ever convey my sympathies to these families.”
According to Merseyside Police, the law enforcement responsible for the seaside town of Southport, a 17-year-old male suspect has been arrested after allegedly walking into a two-hour Taylor Swift Dance and Yoga workshop for elementary-aged kids with a knife and stabbing several attendees. Three girls, ages 6, 7, and 9 years old, have died as a result of their injuries, police confirmed.
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Signed “W&C,” the Waleses wrote, “As parents, we cannot begin to imagine what the families, friends and loved ones of those killed and injured in Southport today are going through.”
“We send our love, thoughts and prayers to all those involved in this horrid and heinous attack,” they continued. “Thank you also to the emergency responders who, despite being met with the most horrific scenes, demonstrated compassion and professionalism when your community needed you most.”
Swift continues on the European leg of her long-running Eras Tour, and will return to London for a second series of shows at Wembley Stadium in mid-August.
A representative for Taylor Swift did not immediately respond to Vanity Fair’s request for comment.
A stabbing attack at a Taylor Swift-themed dance and yoga class in England has claimed the life of another child after a nine-year-old girl died from her injuries Tuesday, bringing the death toll up to three.
Eight other children and two adults are still in the hospital, with several of them in critical condition. The two other children who died were girls ages six and seven, Merseyside Police said.
U.K. stabbing: 3rd girl dies following rampage, victims are identified
Police are questioning a 17-year-old suspect who was arrested minutes after the Monday attack in Southport.
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Taylor Swift wrote in an Instagram story Tuesday that she was “completely in shock” at the “horror of yesterday’s attack.”
“These were just little kids at a dance class. I am at a complete loss for how to ever convey my sympathies to these families,” she wrote.
Screengrab of an Instagram story posted by Taylor Swift, expressing her sympathies for the victims of the Southport stabbing attack on Monday that claimed the lives of three children.
Instagram/taylorswift
Witnesses described scenes “from a horror movie” as bloodied children ran from the attack just before noon on Monday.
“They were in the road, running from the nursery,” said Bare Varathan, who owns a shop nearby. “They had been stabbed, here, here, here, everywhere,” he said, indicating the neck, back and chest.
Jonathan Hayes, a local businessman, was stabbed in the leg after he heard screams from his office and ran into the dance studio to protect the children, the Telegraph reports.
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“Our office is in the same building as the dance studio. He heard screams and went outside, saw the attacker, saw that he had hurt a child and tried to take the knife off him and got stabbed in the leg,” Haye’s wife Helen told the paper.
“He’s very upset that he wasn’t able to be more help. Physically he will be OK, mentally I don’t know,” she added.
A person leaves flowers near the scene in Hart Street, Southport, Britain, on Tuesday. Three children died and nine were injured in a ‘ferocious’ knife attack during a Taylor Swift event at a dance school on Monday.
James Speakman/PA via AP
Shortly after the attack, police arrested a suspect on suspicion of murder and attempted murder and seized a knife. Police said he was born in Cardiff, Wales, and had lived for years in a village about five kilometres from Southport. He has not yet been charged.
Police said detectives are not treating Monday’s attack as terror-related and they are not looking for any other suspects.
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Local people left flowers and stuffed animals in tribute at a police cordon on the street lined with brick houses in the seaside resort near Liverpool — nicknamed “sunny Southport” — whose beach and pier attract vacationers from across northwest England.
People lay flowers near the scene in Hart Street, Southport, where three children died and eight were injured in a ‘ferocious’ knife attack during a Taylor Swift event at a dance school on Monday.
James Speakman/PA Images via Getty Images
It is the latest shocking attack in a country where a recent rise in knife crime has stoked anxieties and led to calls for the government to do more to clamp down on bladed weapons, which are by far the most commonly used instruments in U.K. homicides.
Prince William and his wife Catherine said Monday that “as parents, we cannot begin to imagine what the families, friends and loved ones of those killed and injured in Southport today are going through.”
As parents, we cannot begin to imagine what the families, friends and loved ones of those killed and injured in Southport today are going through.
We send our love, thoughts and prayers to all those involved in this horrid and heinous attack.
Thank you also to the emergency…
— The Prince and Princess of Wales (@KensingtonRoyal) July 29, 2024
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Colin Parry, who owns a nearby auto body shop, told The Guardian that the suspect arrived by taxi.
“He came down our driveway in a taxi and didn’t pay for the taxi, so I confronted him at that point,” Parry was quoted as saying. “He was quite aggressive, he said, ‘What are you gonna do about it?’”
Parry said most of the victims appeared to be young girls.
“The mothers are coming here now and screaming,” Parry said. “It is like a scene from a horror movie. … It’s like something from America, not like sunny Southport.”
Police work at the scene in Southport, England, where a man has been detained and a knife has been seized after a number of people were injured in a reported stabbing on Monday.
James Speakman/PA via AP
Britain’s worst attack on children occurred in 1996, when 43-year-old Thomas Hamilton shot 16 kindergarteners and their teacher dead in a school gymnasium in Dunblane, Scotland. The U.K. subsequently banned the private ownership of almost all handguns.
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Mass shootings and killings with firearms are rare in Britain, where knives were used in about 40 per cent of homicides in the year to March 2023.
Although mass stabbings are also rare, several in recent years have generated fear and outrage and received a tremendous amount of attention.
In April, a man with a sword killed a 14-year-old boy walking to school in London and seriously injured four other people, including two police officers.
In Nottingham in central England in June 2022, a paranoid schizophrenic man fatally stabbed two college students walking home from celebrating the end of the school year and then killed a 65-year-old man, stole his van and used it to hit three pedestrians.
In Reading, west of London, in June 2020, a failed Libyan asylum seeker fatally stabbed three men and wounded three others.
— With files from The Associated Press and Reuters
Athletes from around the world are competing in dozens of disciplines among 32 sports. For those watching at home: Do you know what you’re going listening to during commercial breaks, while making snacks, or to distract you in moments where your favorite isn’t doing that hot? We’ve got you, with a cheeky musical guide to each sport — some picks more literal than others.
While this cut from “Lover” was in her Eras Tour set, Swift executed some apt choreography, pulling back an invisible arrow and making this the obvious choice for the bow-wielding sport.
There is something subtly dignified about badminton. It is a classic-feeling racquet sport, and it requires a similarly first-rate song, like this French pop hit.
The hip-hop all-star collaboration “Forever” was on the soundtrack to LeBron James ‘s 2008 “More Than a Game” documentary, making it the perfect basketball track. James has been selected as Team USA’s male flagbearer this year, making it all the more appropriate.
Heavy breathing that bleeds into minimalistic electronica from the progenitors themselves — if that doesn’t make you want to grab a bicycle, nothing will.
Perhaps the word “dressage” isn’t the first one that comes to mind when this banger by the late Keith and the great Nelson plays, but “horses” certainly does.
This instantly recognizable postwar ballad is all about moving forward unapologetically. In the case of handball at the Olympics, a sport that has been lately dominated by France, this song takes on a different meaning. Don’t look at those past accomplishments; push forward to the next.
It might not be particularly imaginative, but nothing says “combat sport” quite like “Ain’t No Problems” from Waka Flocka Flame, Young Thug and Judo. Get it?
The modern pentathlon semifinals and finals will take place at the Palace of Versailles this year, inspiring this pick from the Swedish power metal band.
Sailing is a vintage sport, and no voice takes a listener back to a certain time than Holiday’s swinging tone. Across this 1937 song, Holiday is in full force, weaving interesting phrasing and tempos.
SHOOTING: “Get Low,” Lil Jon & The East Side Boyz featuring Ying Yang Twins
In film, shooting is often depicted by athletes getting low on the ground to shoot — see what we did there? The reality is a bit more complicated, but the sentiment still stands.
Before becoming a celebrated voice in Latin trap and reggaetón, Carrión was a competitive swimmer, even representing his native Puerto Rico at the 2010 Central American and Caribbean Games.
