State Champ Radio The Eras Tour
Travis Kelce is one of few lucky Swifties who got to see Taylor Swift premiere her brand new Eras Tour set — which is now complete with select numbers from her Billboard 200-topping new album, The Tortured Poets Department — across four shows in Paris over the weekend. And on the latest episode of his podcast New Heights Wednesday (May 15), the Kansas City Chiefs tight end couldn’t help but gush about the “absolutely unbelievable” experience.
“I had a blast at Tay’s show,” the athlete told his brother and co-host, retired Philadelphia Eagles center Jason Kelce. “Her new rendition of The Eras Tour, I suggest everybody go see it. It has her new Tortured Poets Department, a handful of those songs in the new show, which means there’s a new segment and new lights and new dancing. New everything to the f–king show.”
Trending on Billboard
“It is absolutely unbelievable,” he continued. “I enjoyed every bit of it … I don’t know if they’re just getting better or if I just keep forgetting how they are. It was electric in there. Paris was on a whole other level.”
The episode comes about three days after Travis attended Swift’s final Paris concert at La Defense Arena Sunday (May 12), where fan cameras captured him dancing along to the show with suitemates Gigi Hadid and Bradley Cooper. The “Anti-Hero” singer’s tenure in the City of Love marked the first few times she’d ever performed tracks such as “Fortnight,” “Down Bad” and “So High School,” a love song thought by many fans to have been inspired by the athlete.
“I got to see a few familiar faces,” Travis added on the show. “I got to see Gigi and Bradley. Bradley Cooper, man, BC, Big Coop. We were all in the suite having a blast.”
At the show, Swift also debuted a new outfit made with Chiefs colors: red and gold. Later on, she performed “The Alchemy” — another TTPD track believed to be about Travis — as part of the surprise song section, during which the Ohio native held up a hand heart in the stands.
The 14-time Grammy winner will next perform in Stockholm for three nights at Friends Arena starting Friday (May 17), after which she’ll spend the summer traveling through Spain, Scotland, Ireland and parts of Europe before returning to the U.S. in October. And if you’re wondering whether Travis will continue to tag along on the tour, it certainly sounds like he’s game.
“I’m gonna be dancing around,” he hinted on New Heights. “I’m all over the world this offseason.”
Watch Travis gush about Swift’s revamped Eras Tour below.
[embedded content]
Taylor Swift had the perfect outfit for her final Eras Tour show in Paris, considering who was in the audience. The pop star appeared in Kansas City Chiefs colors for the 1989 set of her performance Sunday (May 12), and tight end Travis Kelce adorably jammed out to his superstar girlfriend’s show from the crowd at La Defense Arena.
The tribute to Chiefs Kingdom came midway through the Eras setlist, with Swift taking the stage in a sparkly gold crop top and red skirt to sing “Style,” “Blank Space” and more hits from her fifth studio album. On her left foot, she wore a yellow bootie, and on the right, an orange bootie.
It’s not the first time the “Anti-Hero” singer has sported the team’s official colors, with Swift wearing a number of red and gold outfits to games at Arrowhead Stadium throughout the 2023-24 season, all the way up to the Super Bowl in February, which saw Kelce and the Chiefs take home their second Lombardi Trophy in a row. This time, it was the New Heights podcaster’s turn to support Swift from the stands at La Defense, where he enjoyed the show alongside Gigi Hadid, Bradley Cooper and Lenny Kravitz.
Trending on Billboard
Following the 1989 set, Swift performed a series of songs from The Tortured Poets Department for just the fourth time so far. Fan videos captured Kelce smiling and dancing along to “So High School,” which many think the singer wrote about the athlete. During the number, she and her dancers swag surf as part of the choreography, a sweet tribute to Chiefs Kingdom.
Later, Swift sang another Tortured Poets track believed to be about Kelce as a surprise song — “The Alchemy” — which she mashed up with Red‘s “Treacherous.” While she strummed on the guitar, the Ohio native swayed and held up a cute hand heart at the 14-time Grammy winner.
