People are now posting from INSIDE the stadium – with Sabrina Carpenter due to come on at 6.30PM AEDT. More on her later – but for now, some first looks:
The queues. They are long.
Filters BETA
We have Guardian’s video whizz turned Swifty correspondent Lisa Favazzo on the ground armed with an iPhone and boom microphone, and speaking to excited fans.
Sendhil Rungasamy and Urva Patel travelled all the way from New Zealand to Melbourne to see T-Swift. They were so busy saving up for the travel costs they didn’t have time to make friendship bracelets.
“You can’t miss the Eras Tour... it’s the best thing since sliced bread,” said Rungasamy.
“We were working full-time to save up for the trip, one of our friends gave us this (the bracelet).”
Julie Cameron told Favazzo she’d been a fan of Swift since “she was in country”.
“She’s such a good role model for the younger girls. She’s just an amazing person all round.”
Venue being tested for asbestos prior to Sydney shows
To sidestep from Melbourne for a moment:
The Daily Telegraph has reported that Sydney’s Olympic Park will be tested for asbestos this weekend, ahead of Taylor Swift’s concerts next week.
The news comes amid an expanding asbestos investigation happening across Sydney.
A government source told the DT that the testing is proactive. The exact location is yet to be confirmed.
Taylor is set to perform four shows at Olympic Park on Friday 23, Saturday 24, Sunday 25 and Monday 26 February. About 320,000 fans are expected to be at Olympic Park for the Eras concert and a Blink-182 show, per the DT.
More to come …
MCG turf to ‘lose two-thirds’ ahead of men’s AFL season
It’s the start of the men’s AFL season just a few weeks away, some are wondering what mark three Taylor Swift concerts and nearly 300,000 fans will leave on the hallowed ground.
Very understandable, given last year Ed Sheeran’s team reportedly spent $1.5m replacing the turf after his two record-breaking performances eight days before round one.
Footy supporters can breathe a sigh of relief though: this morning the chief executive of the Melbourne Cricket Club, Stuart Fox, said the process for replacing the turf in time for the footy season will be much the same as it was after Sheeran’s visit.
“This will be the biggest impact we’ve ever had on our turf, this concert, and that’s obviously because of the overlay on the turf, so we actually will lose around two-thirds of the turf,” Fox told 3AW.
“We’ve got a contract with a turf farm off-site, we’ve got 12,000 sq m of turf coming in next Tuesday once the bump-out’s complete and that is all replaced. It’s a huge impact, about a 12-day job to get it ready for round one [of the AFL].”
There was some criticism from players and coaches after AFL round one last year that the field wasn’t up to scratch – but it did pass all preseason checks and the replacement process was deemed a worthwhile success.
And never mind grand final day, Fox said the buzz around the city and the stadium in recent days was unprecedented.
“I’ve not seen a buildup like it before at the ’G. Logistically very challenging, but the hype and buildup has been incredible, particularly from the fans.”
In case you were wondering, Swift will be kicking towards the Punt Road end of the ground.
‘We are close to the stage so wanted to draw attention’
So. Many. Sequins.
Dani and Lily are in row six. Lily said it was “pure luck! We waited so many hours. We joined the queue at the start and we didn’t get on till 7-8pm.”
The pair are dresses as mirror balls from the era/album folklore.
We wanted to be as sparkly as possible,” Dani said. “We are close to the stage so we wanted to draw as much attention. As selfish as that is!
I am most excited for the first few moments of seeing Taylor. It’s been six years since the last tour and it’s going to be incredible to see her up close and personal again.
People are now posting from INSIDE the stadium – with Sabrina Carpenter due to come on at 6.30PM AEDT. More on her later – but for now, some first looks:
The queues. They are long.
‘I was making bracelets for Blink-182’
Back outside the MCG, Millie, Pierre, MacKenzie, and Liana have just met and are trading bracelets.
Pierre and Millie are self-described “Swemos”. Swemos, for the uninitiated, are emos (think Paramore/Fall Out Boy) who also love Taylor.
The pair have been making bracelets since tickets were released, and have brought with them a whole bag to trade.
“We got Taylor Swift tickets and then we were like, ‘Excellent, we have gained a hobby’,” Millie says.
“We’ve been doing it for eight months,” Pierre says.
Millie says after tonight, they are just going to keep making them. “We had a Blink-182 show last week, I was making bracelets for Blink … Just every event, we are like, ‘Oh – a bracelet!’”
Like many fans, MacKenzie thought they had possibly missed out.
“I was in the hospital when I got them, I managed to get accessible seats when I was in there. They called the day after – I thought we had no chance, and now we are here!”
The TayTay academics who descended on Melbourne
Melbourne is by no measure playing it cool that Swift is in town (see: Flinders Street Station all lit up). But earlier this week the University of Melbourne also hosted a “Swiftposium”: an academic symposium dedicated to all things Swift.
More than 400 papers were submitted by academics from around the world, working in fields as varied as economics and gender studies.
Studies presented at the Swiftposium included: the impact of the Eras tour on cities, with politicians sometimes begging Swift to tour in their towns in order to see a corresponding economic boom; how her music is being used in CPR training; how Australian politicians have used Swift references to appear relatable; and even an analysis of how public transport is mentioned in her lyrics (which reportedly found that, as her private jet use has increased, so have the references to trains and buses).
Read more here:
Swifties gather for largest show of Taylor Swift’s Eras tour to date at the MCG
‘I am proud of her’
Chris, who is dressed as Reputation, is currently outside the MCG waiting for his friends. He’s been to see every Taylor tour she has done in Melbourne.