The visual for this one-time K-pop bop shows the girl group getting very serious about table tennis. The song has all the ebullience of the sport, too.
With the Olympics taking on special significance for the athletes representing the Palestinian territories this year, the energetic techno track from one of the most exciting Palestinian DJs goes to taekwondo, in honor of competitor Omar Ismail. Ismail is the lone Palestinian athlete to qualify in his own right for the Games, although others got in through a wild-card system.
When all else fails, this bombastic rock hit delivers. The band wrote the song’s chord changes to mirror punches in “Rocky III.” That might make it seem better suited for boxing, but truth be told, this classic works even better for triathlon. The song is all about endurance — just like the sport.
Three years ago, N’Gapeth helped France win gold at the Tokyo Olympics. He’s competing once again this year, and also happens to be a very talented rapper.
The fittingly named London indie rock band of yesteryear were once masters at articulating the scars of youth. And adolescence often feels like an internal wrestling match.
Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
Virality, it could be assumed, is a gift and a curse.
Hit big online and channel that momentum into mainstream appeal, then the work comes: How does an artist sustain success? Ice Spice, the laidback Bronx rapper born Isis Naija Gaston with the too-cool-for-school, lackadaisical flow and the bright orange curls now iron straight, knows a thing or two about the topic. First came the raunchy “Munch (Feelin’ U),” with its delightful dismissal of “You thought I was feeling you?” (the song inspired the name of her fanbase, who are called Munchkins). Then there was the effortless, SpongeBob SquarePants-referencing “Bikini Bottom.”
Her 2023 debut EP, “Like..?,” produced by her longtime collaborator RiotUSA, only further confirmed her talents; “Boy’s a Liar, Pt. 2” with U.K. hyperpop-garage producer-artist PinkPantheress became the song of the summer. Hell, even Taylor Swift tapped her for a remix of her hit “Karma.” Ice Spice, in two short years, has become a four-time Grammy nominee — and one of the most divisive names in mainstream rap — before she even released an album.
“Y2K!” is Ice Spice’s first full-length project, but don’t expect an introduction. (The title functions in that way, sort of: Ice Spice was born on Jan. 1, 2000, perhaps emblematic of her aesthetic ideology and prescience for her future, social media-indebted success. It is hard to think of another MC that better encapsulates the current moment.) At the core of “Y2K!” are her immediately quotable — and let’s be honest here, meme-able — booty-shaking bars, ripe for internet consumption. And so are the cheeky hooks that made her household name.
A few songs directly recall the Ice Spice listeners have grown to know: Like “Think U the S—- (Fart),” which leans into her characteristic playfulness while maintaining her necessary bravado. “Think you the s—-?” Ice Spice recites in the chorus. “You not even the fart.” Or “Gimme A Light,” which samples Sean Paul’s dancehall classic “Gimme the Light.”
Across the release’s 23-minute run time, drill is still a priority, as she mentions on “Gimme A Light”: “Let’s talk drill / Who bigger than she?” she posits. Brevity is also a strong suit of Ice Spice’s — she understands modern attention spans and she cuts the fat across the album.
Previously released single “Phat Butt” might’ve been the clearest tease of some new sonic explorations in the world of Ice Spice, still one indebted to Nicki Minaj. She launches into a quick nod to Minaj’s “Beez in the Trap” in the intro (“Uh, Man”) and works in a sample of the 2005 hit “I Think They Like Me” by rap group Dem Franchize Boyz with Jermaine Dupri, Da Brat and Bow Wow. Closer “TTYL” sees Ice Spice raising her voice for a rare rap-rock kiss-off. Standout “BB Belt” is bed-squeaking Jersey Club.
The 10-track release uses collaborations sparingly: the self-referential, trap “Oh Shhh…” with Travis Scott, nods back to “Deli” in certain lyrics, the hard-hitting “Bitch I’m Packin’” with Gunna, and the infidelity-revenge anthem “Did It First,” brings the hottest contemporary rapper, Central Cee.
Across “Y2K!”, Ice Spice flexes her lackadaisical flow and traverses new territory, pushing her voice in subtle moments — if only there were more. If anything, this is the New York rapper further manicuring her distinctiveness, offering listeners a hot, short and sweet album.
LONDON (AP) — Meta’s policies on non-consensual deepfake images need updating, including wording that’s “not sufficiently clear,” the company’s oversight panel said Thursday in a decision on cases involving AI-generated explicit depictions of two famous women.
The quasi-independent Oversight Board said in one of the cases, the social media giant failed to take down the deepfake intimate image of a famous Indian woman, whom it didn’t identify, until the company’s review board got involved.
Deepake nude images of women and celebrities including Taylor Swift have proliferated on social media because the technology used to make them has become more accessible and easier to use. Online platforms have been facing pressure to do more to tackle the problem.
The board, which Meta set up in 2020 to serve as a referee for content on its platforms including Facebook and Instagram, has spent months reviewing the two cases involving AI-generated images depicting famous women, one Indian and one American. The board did not identify either woman, describing each only as a “female public figure.”
Meta said it welcomed the board’s recommendations and is reviewing them.
One case involved an “AI-manipulated image” posted on Instagram depicting a nude Indian woman shown from the back with her face visible, resembling a “female public figure.” The board said a user reported the image as pornography but the report wasn’t reviewed within a 48 hour deadline so it was automatically closed. The user filed an appeal to Meta, but that was also automatically closed.
It wasn’t until the user appealed to the Oversight Board that Meta decided that its original decision not to take the post down was made in error.
Meta also disabled the account that posted the images and added them to a database used to automatically detect and remove images that violate its rules.
In the second case, an AI-generated image depicting the American women nude and being groped were posted to a Facebook group. They were automatically removed because they were already in the database. A user appealed the takedown to the board, but it upheld Meta’s decision.
The board said both images violated Meta’s ban on “derogatory sexualized photoshop” under its bullying and harassment policy.
However it added that its policy wording wasn’t clear to users and recommended replacing the word “derogatory” with a different term like “non-consensual” and specifying that the rule covers a broad range of editing and media manipulation techniques that go beyond “photoshop.”
Deepfake nude images should also fall under community standards on “adult sexual exploitation” instead of “bullying and harassment,” it said.
When the board questioned Meta about why the Indian woman was not already in its image database, it was alarmed by the company’s response that it relied on media reports.
“This is worrying because many victims of deepfake intimate images are not in the public eye and are forced to either accept the spread of their non-consensual depictions or search for and report every instance,” the board said.
The board also said it was concerned about Meta’s “auto-closing” of appeals image-based sexual abuse after 48 hours, saying it “could have a significant human rights impact.”
Meta, then called Facebook, launched the Oversight Board in 2020 in response to criticism that it wasn’t moving fast enough to remove misinformation, hate speech and influence campaigns from its platforms. The board has 21 members, a multinational group that includes legal scholars, human rights experts and journalists.
Taylor Swift’s political leanings have been a topic of debate for many years now (Swift herself released a whole documentary about it). The Tortured Poets Department singer has a long history with Donald Trump, who practically begged her not to endorse his 2024 opponent. And a troubling number of Americans believed an unhinged conspiracy theory about Swift and Joe Biden rigging the Super Bowl in favor of her boyfriend Travis Kelce’s Kansas City Chiefs.
So what’s really going on here? Has Taylor Swift actually endorsed a candidate in the 2024 presidential election? What’s her relationship with Trump and likely Democratic nominee Kamala Harris? Could Swifties really decide the election, as some pundits have suggested? Here’s a guide to Swift’s stance on the 2024 election, which we’ll keep updated and packed with Easter eggs that will tell you the Reputation (Taylor’s Version) release date (just kidding).
No. Biden stepped aside and endorsed his vice president Kamala Harris before the pop star announced her preferred candidate in the 2024 election.
Probably! Swift endorsed the Biden-Harris ticket in 2020, so it seems likely that she’ll voice her support for the Democratic nominee once again.