Swift will next perform in Stockholm for three nights at Friends Arena starting May 17, after which she’ll spend the summer traveling through Spain, Scotland, Ireland and more cities in Europe before returning to the U.S. in October. In an Instagram post Sunday (May 12), the musician confirmed that she’ll be including the Tortured Poets set in the show throughout the rest of the Eras trek, writing, “I’m SO fired up to play this for every crowd on the tour.”
See a photo of Swift’s Chiefs-themed outfit, plus videos of Kelce enjoying the show, below.
Taylor Swift performs onstage during night four of “Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour” at La Defense on May 12, 2024 in Paris, France.
Kevin Mazur/TAS24/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
Any fans not in Paris for Taylor Swift‘s four Eras Tour shows at La Defense Arena are probably feeling a little down bad after missing the pop star’s first-ever performances of several The Tortured Poets Department songs. But luckily, she’s just as excited to bring the updated show to all of the remaining cities on […]
He knows how to ball, she knows Aristotle – but swag surfing they have in common. Taylor Swift‘s first show back on the Eras Tour Thursday (May 9) featured multiple surprises as she debuted several new numbers from The Tortured Poets Department, including what appeared to be a subtle tribute to boyfriend Travis Kelce. While […]
Taylor Swift is back at it! The 34-year-old pop star returned to her global Eras Tour on Thursday (May 9) following a two-month break, kicking off the trek’s European leg at La Defense Arena in Paris for the first of four planned shows at the venue — complete with several new costumes, dance numbers, visuals, […]
Taylor Swift‘s Eras Tour has officially resumed, meaning Swifties are back to getting creative with their concert gear. And one fan in particular really understood the assignment at the pop star’s first show back in Paris on Thursday night (May 9), sporting a homemade cape showing off her recent Billboard Hot 100 record.
As captured in pictures by passerby fans at La Defense in Paris, the unknown Swiftie’s cape is so long, it touches the ground. The accessory boasts a screenshot of the Hot 100 chart as it was the week of May 4, 2024, when Swift became the first artist in history to occupy the top 14 spots of the chart.
All 14 of those songs were from the singer’s latest album The Tortured Poets Department, which dropped April 19 and has spent two weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 so far. The LP’s lead single “Fortnight” featuring Post Malone began at the top of the Hot 100, followed by “Down Bad,” “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart,” “The Tortured Poets Department,” “So Long, London,” “My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys,” “But Daddy I Love Him, “Florida!!!,” “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?,” “Guilty as Sin?,” “Fresh Out the Slammer,” “Loml,” “The Alchemy” and “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived.”
Trending on Billboard
In achieving the milestone, Swift broke her own record set with 2022’s Midnights, which made her the first artist to ever occupy all of the top 10 simultaneously. (And yes, someone also wore a cape reflecting that accolade to an earlier Eras show.)
The Paris show follows a two-month pause Swift took from touring to promote and release Tortured Poets. After three more performances at La Defense, she’ll travel through Spain, Sweden, Portugal, the U.K. and more.
See the Swiftie’s Taylor-themed Hot 100 cape below.
Taylor Swift is returning to the road to complete the final leg of her Eras Tour for fans eager to hear the singer-songwriter perform new tracks like “Fortnight,” “Down Bad” and “Florida!!!” from her new album, The Tortured Poets Department.
Explore
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
But those fans may be in for some sticker shock. Prices to see Swift at one of her final nine shows in the United States have increased following the release of the album April 19, with the average get-in-the-door price — the lowest price available — hovering around $2,600 per ticket, according to data from TicketIQ. That means it would cost a couple more than $5,000 just to be in the same building as Swift in Miami (Oct 18-20), New Orleans (Oct 25-27) and Indianapolis (Nov. 1-3) this fall.
In Europe, however — where Swift starts a 51-show run on May 9 with a kickoff date at Paris’ La Defense Arena — tickets cost only a fraction of that. Right now, the get-in-the door price to see the opening of the European leg of the Eras Tour is $340 a ticket — 87% cheaper than the average price in the United States.
Trending on Billboard
That means a fan in Miami could fly to Paris for about $900 a person (according to prices generated on kayak.com), spend two nights at a four-star hotel at $250 a night and purchase a $340 concert ticket for a grand total of $1,740 — which is still $760 less than the cheapest tickets currently available for her Miami shows.
