As soon as Taylor Swift announced her Eras Tour last November, I knew it would be an absolute battle to get tickets.
Though I’ve been a Swiftie since 2007, there’s no denying she is currently at the peak of her fame and popularity, fuelled mostly by TikTok and the re-recording of her old albums.
I made the decision pretty quickly – if I wanted to see this tour, I was going to have to fly to the US to do it. Even if she did come to Australia, there wouldn’t be enough dates to meet demand.
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So with nothing but a group chat of Swifties, a detailed spreadsheet dedicated to assigning ticket duties, and a bunch of presale codes, we managed to get tickets to opening night in Arizona in March. Plus a few tickets for NYC and Nashville as well.
I flew over there for three months with five tickets to my name, but ended up going to eight shows in total. God bless last-minute ticket drops.
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This trip wasn’t my first time travelling to see Taylor. In 2016 I flew to Austin, Texas for four days to see her sing at the Formula One. I went to shows for the Reputation Tour in the US, New Zealand, and Japan.
Say what you want about my priorities, but through the Taylor fandom I’ve met some of my closest friends and done some bucket-list travelling.
If you’ve never seen Taylor Swift live, it’s fair if you’re a bit baffled my my obsession and need to attend so many concerts.
“Isn’t it the same setlist every time?” my boyfriend and parents have asked me on multiple occasions. A regular comment on my videos posted from the show is: “Why not just watch a live stream instead?”
Guys, you simply don’t get it. It feels cliché to call it magic, but there’s a certain vibe at a Taylor show that you will never feel anywhere else.
“Seeing the Eras tour was one of the most surreal, happy moments of my life, and I’d go every single night if I could.”
Especially the Eras tour. Strangers sing to each other, trade friendship bracelets, gush over outfits, Airdrop cute photos between phones. We made best friends for the night with a girl in front of us who came alone. We watched as a couple seated beside us get engaged during Lover.
Taylor is singing to an audience of 70,000 people, but somehow makes you feel like you’re an integral part of the show, whether you’re seated front row or up in the nosebleeds. Her tours, specifically this one, is a haven for unabashed joy and excitement.
I’ve been called a ticket hog and financially irresponsible, but honestly I don’t care. Seeing the Eras tour was one of the most surreal, happy moments of my life, and I’d go every single night if I could.
One of the more unhinged decisions I made during this Swiftie pilgrimage was to fly to the show in Atlanta – without any tickets. My friend and I arrived the night before the show, stayed in a dodgy motel on the edge of downtown, and spent a whole day refreshing the Ticketmaster page in the hope of a last-minute ticket drop.
For the US Eras shows, it’s common for the official ticket seller to release a handful of tickets sporadically in the days leading up to the shows. Some are obstructed-view seats for $200, some are floor tickets for $49. It’s random and unpredictable, but for heaps of fans it’s their only choice.
The tickets are hard to get. Most of the time, if you’re lucky enough to get them in your cart, they’ll disappear as you’re entering your card information, scooped up by a bot and resold on Stubhub for four times the price.
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Thankfully, for the Friday show, a friend saw my pleas on Twitter and helped us secure tickets at 4:45pm, two hours before Taylor took the stage.
We tried for the same thing on Saturday night, even getting ready for the show and sitting outside the stadium refreshing Ticketmaster. By 7pm, when the show had already started and we could hear the audience inside screaming the bridge of Cruel Summer, the scalpers were still asking for $1000+ for nosebleeds on StubHub.
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The rest of the sad, ticket-less Swifties stayed outside to listen to the show – Taylor-gating, as it’s recently been coined – but we just got a 10-pack of hard seltzer, a ton of snacks, and retreated to watch the show via TikTok live stream from bed in our hotel.
My last-minute ticket experience didn’t go so great in Nashville, though. I had tickets to the Friday and Sunday, but I’m greedy and needed to go all three nights. Sitting on a curb in downtown Nashville, surrounded by girlies in cowboy boots and sparkly dresses, my friend and I fruitlessly refreshed ticket pages, with no luck.
At the last minute we just bit the bullet and spent an obscene amount on obstructed-view tickets. It’s not a moment I’m proud of, but I don’t regret it one bit. We made sure to have the absolute best time at that show, and it was worth it.
If you’re on the fence about buying tickets, if you’ve missed out and are considering flying somewhere else to see the show, all I can say is: do it.
As a tweet I saw yesterday read: “Money comes back. The Eras Tour does not.”
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