Swift made her first public presidential endorsement about a month before the 2020 election, announcing her support for the Biden-Harris ticket with this tweet, featuring a batch of campaign logo cookies:
The change we need most is to elect a president who recognizes that people of color deserve to feel safe and represented, that women deserve the right to choose what happens to their bodies, and that the LGBTQIA+ community deserves to be acknowledged and included. Everyone deserves a government that takes global health risks seriously and puts the lives of its people first. The only way we can begin to make things better is to choose leaders who are willing to face these issues and find ways to work through them.
I will proudly vote for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris in this year’s presidential election. Under their leadership, I believe America has a chance to start the healing process it so desperately needs.
If Swift follows her precedent from 2020, she might make a Harris endorsement about a month before the election, while she’s on a break from The Eras Tour. The European leg of her tour runs from May 9 to August 20, followed by a ten-week break. The Democratic National Convention is August 19 to 22. Election Day is November 5, and Swift’s tour resumes in Canada the following week.
In recent years, Swift has periodically encouraged her social-media followers to vote. After she posted an Instagram message about registering to vote in September 2023, the nonpartisan nonprofit Vote.org recorded 35,252 new registrations on National Voter Registration Day, a 23 percent increase over the previous year.
On March 5, 2024 she encouraged her supporters to vote on Super Tuesday, but she didn’t back any specific candidates.
After confusing Swift for Britney Spears during his 2023 turkey pardon, Biden made clear this year that he does in fact know who she is, and would appreciate another endorsement.
In February 2024, Biden joked several times about working with Swift to rig the Super Bowl for the Kansas City Chiefs. He referenced the baseless conspiracy theory — which nearly one in five Americans believe — in his first TikTok and this post-game social-media post:
When Seth Meyers asked the president to “confirm or deny” that there is an “active conspiracy” between him and Swift a short time later, the president answered, “It’s classified.” He repeated the line when asked if she might endorse him again in 2024.
While Biden has tried to play it cool in public, in January the New York Timesreported that his campaign desperately wants Swift to get involved in the 2024 race:
… The biggest and most influential endorsement target is Ms. Swift … Fund-raising appeals from Ms. Swift could be worth millions of dollars for Mr. Biden.
Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, a top Biden surrogate, all but begged Ms. Swift to become more involved in Mr. Biden’s campaign when he spoke to reporters after a Republican primary debate in September.
“Taylor Swift stands tall and unique,” he said. “What she was able to accomplish just in getting young people activated to consider that they have a voice and that they should have a choice in the next election, I think, is profoundly powerful.”
The chatter around Ms. Swift and the potential of reaching her 279 million Instagram followers reached such intensity that the Biden team urged applicants in a job posting for a social media position not to describe their Taylor Swift strategy — the campaign had enough suggestions already. One idea that has been tossed around, a bit in jest: sending the president to a stop on Ms. Swift’s Eras Tour.
She publicly criticized Trump for the first time on June 1, 2019 in an open letter to Tennessee senator Lamar Alexander, urging the Republican to ensure protections for the LGBTQ+ community by passing the Equality Act. She said of then-President Trump:
I personally reject the President’s stance that his administration “supports equal treatment of all,” but that the Equality Act, “in its current form is filled with poison pills that threaten to determine parental and conscience rights.” No, one cannot take the position that one supports a community, while condemning it in the next breath as going against “conscience” or “parental rights.” That statement implies that there is something morally wrong with you being anything other than heterosexual or cisgender, which is an incredibly harmful letter to send to a nation full of healthy and loving families with same-sex, non-binary or transgender parents, sons or daughters.
Swift kept her political views to herself until the 2018 midterms, when she spoke out against Tennessee Senate candidate Marsha Blackburn. Swift explained why she’d previously remained silent in her Instagram post opposing Blackburn (who went on to win the election):
In the past I’ve been reluctant to publicly voice my political opinions, but due to several events in my life and in the world in the past two years, I feel very differently about that now. I always have and always will cast my vote based on which candidate will protect and fight for the human rights I believe we all deserve in this country. I believe in the fight for LGBTQ rights, and that any form of discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender is WRONG. I believe that the systemic racism we still see in this country towards people of color is terrifying, sickening and prevalent.
Swift’s decision to endorse two Democrats in the 2018 midterms was a major plot point in her documentary Miss Americana). In the film, per The Daily Beast, she says she regrets not denouncing Trump publicly in 2016:
In Miss Americana, released in 2020, Swift calls Blackburn “Trump in a wig” in footage of conversations leading up to her decision to drop the post. When one of Swift’s entourage warns her that speaking out against the candidate will prompt the press to conclude that she is also condemning Trump, Swift makes her stance clear. “I don’t care if they write that,” she says. “I’m sad I didn’t say it two years ago.”
As the 2020 election grew closer, Swift voiced her support for the Black Lives Matter movement and criticized Trump several times on Twitter. In May 2020 she promised “we will vote you out in November”:
And in August 2020, she accused Trump of trying to sabotage mail-in voting and said his “ineffective leadership” had “gravely worsened” the COVID-19 crisis:
Yes, on more than one occasion. In January 2020 Swift released the song “Only the Young” to accompany the Miss Americana documentary. The lyrics seemed to make reference to Trump winning the 2016 election and other political issues, like school shootings: “You go to class, scared / Wondering where the best hiding spot would be / And the big bad man and his big bad clan / Their hands are stained with red.”
In October 2020, Swift allowed Representative Eric Swalwell’s Remedy PAC to use the song in a pro-Biden ad and got a personal thank you from Kamala Harris:
While Swift’s 2019 song “Miss Americana & the Heartbreak Prince” is less explicitly anti-Trump, she confirmed in a September 2019 Rolling Stone interview that the high-school metaphor in the song is about Trump-era politics:
There are so many influences that go into that particular song. I wrote it a couple of months after midterm elections, and I wanted to take the idea of politics and pick a metaphorical place for that to exist. And so I was thinking about a traditional American high school, where there’s all these kinds of social events that could make someone feel completely alienated. And I think a lot of people in our political landscape are just feeling like we need to huddle up under the bleachers and figure out a plan to make things better.
Trump tweeted about Swift several times during the Red era. He said the Swift-Connor Kennedy breakup was “great news” for her, and called her “terrific.” He also cryptically thanked Swift for the “beautiful picture.” As the Daily Beast notes, “if this tweet implies the existence of a photo of Swift and Trump posing together, it has almost certainly been scrubbed from the internet forever at the hands of Tree Paine, Swift’s formidable publicist.”
Trump mildly rebuked Swift in 2018 after she endorsed the opponent of his preferred Tennessee Senate candidate, Marsha Blackburn, per The Daily Beast:
Shortly afterward at a press conference, Trump smirked that he was “sure Taylor Swift has nothing, or doesn’t know anything about [Blackburn].” Then the infamous quote, later referenced on the Taylor Swift Netflix documentary Miss Americana: “And let’s say that I like Taylor’s music about 25 percent less now, OK?”
Today the ex-president and the pop star are engaged in a popularity contest (in his mind, at least). Rolling Stonereported in January:
Behind the scenes, Trump has reacted to the possibility of Biden and Swift teaming up against him this year not with alarm, but with an instant projection of ego. In recent weeks, the former president has told people in his orbit that no amount of A-list celebrity endorsements will save Biden. Trump has also privately claimed that he is “more popular” than Swift is and that he has more committed fans than she does, a person close to Trump and another source with knowledge of the matter tell Rolling Stone.
Last month, the source close to Trump adds, the ex-president commented to some confidants that it “obviously” made no sense that he was not named Time magazine’s 2023 Person of the Year — an honor that went to none other than Swift in December.