Tickets to see Swift in Stockholm (May 17-19) are even cheaper, at $312 for the cheapest tickets, while tickets for her show in Portugal (May 24-25) start at $336 and in Spain (May 29-30) start at $324. Prices do start to climb in the United Kingdom, with the get-in-the-door price hovering around £540 (about $674 USD) for Swift’s Liverpool shows (June 13-15). Prices to see Swift at Wembley Stadium (June 21-23) hover around £720 ($900).
The reason for the huge difference in price, experts say, is due in part to longstanding consumer skepticism about resale tickets in most of Europe. That’s coupled with a much more aggressive regulatory environment where artists and consumers are empowered to report and remove illegal ticket listings, and where prices are kept low thanks to laws limiting how high tickets can be marked up over face value.
The European approach is significantly different from that of the United States, where ticket resale is not regulated and deceptive marketing practices, including the use of deceptive websites and speculative ticket listings, continue unabated despite widespread outcry from consumers. And federal officials don’t regularly enforce the few ticketing laws that do exist. It took five years after the BOTS Act — banning automated programs that jump the queue and buy up tickets — was passed for the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to bring a case against brokers for violating the bill.
Sam Shemtob, managing director for ticket resale advocacy group Face-value European Alliance for Ticketing (FEAT), points to Europe as a model for how governments can be more vigilant about regulating resale markets. In countries like France, Germany and the Netherlands, ticket resellers face limits on how much tickets can be marked up on secondary sites — typically 20% over face value. Other countries like the United Kingdom allow resale but restrict who is allowed to post tickets for resale and give artists and event promoters the right to take some resale ticket listings down.
Adopting European-style regulations in the United States by restricting ticket markups to 20% above face value would transform the concert business overnight and likely drive prices down dramatically on the secondary market. Markup caps would also likely make programs like Ticketmaster’s platinum ticket pricing (which charges high markups for a small percentage of tickets to offset the resale market) obsolete and significantly reduce the number of ticket brokers and bad actors using bots to disrupt ticket sales and illegally buy up tickets.
A federal cap on ticket markups would also significantly disrupt the secondary ticketing market and push many brokers out of business, which might create unintended consequences for sports teams that are much more willing to sell season tickets to brokers and depend on resellers for distribution. It’s also unclear if Americans would even accept a regulatory framework capping how much tickets could be marked up. Lawmakers in New York, Utah, Colorado, Connecticut and Virginia have all passed laws in the last decade making it illegal to restrict how and where ticket brokers resell tickets. While U.S. consumers often complain about the excesses of ticket resale and like the idea of using technology to keep tickets out of the hands of scalpers, they also dislike the restrictions that come with non-transferable tickets and tend to loudly oppose policies that create inconveniences.
Shemtob notes that Europe’s ticketing rules aren’t just about protecting price, but are also designed to empower citizens to take action.
On Jan. 1, 2025, Europe’s Digital Services Act (DSA) will go into effect, creating a uniform set of guidelines for online ticket resale requiring resellers to disclose their names and contact details to potential ticket buyers. The DSA also mandates that resale platforms track takedowns of public ticket listings (to help provide a record of the deceptive activity taking place) and ban deceptive marketing practices.
While many of the DSA’s reforms mirror U.S. efforts to clean up ticketing, Shemtob says a provision in the DSA bill that makes it simple to flag, report and take down ticket listings that violate the rules is a game-changer for consumer advocates. The law creates “a clear process for removing illegal ticket listings as and when they appear,” he said in a statement provided to Billboard, putting in place “the groundwork for a fairer, more transparent ticket-buying experience for consumers.”
Besides keeping prices in Europe low, the legislation has also led to a surprising boom in tourism from U.S. fans traveling to the continent to pursue cheaper Eras Tour tickets: A spokesperson for StubHub told Billboard that 68% of ticket purchases for Swift’s 51-show run in Europe have come from U.S. buyers.
It’s hard not to feel confident when Taylor Swift is in your corner. After opening for the pop star for a chunk of the Eras Tour last year, Girl in Red says she feels more sure of her abilities than ever, and that’s largely thanks to the “Anti-Hero” singer’s support. One of Elle‘s three rising […]
ADD:
“Fortnight”
“The Tortured Poets Department”
“Down Bad”
“So Long, London”
“Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?”
