Taylor Swift Eras tour Melbourne concert: relive the pop star’s biggest ever show – as it happened (2024)

We got another missive from a fan, Scott!

“I’m at MCG,” he writes. “Apparently boyfriends of Swifties attending the concert are required to wear Kansas Chief shirts. I assume there is a need to assert their cis-ness. I on the other hand feel the need to assert my sissy-ness.”

We love you Scott!

This feels like a good time to call out my colleague Claire Keenan, who rocked up to her shift like this:

One person in the Guardian group chat has assessed it as “fine”; another says the Olivia Newton-John cover was the highlight, but mainly because “I don’t know a single song of hers”.

In more exciting news, someone has already uploaded the outro to Nonsense (the part she changes for every performance/city).

Taylor Swift on at 8pm! What should we order for dinner??? Send us ideas at melb.eras@guardian.co.uk

Has Taylormania surpassed Beatlemania?

John emailed the Guardian just now with this beautiful note:

I am in my 70s. Two years ago I had scarcely heard of Taylor Swift. Now here I am following your blog of her Melbourne concert. It is very moving. I hope all these wonderful young people have a magnificent time. I haven’t had this much fun since the Beatles in the 60s. It was easier to get tickets then.

You can also send us your thoughts on: melb.eras@guardian.co.uk

Bree Leitch went one step further and got a snake tattoo on her arm “for the concert”. And yes, it’s real.

We’re getting some good Twitter/X footage, which bodes well for reception!

Here is Sabrina Carpenter performing Vicious.

And here’s that Olivia cover:

Crowds are filling the stadium now while Sabrina performs. She’s doing a cover of Hopelessly Devoted to You, in honour of Olivia Newton-John.

Here’s one of Sabrina’s hit songs, Nonsense.

Apparently Sabrina just said “Australians are so hot”, which, true.

In other news, our Guardian group chat is popping off!

Sian said earlier:

The vibes are very calm! It’s like the opposite of a sport game.

Even the cops have bracelets on.

I expect this has changed now that the concert has started.

Matilda shared a pic of the free light-up bracelets she’s secured:

Sian shared her girl dinner pre-concert:

And our colleague Meadow Nguyen got a Tay Tam!

Oooh here she is!

And here:

What to expect from Sabrina Carpenter’s set?

We are told there was “just an announcement and some cheers” from within the stadium, indicating Sabrina Carpenter is on stage.

Carpenter’s hit songs are Feather and Nonsense, so they will definitely get a run – but Nonsense has its own moment to watch out for: each time she plays it live she adds a few city-specific (and usually sexually explicit) lines to the outro.

For example:

“I just wanna ride him like a rodeo / But first he gotta grow it like Pinocchio / Sorry I’m so vulgar, San Antonio.”

In fact, they got so raunchy that her performance on BBC’s Live Lounge was taken off YouTube shortly after being uploaded, and was promptly replaced with a version cutting abruptly before the outro.

Luckily we have no such qualms – she sang:

“I’m American I am not British / So BBC it stands for something different / This live lounge is just so lit because I’m in it.”

It’s a savvy trick that means each time she plays you can be sure hundreds of videos will be uploaded by fans. Now a viral sensation, she was quickly snapped up by Swift to open for her during the international leg of her tour – and since her first Eras slot, she’s established another TikTok-able moment: a small dance section of the song Feather.

We’re ten minutes from the scheduled start time for Sabrina Carpenter’s opening set. We all know Swift’s 2016 villain arc (the Kanye West video) and redemption story (arguably the Lover era), but did you know that Carpenter has been through this public-opinion hero’s journey too?

The US pop star started off on the Disney Channel, playing Maya Hart on Girl Meets World. She put out a few songs during her stint on the show, and was liked well enough, but it was a different Disney star that threw Carpenter into the public eye: Olivia Rodrigo, whose hit debut album Sour was almost definitely about her breakup from Joshua Bassett, who, according to the album at least, began dating another girl VERY shortly after their split.

The hints in the lyrics of Rodrigo’s songs hint at who that girl could have been: Sabrina Carpenter, seen hanging out with Bassett in the months after the breakup – and who suffered the wrath of the internet as a result.

Luckily, she’s very funny – and as the initial wave of hate died down, she started winning people over on social media with posts like this.

And here she is meeting fans at Melbourne airport – and receiving her first koala.