On February 11, Trump made a desperate attempt to steal attention from Kelce and Swift and convince her not to endorse Biden. He posted this on Truth Social hours before the Super Bowl:
Trump has been careful not to criticize Swift in public. In a November 2023 interview conducted for the forthcoming book Apprentice in Wonderland: How Donald Trump and Mark Burnett Took America Through the Looking Glass, Trump repeatedly called Swift “beautiful,” and questioned whether she’s actually liberal. Variety published an excerpt from the book on June 10:
Trump, usually one to punch back at critics, is smart enough to know Swift’s fame is on another level. “She’s got a great star quality,” Trump says. “She really does.” Trump is effusive as he uses one of his favorite adjectives to describe women—“beautiful”— several times in a row.
“I think she’s beautiful—very beautiful! I find her very beautiful. I think she’s liberal. She probably doesn’t like Trump. I hear she’s very talented. I think she’s very beautiful, actually—unusually beautiful!” It’s her fame, not her songcraft, that fascinates Trump. When asked about Swift’s music, played so frequently on the radio that it’s inescapable in daily life, he says, “Don’t know it well.”
Beyond Swift’s looks, what intrigues Trump the most is the idea— frequently bandied about online before she endorsed the Democratic Senate candidate in Tennessee in 2018—that she could secretly be supporting him. “But she is liberal, or is that just an act?” he asks me. “She’s legitimately liberal? It’s not an act? It surprises me that a country star can be successful being liberal.”
I tell Trump that Swift is no longer a country star; she’s been making pop music for years. He doesn’t seem aware of this, but he reaches for a different name. “Garth Brooks is liberal. Explain that! How does it happen? But he’s liberal.” Trump trails off. “It’s one of those things . .”
Two weeks later CNN played the audio recording of Trump rambling about Swift’s beauty:
But during a closed door meeting with Republican members of Congress on June 13, Trump reportedly complained about Swift being a Biden supporter:
Could the megastar help boost turnout in the November election, especially among younger voters? That’s what multiple commentators have suggested. But PolitiFact poured cold water on the idea:
… it is misguided to assume that Swift’s potential involvement in the race would be a magic bullet with guaranteed results. Experts say it often takes more than a single message or action for celebrity endorsements to move the needle in elections. And younger people could be particularly hard to sway because they consistently chalk up the lowest turnout rates at the polls. An endorsement would draw attention, but her fans already lean left.
On the other hand, Biden did beat Trump in 2020. And betting against the power of Swifties is usually a bad idea.
Continuing to give listeners a taste of her “Swiftian prowess” on the songwriting front, Gracie Abrams has rolled out the second music video for a single from The Story of Us: “I Love You, I’m Sorry.” Something of a “sequel” to 2020’s “I Miss You, I’m Sorry,” Abrams is only somewhat less doleful on this particular track (which she first previewed on Instagram earlier this year, exactly four years after the release of “I Miss You, I’m Sorry”). Of course, more than apologizing to the object of her affection for hurting him and loving him (even still), she’s ultimately apologizing to herself for being silly enough to do so. But, as another Swiftian acolyte, Selena Gomez, once said, “The heart wants what it wants.” (Mind you, Woody Allen said this before her…about Soon-Yi Previn—and yes, Allen does seem like someone who would co-star in Only Murders in the Building with Gomez if he weren’t cancelled.)
Like the first single from The Story of Us, “Risk,” the video for “I Love You, I’m Sorry” is once again directed by Abrams’ bestie and frequent co-songwriter, Audrey Hobert. Accordingly, “I Love You, I’m Sorry” offers a similar “narrative” to “Risk” in that, basically, Abrams is an absolute wreck over a guy, all while attempting, hopelessly, to “play it cool.” Except that, in the case of “I Love You, I’m Sorry,” the relationship was actually serious. Serious enough for her to still be reflecting on it while sitting on the beach two years later. For that’s where Hobert commences the story, with Abrams describing, “Two Augusts ago/I told the truth, oh/But you didn’t like it, you went home.”
Hobert then reveals Abrams in a series of scenes during which her overall vibe echoes the lyric, “I might not feel real, but it’s okay, mm.” Her aura of “not feeling real” shows up when she’s dissociatedly drinking Aperol spritzes with friends (including Hobert), when she’s riding in the backseat of a car, when she’s in bed reading a book with a cover that reads with the generic title “Self Help” (that’s right, no hyphen)—when she’s doing, hell, just about anything. In the book-reading scene, Abrams also looks ever so slightly like Billie Eilish in her current Hit Me Hard and Soft era, but then, there’s also moments when she doesn’t look so dissimilar from Madison Beer either. All of which is to say that Abrams channels quite a few singer-songwriter types of the moment, both lyrically and aesthetically.
Though she does seem, at the very least, to be “original” in terms of being among the few Gen Z “pop stars” to proudly display her drinking habit in full effect, cheersing the viewer with her spritz in a manner that indicates she’s gotten slightly “classier” since she was filling her wine glass to the brim with a generic red in “Risk.” Her “class” game has also been one-upped by paying slight homage to Bob Dylan’s “Most Likely You Go Your Way (And I’ll Go Mine),” still every “thoughtful” female songwriter’s go-to for inspiration (followed closely by Joni Mitchell). This comes in the form of the rueful yet shrugging line, “I’ll be on a boat, you’re on a plane going somewhere, same.” In other words, as Dylan put it, “I’m just gonna let you pass/Yes, and I’ll go last/And then time will tell just who has fell/And who’s been left behind/When you go your way and I go mine.”
If Abrams were to guess, though, it seems she thinks she’s the one who will fall, taking ownership of being the “dick” in the situation (Olivia Rodrigo would never). This much is made clear in the bridge, wherein she belts out, “You were the best, but you were the worst/As sick as it sounds, I loved you first/I was a dick, it is what it is/A habit to kick, the age-old curse/I tend to laugh whenever I’m sad/I stare at the crash, it actually works.” And yet, it’s Hobert who pushes her out of the car about midway through the video so that she can truly watch the metaphorical car crash, entering an auditorium to accept the award for Asshole of the Year. In this moment, Abrams surprises viewers by not having the boy who theoretically did her wrong take the stage, but gladly decides to do so herself, claiming the trophy and then ripping the head off of it to sing into it like a mic, confessing all her sins and still wishing that things might have been different. In another sense, Abrams also gives off the Dylan verse, “You say you’re sorry/For tellin’ me stories/That you know I believe are true/Say ya got some other/Other kind of lover/And yes, I believe you do.”
Abrams’ version of that acknowledgement is, “That’s just the way life goes [or, as Janet would say, “That’s the way love goes”]/I like to slam doors closed/Trust me, I know it’s always about me.” This last line mirrors Taylor Swift on “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” as she sings, “So tell me everything is not about me/But what if it is?” And, in another instance of her Swift-like mimicry, Abrams sings, “I push my luck, it shows/Thankful you don’t send someone to kill me.” This also paralleling Swift on “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived” when she demands, “Were you sent by someone who wanted me dead?”
And so, no matter which songwriter Abrams is riffing on for “I Love You, I’m Sorry,” she’s made a video that’s at least faintly more unique than the song itself. A lament as old as the 1960s by this point. Fortunately for Abrams, the generation she’s trying to appeal to appears to have no awareness of those forebears who were already saying the same thing. In short, they think Abrams just fell out of a coconut tree.
Taylor Swift kicked off her Eras Tour concert with a spectacular performance in Germany. However, just before her first show in the city, her alleged stalker was arrested on Wednesday. According to reports, German police detained an American man suspected of stalking Swift and supposedly making threats against her and her reported boyfriend, Travis Kelce, on social media. Read on further to know more details!
Taylor Swift’s alleged stalker ‘detained’ before her Eras Tour concert in Germany
Taylor Swift is making headlines as the singer rocks the stage with her sensational performance during her Eras Tour concert in Germany on July 18. According to a recent report by Deadline, before her show and her performance at Veltins Arena in Gelsenkirchen, Germany, police “detained a U.S. man” suspected of stalking her. The report further mentioned that the man was allegedly making threats against her and her boyfriend, Travis Kelce, on social media.