Mashup: “Teardrops on My Guitar” x “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart”
“But Daddy I Love Him”
Note: As Swift’s newest album, Tortured Poets deserves to be the finale. And while, upon first listen, the record may not seem like it has enough stadium-ready bops to close out the show, the above songs 100% have the potential to be converted into the high-energy moments the Eras Tour commands. Just imagine the theatrical potential of “Who’s Afraid,” the meta-ness of a real-life crowd chanting “More!” during “Broken Heart,” and confetti falling from the sky during the final chorus of “But Daddy…” We picture gothic visuals, writing desks, typewriter props, period costumes and lightning strikes during this section.
Now, about that mashup. It’s absurd that Swift has never included any songs from her 2006 self-titled debut album — aka her first-ever era — on the main Eras Tour setlist. But it’s not too late to rectify that.
Picture this: The lights go down after Swift performs “Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me?” Costumes change, a tiger cage and other circus-themed set pieces are wheeled away. Then, the songwriter — her silhouette barely visible under the dim glow of an aquamarine spotlight — sings a cappella the final chorus of the first song about faking smiles in the face of heartbreak she ever released: “Teardrops on My Guitar.” Emphasis on the lyric, “the only one who’s got enough of me to break my heart.”
After she trails off on the last line — “Drew looks at me, I fake a smile so he won’t see” — the stadium comes to life once more as the crowd’s multi-color light-up bracelets go haywire, an explosion of sound filling the space. “I can read your mind,” Swift jumps in, surrounded by dancers as the lights suddenly go up, revealing one last fabulous costume. “‘She’s having the time of her life…’”
Once that’s done, she’ll move on to the finale, flipping off the haters, embracing her truest fans and proudly proclaiming her love for the man of her dreams in one fell swoop with “But Daddy I Love Him,” disappearing offstage before concertgoers have even finished singing along. Fin.
Sabrina Carpenter had a lot to discuss in her new Cosmopolitan digital cover story, from traveling the world with Taylor Swift on the Eras Tour to how she approaches dating (ahem, Barry Keoghan).
While reflecting on opening for the “Anti-Hero” singer on the superstar’s global Eras trek’s Latin America, Australia and Singapore legs, the Girl Meets World alum said she feels “so genuinely lucky.” “I get to perform a set that I’m super comfortable with, and then I get to watch one of the greatest performers every night,” she continued.
“It almost feels like a Broadway show because everything is so synchronized, but at the same time feels so in the moment,” Carpenter added. “That’s an art. It’s really hard to teach. It’s really hard to learn. And I feel so lucky that I get to watch Taylor perform every time. It makes me want to tour the world again, which is a good feeling.”
Trending on Billboard
The “Feather” singer’s Eras stint followed her own headlining tour for Emails I Can’t Send, Carpenter’s fourth studio album, which debuted at No. 23 on the Billboard 200 in July 2022. Swift’s trek has made for several memorable moments where Carpenter is concerned, from the time the two artists performed “White Horse” and “Coney Island” together to the Work It star’s nightly NSFW “Nonsense” outros.
“the most thank you’s I’ve ever thank you’d to Taylor,” she reflected in a recent Instagram post. “I feel so lucky to witness the magic that is you and this tour. there is truly no one like you and there never will be! i love you with all my heart and i will cherish this taybrina era (and all the eras) till the end of time.”
Another fan-favorite moment from Carpenter’s time with the Eras Tour came earlier this month, when cameras captured the singer-actress running into Barry Keoghan’s arms backstage. Since then, the couple have made their public debut, stepping out together at the 2024 Vanity Fair Oscars party.
Without naming the Saltburn actor directly, Carpenter shared that she prefers to leave her love life up to “fate.” “I know that’s super broad, but I don’t actively look for it,” she told Cosmo. “The relationships that I actually want to put my energy into have to be so interesting or invigorating because they take me away from the other things I love. So yeah, it’s fun and it’s messy. I think I’m still just at this place where I’m really enjoying the newness of all of it.”
See Carpenter on the digital cover of Cosmopolitan below.
Brendan Wixted for Cosmopolitan
Sabrina Carpenter for Cosmopolitan
Brendan Wixted for Cosmopolitan