I wore the same outfit to the Reputation tour. I’ve seen every tour, I saw her when she was at Billboard in Russell Street, and now she’s at the MCG.
This was a lot harder to get tickets to, but I think it will be her best one yet,” he said.
I think she’s just come into her own, I feel like she’s at the peak of her career, I don’t think it’ll drop anytime soon but it’s just a celebration of all her eras and the hard work she’s put into her music.
I am trying to be calm, but I am so excited. I am proud of her – she’s awesome.
Will Travis Kelce show?
Are the rumours true that Taylor Swift’s boyfriend might make a special appearance at an Eras show down under?
Kansas City Chiefs tight-end Travis Kelce, who has been dating Swift since September last year, mentioned he could be flying to Australia following his huge Super Bowl win on Monday.
On his New Heights podcast that he co-hosts with his brother Jason, the footballer said that he was “about to go on a f--ing adventure myself over to an island here soon”.
When asked by his brother which island, Kelce said:
I don’t know. I think the best ones are south right now. I’m going to go south.
While the comment doesn’t confirm the athlete will hop on a plane to Australia, the reason fans are speculating is because, firstly, Kelce has been super supportive of Taylor during her Eras tour.
I will leave this here:
Taylor did just fly halfway around the world through multiple time zones to watch him play (and win!) the Super Bowl …
‘The energy in the stadium will be electrifying’
Outside the MCG fans are starting to gather for Taylor’s first Melbourne show of this tour. People are buying merch and lots are wearing sequins.
Emily and Charlotte are down here from Sydney – they almost missed out on tickets. Emily said she cried when she thought they didn’t get them.
“I’ve been a fan of Taylor since I can remember when. Childhood, birth, came out of the womb with Taylor Swift. I was like if I don’t get this, when she’s playing every single era, I will die.”
Charlotte said she sat online for hours and eventually scored a hotel package, which the pair jumped on.
“When Taylor comes out, the energy in the stadium will be electrifying. It’ll be amazing to be surrounded by a bunch of people who share this love for Taylor.”
They both said there was a real sense of community in the air down here as the crowd built, with people chatting and sharing friendship bracelets.
“It’s much different than any other concert I’ve been too,” Emily said. “I went to ten concerts last year and most of those were tiny, tiny venues, but this feels more close than those ones.”
Hello it is culture editor Steph here, with an enormous coffee (this thing goes until 11pm???!) and a guest post.
We did debate whether or not we were overdoing it with the Taylor Swift coverage – but the Eras tour juggernaut has become one of the biggest cultural moments of our time, AND it’s particularly huge news for Australia, AND sometimes having fun is good.
Besides, liveblogging so-called “things-that-aren’t-news” has a rich history at the Guardian. Once we tried to live blog a leap second; another time, on a fairly hot day, we cracked an egg on the pavement outside and liveblogged what happened to it (not much).
We’re not sure how this will go. The MCG is a notorious reception black hole during big events, and while Telstra have promised to optimise their capacity “by adjusting the configuration of cells and the balance of traffic between them”, we have absolutely no idea what that means – so we’re sending a satellite phone as back-up.
This technology is usually used by the Guardian in war zones and bushfires. Whoever ends up with it will have to pull out its very long antenna and aim it at the sky in order to send us text messages by rapping out numbers repeatedly on a keypad, just like in the old days.
We can see the Swifties getting excited as the gates begin to open at the MCG.
As we reported earlier in the blog, this will be Taylor’s biggest concert yet with an average of 86,000 people attending each Melbourne concert over the next three nights.
4.30pm gates open
6.20pm show starts
The music is set to kick off with pop princess Sabrina Carpenter as the opening act.
Taylor is set to come on stage around 7.30pm or 8pm at the latest. But we will keep you posted.
We’ve also just set up a TIP LINE because we are TAKING THIS SERIOUSLY. If you want to send us fun facts/pics/a lot of emotions, hit us up at melb.eras@guardian.co.uk
https://news.google.com/rss/articles/CBMizwFodHRwczovL3d3dy50aGVndWFyZGlhbi5jb20vbXVzaWMvbGl2ZS8yMDI0L2ZlYi8xNi90YXlsb3Itc3dpZnQtbWVsYm91cm5lLWNvbmNlcnQtbGl2ZS1zaG93LXVwZGF0ZXMtZXJhcy10b3VyLXRpY2tldHMtc2V0bGlzdC1zdGFydC10aW1lLXN1cHBvcnQtYWN0cy1zYWJyaW5hLWNhcnBlbnRlci11cGRhdGVzLW5ld3MtbWNnLXRyYWZmaWMtYXVzdHJhbGlhLXRvdXLSAQA?oc=5
2024-02-16 05:59:00Z
CBMizwFodHRwczovL3d3dy50aGVndWFyZGlhbi5jb20vbXVzaWMvbGl2ZS8yMDI0L2ZlYi8xNi90YXlsb3Itc3dpZnQtbWVsYm91cm5lLWNvbmNlcnQtbGl2ZS1zaG93LXVwZGF0ZXMtZXJhcy10b3VyLXRpY2tldHMtc2V0bGlzdC1zdGFydC10aW1lLXN1cHBvcnQtYWN0cy1zYWJyaW5hLWNhcnBlbnRlci11cGRhdGVzLW5ld3MtbWNnLXRyYWZmaWMtYXVzdHJhbGlhLXRvdXLSAQA
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