The outlet noted that the man was trying to attend her concert in Gelsenkirchen, and he had a ticket. However, he was taken into custody at the entry control point before the concert on Wednesday. The event organizers alerted the authorities about the suspected stalker’s troubling behavior online.
However, authorities mentioned that neither Swift nor her boyfriend Kelce, who attended her show, nor the audience were in “danger.” The show, one of three concerts Swift is performing in Gelsenkirchen, was attended by 60,000 people.
As per Marca, the police stated, “As the first investigations could not completely rule out that he presented a danger, the suspect was identified and detained at the access control before the concert.”
Taylor Swift says her iconic Eras Tour has become her ‘entire life’
In June 2024, Taylor Swift announced during her Eras Tour show in Liverpool, England, that her iconic tour would end in December 2024. As per EW, during the show, Swift told the audience that celebrating her 100th show means she’s finally accepting that “this is the very first time I’ve ever acknowledged to myself and admitted that this tour is gonna end in December. Like, that’s it.”
The singer further mentioned that the Eras Tour has become her “entire life,” and she doesn’t remember her old hobbies, noting “All I do when I’m not on stage is just like sit at home and try to think of some clever acoustic song mashups and thinking about what you might like to hear.”
Meanwhile, Taylor Swift has seven shows planned in Germany over the next two weeks, with performances in Gelsenkirchen, Hamburg, and Munich.
Over a year into Taylor Swift’sEras tour, she has found ways to keep the show fresh and new for those who have been waiting since she opened in Phoenix, Arizona in March 2023 to see her. Since the tour began in the United States last year, Swift has released two rerecorded albums — Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) and 1989 (Taylor’s Version) in addition to a brand-new double album, The Tortured Poets Department.
Right as she picked the tour back up in 2024, she flew from Tokyo, Japan to Allegiant Stadium in Paradise, Nevada (where she had previously performed) to watch her beau Travis Kelce and his NFL team the Kansas City Chiefs win the Super Bowl.
Every show on the Eras Tour involves an acoustic set where Swift performs at least two songs custom to that night’s show. At first, she wouldn’t allow herself repeats unless she messed up the lyrics to a song, but now, she has done away with that rule and gotten more creative by combining songs in mashups and playing up to four in a segment. The first song or three take place on guitar, and then she shifts to piano for the second half before diving beneath the stage to resume the setlist – which has since contracted and expanded to include a Tortured Poets Department era and set.
Below you’ll find Taylor Swift’s surprise songs that she has played most recently in Europe as well as a record of all those she has played on the entire tour so far.
International Leg 2024
Tokyo
February 6 — “Holy Ground” and “Dear Reader”
February 7 — “Eyes Open” and “Electric Touch”
February 8 — “Superman” and “The Outside”
February 9 — “Come In With the Rain” and “You’re On Your Own Kid”
Melbourne
February 16 in — “Red” and “You’re Losing Me”
February 17 — Mashup of “Getaway Car”/”August”/”The Other Side of the Door” and “This Is Me Trying”
Sydney
February 18 — Mashup of “Come Back… Be Here”/”Daylight” and “Teardrops on My Guitar”February 23 in Sydney, Australia – “How You Get the Girl” and Mashup of “White Horse/Coney Island” with Sabrina Carpenter
February 24 — “Should’ve Said No (Naur)” and Mashup of “New Year’s Day/Peace”
February 25 — Mashup of “Is It Over Now/I Wish You Would” and Mashup of “Haunted/Exile”
February 26 — Mashup of “Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve/Ivy” and Mashup of “Forever & Always/Maroon”
Singapore
March 2 — Mashup of “long story short/The Story of Us” and Mashup of “Clean/evermore”
March 3 — Mashup of “Mine/Starlight” and Mashup of “I Don’t Wanna Live Forever/Dress”
March 4 — Mashup of “Foolish One/Tell Me Why” and Mashup of “This Love/Call It What You Want”
March 7 — Mashup of “Death by a Thousand Cuts/Babe” and Mashup of “Fifteen/You’re On Your Own Kid”
March 8 — Mashup of “Sparks Fly/gold rush” and “False God/Slut!”
March 9 — Mashup of “Tim McGraw/Cowboy Like Me” and “Mirrorball/Epiphany”
April 19 – The Tortured Poets Department release day
*Resuming her European tour in 2024 involved an additional set for the record-breakingThe Tortured Poets Department complete with 7 staple songs. Most — “Fortnight (feat. Post Malone),” “Down Bad,” “But Daddy I Love Him,” “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” “I Can Do It With A Broken Heart,” “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived” from the first half and “So High School” from the second half.
Paris
May 9 — “Paris” and “loml”May 10 — Mashup of “Is It Over Now/Out of the Woods” and “My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys
May 11 — “Hey Stephen” and “Maroon”
May 12 — Mashup of “The Alchemy/Treacherous” and “Begin Again/Paris”
Stockholm
May 17 — Mashup of “I Think He Knows/Gorgeous” and “Peter”May 18 — “Guilty as Sin” and Mashup of “Say Don’t Go/Welcome to New York/Clean”
May 19 — Mashup of “Message in a Bottle/How You Get the Girl/New Romantics” and “How Did It End?”
Lisbon
May 24 — Mashup of “Come Back…Be Here/The Way I Loved You/The Other Side of the Door” and Mashup of “Fresh Out the Slammer/High Infidelity”
May 25 — Mashup of “Now That We Don’t Talk/The Tortured Poets Department” and Mashup of “You’re On Your Own Kid/Long Live”
Madrid
May 29 — Mashup of “Sparks Fly/I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)” and Mashup of “I Look in People’s Windows/Snow on the Beach”
May 30 – Mashup of “Our Song/Jump Then Fall” and “King of My Heart”
Lyon, France
June 2 – Mashup of “The Prophecy/Long Story Short” and Mashup of “Fifteen/You’re On Your Own Kid”
June 3 – Mashup of “Glitch/Everything Has Changed” and “Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus”
Edinburgh, Scotland
June 7 – Mashup of “Would’ve Could’ve Should’ve/I Know Places” and Mashup of “‘Tis the Damn Season/Daylight”
June 8 – Mashup of “The Bolter/Getaway Car” and Mashup of “All of the Girls You’ve Loved Before/Crazier”
June 9 – Mashup of “It’s Nice to Have a Friend/Dorothea” and Mashup of “Haunted/Exile”
Liverpool, England
June 13 – Mashup of “I Can See You/Mine” and Mashup of “Cornelia Street/Maroon”
June 14 – “This Is What You Came For” and Mashup of “The Great War/You’re Losing Me”
June 15 – “Carolina/No Body No Crime” and “The Manuscript/Red”
Cardiff, Wales
June 18 – “I Forgot That You Existed/This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things” and “I Hate It Here/The Lakes”
London, England
June 21 – Mashup of “Hits Different/Death By a Thousand Cuts” and “The Black Dog/Come Back…Be Here/Maroon”
June 22 – Mashup of “ThanK you aIMee/Mean” and “Castles Crumbling (feat. Haley Williams)”
June 23 – “Us” by Gracie Abrams (feat. Taylor Swift) and Mashup of “Out of the Woods/Is It Over Now/Clean”
Dublin, Ireland
June 28 – Mashup of “State of Grace/You’re On Your Own Kid” and Mashup of “Sweet Nothing/Hoax”
June 29 – Mashup of “The Albatross/Dancing With Our Hands Tied” and Mashup of “This Love/Ours”
June 30 – Mashup of “Clara Bow/The Lucky One” and “You’re On Your Own Kid”
Amsterdam, Netherlands
July 4 – Mashup of “Guilty as Sin/Untouchable” and Mashup of “The Archer/Question…?”
July 5 – Mashup of “imgonnagetyouback/Dress” and “You Are In Love/Cowboy Like Me”
July 6 – Mashup of “Sweeter Than Fiction/Holy Ground” and Mashup of “Mary’s Song/So High School/Everything Has Changed”
Zürich, Switzerland
July 9 – Mashup of “All You Had to Do Was Stay/Right Where You Left Me” and “Last Kiss/Sad Beautiful Tragic”
July 10 – Mashup of “Closure/A Perfectly Good Heart” and “Robin/Never Grow Up”
Milan, Italy
July 13 – Mashup of “the 1/Wonderland” and Mashup of “I Almost Do/The Moment I Knew”
July 14 – Mashup of “Mr. Perfectly Fine/Red” and Mashup of “Getaway Car/Out of the Woods”
Gelsenkirchen, Germany
July 17 – Mashup of “Superstar/Invisible String” and Mashup of “Slut!/False God”
July 18 – Mashup of “Speak Now/Hey Stephen” and Mashup of “this is me trying/Labyrinth”
People reports that Chiefs star Travis Kelce just attended his 13th performance of Taylor Swift‘s The Eras Tour, and the significance of that number is lost on no one.
Swift is a big fan of the number 13 — so much so that before every show she paints a 13 on her hand for good luck. Why are those digits so near and dear to her heart?
Swift was born on December 13, 1989, and explained in an interview with MTV News: “I turned 13 on Friday the 13th. My first album went gold in 13 weeks. My first No. 1 song had a 13-second intro. Every time I’ve won an award I’ve been seated in either the 13th seat, the 13th row, the 13th section or row M, which is the 13th letter. Basically, whenever a 13 comes up in my life, it’s a good thing.”
Swift isn’t the only one who leans into superstitions to give herself an extra boost of confidence. In the book Recipes for Good Luck, author Ellen Weinstein researched the superstitions and rituals of some of the most famous and successful people in modern history. And while some might seem odd or silly to others, Weinstein writes that beliefs, rituals and routines can “help you face the world with ambition and confidence and inspire you to go on making good luck of your own.”
Here are some other superstars who used pre-performance rituals to get ready to go.
During his playing days, NBA superstar Michael Jordan wore UNC shorts underneath his Chicago Bulls uniform. They were the same shorts he wore in 1982 when he scored the winning jump shot that brought his college team, the University of North Carolina Tar Heels, their first NCAA championship since 1957.
Tennis great Serena Williams has several distinctive pre-performance and on-court rituals: before a match, she’d tie her shoelaces in the exact same way and always bounced the ball five times before her first serve and twice before her second.
Before beginning the opening monologue of her former talk show, Ellen DeGeneres would be sure to throw a mint in the air and catch it in her mouth.
Rihanna has said that she doesn’t allow anything yellow in her dressing room before a show, believing it is bad luck.
Soccer legend David Beckham has a thing against odd numbers. His wife Victoria told The Chicago Sun-Times that their house had several refrigerators, each devoted to different types of food. “In the drinks one, everything is symmetrical,” she explained. “If there’s three cans, he’ll throw one away because it has to be an even number.”
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If you think you missed your shot at snagging Taylor Swift tickets, think again. There are still a bunch of The Eras Tour dates left before the tour ends in December, and some won’t cost you an arm and a leg like you’d expect. In fact, I scoured multiple ticket resale sites to compare seat prices for every remaining show in the tour. So if you’re scrambling to find cheap Taylor Swift tickets, you’ve come to the right place.
The Eras Tour is Swift’s sixth headlining concert tour. It all started with the Fearless Tour in 2009 and 2010, then the Speak Now World Tour in 2011 and 2012, followed by The Red Tour in 2013 and 2014. After that came the 1989 World Tour in 2015 and the Reputation Stadium Tour in 2018. Fans have been waiting for Swift’s return to the concert stage for several years, especially since she was supposed to put on her sixth concert tour, Lover Fest, in 2020. The tour, however, was postponed and ultimately canceled in February 2021 because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Luckily for Swifties around the world, news of The Eras Tour came out in November 2022. The tour, which was announced less than two weeks after the release of her second most recent album, Midnights, is a “journey through the musical eras” of Swift’s past 11 albums: 2006’s Taylor Swift, 2008’s Fearless, 2010’s Speak Now, 2012’s Red, 2014’s 1989, 2017’s Reputation, 2019’s Lover, 2020’s Folklore and Evermore, 2022’s Midnights, and 2024’s Tortured Poets Department. Concertgoers are in for a treat, because The Eras Tour is the first time Swift has performed songs from all five of her past albums. You can expect to get serenaded for over three hours, as Swift performs 46 songs (this includes two surprise songs).
The Eras Tour includes 152 shows across five different continents. It kicked off on March 17, 2023 in Glendale, Arizona and will make its final stop on December 8, 2024 in Vancouver, Canada. Even more impressive than 152 shows? The Eras Tour became the first tour to surpass $1 billion in revenue, crowning it as the highest-grossing tour ever, according to Pollstar’s 2023 year-end chart.
So where can fans buy cheap Taylor Swift tickets to The Eras Tour? We’ve spent hours scouring the web to find the most affordable stops on the tour. Plus, we’ve got a special discount code so you can get your seats for even less.
Buda Mendes/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management.Buda Mendes/TAS23/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
How to buy Taylor Swift tickets to The Eras Tour
Tickets to The Eras Tour went on sale in November 2022 and sold out almost immediately. While seats are sold out on Ticketmaster, they’re still on sale on trusted resale sites like StubHub and Vivid Seats, which offers $20 off of orders of $200 or more with the code SC2022—a 10% savings. Resale prices for The Eras Tour tickets have also decreased significantly since the tour went on sale in 2022. But don’t wait for them to sell out again.
To sort by price, click either “Sort by Price” in the top bar or toggle the price scale to the range you want to buy from.
For $20 off of $200 or more, use code SC2022 at checkout
Create or sign into your account, check out, and enjoy The Eras Tour!
When Taylor Swift tickets restock, visit Ticketmaster.com and search for “Taylor Swift“
Select See Tickets on the event date of your choice
To sort by price, click either “Lowest Price” or slide the price scale to see tickets within your range
Create or sign into your account, check out, and enjoy The Eras Tour!
Ashok Kumar/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management.Ashok Kumar/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
Where to buy cheap Taylor Swift tickets
The most affordable tickets are in Gelsenkirchen, Hamburg, Munich, and Warsaw. These destinations all have Eras Tour concert tickets for under $300 a piece, with the most affordable seats on this list costing $107 in Hamburg, Germany and Warsaw, Poland.
For some price comparison, when we updated this story on June 17, 2024, tickets cost as low as $303 in Gelsenkirchen, $341 in Hamburg, $391 in Munich, and $298 in Warsaw. Now, seats start at $185 in Gelsenkirchen, $107 in Hamburg, $231 in Munich, and $107 in Warsaw. Prices are dropping in certain cities in Europe, so don’t wait any longer to buy your Taylor Swift concert tickets.
*** The following lowest ticket prices were gathered on July 18, 2024, and are subject to change. Bolded shows have tickets under $300 a piece.
July 19, 2024 — Gelsenkirchen, Germany @ VELTINS-Arena (Paramore)
StubHub – $185
Vivid Seats – N/A
Ticketmaster – N/A
July 23, 2024 — Hamburg, Germany @ Volksparkstadion (Paramore)
StubHub – $114
Vivid Seats – $651
Ticketmaster – N/A
July 24, 2024 — Hamburg, Germany @ Volksparkstadion (Paramore)
StubHub – $107
Vivid Seats – $329
Ticketmaster – N/A
July 27, 2024 — Munich, Germany Olympiastadion (Paramore)
StubHub – $271
Vivid Seats – N/A
Ticketmaster – N/A
July 28, 2024 — Munich, Germany Olympiastadion (Paramore)
StubHub – $238
Vivid Seats – $772
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 1, 2024 — Warsaw, Poland @ PGA Narodowy (Paramore)
StubHub – $117
Vivid Seats – N/A
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 2, 2024 — Warsaw, Poland @ PGA Narodowy (Paramore)
StubHub – $115
Vivid Seats – N/A
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 3, 2024 — Warsaw, Poland @ PGA Narodowy (Paramore)
StubHub – $107
Vivid Seats – N/A
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 8, 2023 — Vienna, Austria @ Ernst-Happel-Stadion (Paramore)
StubHub – $462
Vivid Seats – N/A
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 9, 2023 — Vienna, Austria @ Ernst-Happel-Stadion (Paramore)
StubHub – $364
Vivid Seats – N/A
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 10, 2023 — Vienna, Austraia @ Ernst-Happel-Stadion (Paramore)
StubHub – $463
Vivid Seats – $1,626
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 15, 2024 — London, United Kingdom @ Wembley Stadium (Paramore)
StubHub – $1,217
Vivid Seats – $1,063
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 16, 2023 — London, United Kingdom @ Wembley Stadium (Paramore)
StubHub – $1,223
Vivid Seats – $1,008
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 17, 2024 — London, United Kingdom @ Wembley Stadium (Paramore)
StubHub – $1,256
Vivid Seats – $1,008
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 19, 2024 — London, United Kingdom @ Wembley Stadium (Paramore)
StubHub – $1,176
Vivid Seats – $1,171
Ticketmaster – N/A
August 20, 2024 — London, United Kingdom @ Wembley Stadium (Paramore)
StubHub – $1,516
Vivid Seats – $1,626
Ticketmaster – N/A
October 18, 2024 — Miami, Florida @ Hard Rock Cafe (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $2,080
Vivid Seats – $2,240
Ticketmaster – N/A
October 19, 2024 — Miami, Florida @ Hard Rock Cafe (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,987
Vivid Seats – $2,121
Ticketmaster – N/A
October 20, 2024 — Miami, Florida @ Hard Rock Cafe (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $2,023
Vivid Seats – $2,226
Ticketmaster – N/A
October 25, 2024 — New Orleans, Louisiana @ Caesar’s Superdome (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,498
Vivid Seats – $1,747
Ticketmaster – N/A
October 26, 2024 — New Orleans, Louisiana @ Caesar’s Superdome (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,832
Vivid Seats – $1,811
Ticketmaster – N/A
October 27, 2024 — New Orleans, Louisiana @ Caesar’s Superdome (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,832
Vivid Seats – $1,944
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 1, 2024 — Indianapolis, Indiana @ Lucas Oil Stadium (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $2,165
Vivid Seats – $2,276
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 2, 2024 — Indianapolis, Indiana @ Lucas Oil Stadium (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $2,081
Vivid Seats – $2,229
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 3, 2024 — Indianapolis, Indiana @ Lucas Oil Stadium (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $2,071
Vivid Seats – $2,097
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 14, 2024 — Toronto, Canada @ Rogers Centre (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,704
Vivid Seats – $1,666
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 15, 2024 — Toronto, Canada @ Rogers Centre (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,826
Vivid Seats – $1,860
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 16, 2024 — Toronto, Canada @ Rogers Centre (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,665
Vivid Seats – $1,837
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 21, 2024 — Toronto, Canada @ Rogers Centre (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,400
Vivid Seats – $1,580
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 22, 2024 — Toronto, Canada @ Rogers Centre (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,552
Vivid Seats – $1,707
Ticketmaster – N/A
November 23, 2024 — Toronto, Canada @ Rogers Centre (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,704
Vivid Seats – $1,580
Ticketmaster – N/A
December 6, 2024 — Vancouver, Canada @ BC Place Stadium (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,582
Vivid Seats – $1,741
Ticketmaster – N/A
December 7, 2024 — Vancouver, Canada @ BC Place Stadium (Gracie Abrams)
StubHub – $1,521
Vivid Seats – $1,613
Ticketmaster – N/A
December 8, 2024 — Vancouver, Canada @ BC Place Stadium (Gracie Abrams)
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Ordering up one grungy greyscale-approved guitarist who attaches their siren calls to electric chords, a self-professed “Starlette” with braided hair better left whooshed in photos, and a pixie-fever, cheesing dream. Australia might’ve just stumbled upon the next Rock‘Rave Angel.’ You know that we’re calling in the big guns here when we make Bratz references, but with one of the members of Blusher quite literally named Jade (just with an Alice following), we have grounds to. The other two fashionably chic girlies go by Miranda Ward and Lauren Coutts. You really have to drag out the rs in their names until your faux-Aussie accents give you the authentic true blue experience. Another icon in her own right, Kylie Minogue, already has. The girls recently supported her at British Summertime London Hyde Park!
See, we’ve already given you two pop culture reasons to support the girls! But if you need an extra one, we’ve got you. This one comes in a gangly, glitter-pop package, brackets seemingly going around just one of her names these days. Yep, it’s Taylor Swift! Blusher seems to have its own (Taylor’s Version) moment by having a single band member around a particular visualizer. Why’s that the case? Not only can they sing some bars, but they also know how to turn the dials in the production studio! This is a super cool way for each girl to lay their distinctive mark on a cohesive group assignment individually. So, we’re pairing Blusher with not just (Taylor’s Version) but Taylor herself by matching up their three latest tunes with a song from Tay Tay’s discography that fits the vibe!
‘Accelerator (Lauren’s Version)’
If the OG is like jumping into an already moving vehicle, the remix is more in tune with setting down an ocean-view highway at just the appropriate speed. At least that’s what the intro feels like, Lauren’s spiky heel slamming down on the breaks, switching lanes from a high-speed 200 hz/second, sensual ‘Accelerator’ to a hushed-down, whimsical intro.The pause, the momentary, leisurely waving of a striped handkerchief, prompts the second lap of a neurotic competition. Then we’re back to hearing the same revving from motor engines. “Sunlight in your eyes, when we touch, it’s like the stars collide,” a copy-paste of the pre-chorus to the intro. Or reversing if we’re following through on this car racing analogy properly. One that is full of these sparkly twinkles, like confetti for one’s ear.
As this crush-craving track speaks of the cloud nine one can be on when butterflies swarm one’s belly around someone they like, we’re matching it up with Taylor’s ‘Gorgeous.’
’24 Hours In Paris (Miranda’s Version)’
The swaying, cacophonous scatter of drums and sunset-tinged pink synths, Miranda’s stamp on ‘24 Hours In Paris’ is if a tourist picks up a croissant and starts using it as a microphone. Of course, what they’re saying would be illiterate to the locals if they were only to speak French, much like we’re only able to hear punching “uhs” and background vocal whisperings until the minute mark. But who needs distinctive words? Isn’t that what French kisses are for?
We’re pushing the Taylor Swift worldwide emotional map discography into the same location pin this resides in, ‘Paris.’ Or at least close to it! Taylor speaks of falling in love, whereas Blusher tells of falling apart. Even when we’re as dizzy as the constantly spinning aesthetic of the remix visualizer, we still can’t run so far from heartbreak.
Still Loading ‘Overglow (Jade’s Version)’
So, the loading bar isn’t quite 100% on Jade’s ‘Overglow’ remix. Though we know it’s about to be the one thing we will have on constant rotation. For now, we’ll be just in love with its OG form. Instead of toxic partners sprouting tears all over Paree, the axil has spun again! The girls have become a shaky bundle of nerves of a bustling Tokyo, wondering if their muses know how smitten they feel. It’s for the cute video montages, the stolen glances on kaleidoscopic film, pretending as if we’re documenting the attractions. Still, we’re capturing every feature of our object of desire’s faces so we can hit replay back in our hotel rooms. There’s even an instrumental break that screams the kicking of one’s feet in anticipated glee.
That same lowercase-lettered unwillingness to scream out one’s love syncs up with Taylor’s ‘gold rush.’
Seeing the bell notification of Blusher dropping (Jade’s version) of ‘Overglow’ is a lot like waiting for the summer’s rays to turn a glowing golden for our perfect selfie lighting. It’s magical in the long run but dull waiting for each minute to pass until it’s the moment. What do you think the remix will sound like? Let us know on our socials, X, Instagram, and Facebook!
Ryan Reynolds’ favorite Taylor Swift song is no surprise to anyone who has been following their friendship the last 10 years, because it has an incredibly special meaning for the actor.
In a new interview the Deadpool star was joined by Hugh Jackman and Shaun Levy, and the three were asked questions to determine how well they knew each other. One question asked what Ryan’s favorite Taylor Swift song was, and Hugh confidently claimed he “knew the answer to this,” calling out “We Are Never Getting Back Together”.
Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds have four children, three of whom are named in “Betty” by Taylor Swift
Shaun gave a very niche answer, “Gorgeous,” which Ryan’s eldest daughter James appears on in the opening seconds speaking the title of the song, but both were incorrect.
Ryan then revealed it was “Betty,” a song from Taylor’s eighth album Folklore which uses the names of his three daughters: James, Betty and Inez.
Watch the video here:
Ryan Reynolds reveals favorite Taylor Swift song
“I am in my Folklore and Evermore eras,” Ryan quipped.
Ryan and wife Blake Lively are parents to daughters James, nine, Inez, seven, Betty, four, plus a fourth child whose name or sex they’ve yet to reveal. Inez and Betty’s names were first revealed in the “Cruel Summer” singer’s song “Betty”, from the 2020 album Folklore, while James also featured on the Reputation track “Gorgeous,” with her baby voice appearing at the very beginning.
Blake and Ryan with their daughters James, then two, and baby Inez in 2016
“Betty” is one of Taylor’s own personal favorites as well, and during the Eras Tour has spoken extensively about her process of writing characters from the imagined worlds she created for the Folklore album.
Taylor, Ryan and Blake take a picture with friends at a Chiefs game
Fans have wondered if Taylor revealed the name and gender of Blake and Ryan’s fourth child in her 2022 album Midnights, perhaps the name Daisy-Mae in “You’re On Your Own, Kid,” or 2024’s The Tortured Poets Department which included the names Cassandra, Peter, Chloe, Sam, Sophia, Marcus, Robin, and Aimee in various song titles.
However, Ryan hinted that their fourth baby’s name has not been teased, telling Hoda Kotb earlier in 2024: “We always wait for Taylor to tell us the child’s name. We’ll say this, we’re still waiting.”
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Our favorite stars, they’re just like us! You already know we at The Honey POP are huge Taylor Swift fans, and Jordana Bryant recently released the playful ‘Taylor 4 President’ to celebrate Taylor’s legacy and impact. The pop-country anthem will have you listening for Easter eggs and dancing around your room while you get hyped to vote in this November’s election. It’s yet another example of Jordana’s ability to write witty lyrics that will set up camp in your mind and heart!
As an 18-year-old getting ready to vote for the first time, I’m hopeful this election year to find a candidate who speaks to me – someone that I can get excited about supporting. I think what makes Taylor Swift a really powerful songwriter and entertainer is how she connects with her fans and how relatable her music is. It’d be wonderful to have someone running for president with that similar universal relatability and ability to connect all kinds of people. By releasing this song, I want to bring some lightheartedness to the genuine changes myself and my peers hope to see this November. If nothing else, I hope it’s a reminder for voters, especially first-time voters like myself, to vote for what they want their future to look like.
Jordana Bryant
Listen to ‘Taylor 4 President’ below, then keep reading for our breakdown of the lyrical references Jordana slipped in to honor Taylor’s work! See how many you can figure out on your own before we compare notes 👀
“This Is The Time For A Matriarchy…”
Has there been a more iconic moment in Swiftiedom than finally hearing what lyric made ‘All Too Well (Ten Minute Version)’ explicit? There are very few moments that could top it! “F*ck the patriarchy” has gone on to become one of Taylor’s most rallying lyrics, with the crowds at the Eras Tour screaming it at the top of their lungs. And we still haven’t had a female president, so this tie-in works perfectly.
“You Said It Yourself That You’d Be The Man…”
Taylor did, in fact, say that she’d be the man! Her 2019 single ‘The Man’ reflects on the double standards that women and men face in the entertainment business and life in general. She notes that men are allowed to “brag about raking in dollars and getting b*tches and models” while women in the spotlight are often shamed for their business moves and dating lives. But she refuses to let that get her down, insisting, “if I was a man, then I’d be the man.”
“We Could Really Use Your Mastermind…”
In her music, visuals, and beyond, Taylor is a total creative powerhouse and always has such innovative ideas. This line specifically references her 2022 track ‘Mastermind,’ which plays with the idea that she plans absolutely everything out. Her powerful mind hasn’t let us down over the years!
“This Summer Would Be Far From A Cruel One…”
So we’ve all had ‘Cruel Summer’ on a constant repeat since the summer of 2019, right?! If not, get on that! The song has made history and become one of Taylor’s most well-known tracks, reaching #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 four years after its release thanks to the hype of the Eras Tour.
“My Mother Would Breathe Easy If You Won…”
Yay, some recognition for the deep cuts on Taylor’s 2008 album, Fearless! ‘Breathe’ is a melancholy song about parting ways with a friend through a difficult time, and we love how Jordana spun the title here. Here, it’s almost like hoping not to part ways with the idea of a better future while you worry about the outcome of an election.
“It’s Time For The Era Where You’re In Control Of All Of The Polls…”
Taylor running for president would totally usher in a new era, and this line plays on the success of the Eras Tour to make that point! Eras is a career-spanning victory lap for Taylor to celebrate her legacy and music with millions of fans worldwide, both physically at the shows with social content, and through fan livestreams of the concerts.
“You’d Be The Best Thing In The West Wing / With Her Own Kind Of Army…”
The second verse of ‘Taylor 4 President’ includes two references to the lyrics of Taylor’s song ‘You’re Losing Me,’ which was a Vault addition to Midnights. The lyrics in question are “I’m the best thing at this party” and “fighting in only your army.” Jordana flipped the latter to reference the military power the president has, while also celebrating Swifties and their passionate support for Taylor!
“Queen Of 13…”
Finally, we can’t have a tribute to Taylor without referencing her lucky number, 13! She used to paint it on the back of her hand before every concert, often won her earliest awards while sitting in the 13th row of seats, and now has a bedazzled 13 on her silver Fearless guitar on the Eras Tour.
What do you think of Jordana Bryant’s ‘Taylor 4 President?’ Which of these lyrical references is your favorite? Let us know in the comments below or hit us up on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter!
If you’re a Swiftie, you won’t want to miss this upcoming festival.
Not only will you enjoy the music of one of the world’s biggest superstars, but you’ll also be supporting a great local cause.
SwiftieFest 2024, a touring show celebrating the music of Taylor Swift, will take place at Wildwood Amphitheater in Lake Orion on July 12 at 7 p.m. and July 13 at noon.
The festival will feature a live concert showcasing Taylor Swift’s greatest hits, performed by the tribute band Sparks Fly. Friday’s performance will include a special appearance by Lilly MacPhee, while Saturday’s matinee will feature special guest Ali McManus.
The show promises to capture “the essence of Taylor Swift’s music and style.”
In addition to entertainment, a portion of each ticket sold will be donated to two local nonprofits: The Community Foundation of Greater Rochester, supporting victims of the Brooklands Splash Pad shooting in Rochester Hills, and Mission Oakland, established to support law enforcement in Oakland County. The donations will assist the widow and three daughters of deputy Bradley Reckling, who was killed in the line of duty during the Rochester Hills shooting.
“We stepped up for Oxford Strong and are honored to continue contributing to these meaningful causes and support our community during these challenging times,” Brian Major, executive producer of Wildwood Amphitheater, said in a statement. “SwiftieFest 2024 is not just about celebrating today’s most popular music; it’s about coming together to make a positive impact and uplift a community in need.”
General admission tickets for SwiftieFest 2024 are $20 for adults (with up to two children under 12 admitted free per ticket), and VIP tickets available for $30. Tickets are available now and can be purchased online at orion.events, or at the door for $5 more.
