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Taylor's Speeches on the Eras Tour (masterpost)

Denver, CO 14/07/23 & 15/07/23

Taylor Swift before singing Lover in Denver, CO on 14th July 2023

"It is an honor, a privilege, a thrill, and a delight to get to say these words to you: Denver, Colorado, welcome to the Eras Tour! I am looking out at this gigantic, fantastic, passionate crowd, I just, I have a suspicion about something, but I just wanted to check with you, so I had a question: Is there anyone here tonight who has gone to a substantial, extensive amount of effort in order to be with us here on this Friday night? Awesome, that seems to be about all 73,000 of you, which I had suspected. So I have to say, on behalf of every person that you see on this stage, all of our crew, everyone who helped put this show together, thank you from the bottom of our hearts for deciding to spend your evening with us at the Eras Tour. Speaking of the people you see on this stage, I’m not trying to brag, that’s annoying, but allow me this one thing to get to brag about: We have the most incredible opening acts on the Eras Tour tonight. I want to mention them because they’re fantastic. You started off your evening seeing an incredibly talented singer-songwriter who is a friend of mine. She’s absolutely wonderful, her music is fantastic, support her forever. Give it up again for Gracie Abrams. Next you saw a band that absolutely bodied it so hard you probably didn’t know what to do because they are that incredible. We are so lucky to have Muna on this tour! Alright, let’s talk about us now. You and I are about to go on a little journey, and it’s gonna span 17 years of music, and we’re going to do this one era at a time. How does that sound? Alright let’s do this Denver! I just want to say, before we start, I have one goal this evening. These songs you’re about to hear? They may have been about something that I wrote about something that happened to me in my life, or a feeling I felt at one point, but after tonight, I hope that anytime you hear these songs out in the world, you’re gonna think about tonight, and the memories we made tonight in here, in Denver, Colorado. Oh, and one more thing. I’ll be your host this evening, my name’s Taylor."

Taylor Swift before singing champagne problems in Denver, CO on 14th July 2023

"Well, well, well, Denver, we have a lot to catch up on. We really do. I haven’t toured in five years. You know, I started playing shows and writing songs when I was 12 years old, so, so the five years that I haven’t been playing shows for you, and getting to dance with you, and sing with you, and experience this insane, euphoric connection with you, that was the longest I’d ever gone without getting that feeling, and getting that sense of connection. So honestly, thank you for coming, I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to be with you guys. And actually, you know, like, we’re pretty close to being at the end of the US leg of the Eras Tour. This is extremely emotional for me every single second that I get to be up here and hanging out with you, and especially when a crowd is as jumping and bouncy as this crowd has been. I can see every single one of you. This is the most buoyant, bouncy crowd imaginable. You get a million bonus points for that. I can’t imagine, you’re probably already tired, it’s amazing! Yeah, we got a lot to catch up on, because basically while I was away, and while we were away from each other—ugh—I just felt like, ‘If I can’t play shows, and I can’t connect with them in that way, you know what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna make as many albums as humanly possible and put them out.’ So that’s what I did, and so we have some new family members in our musical family member—in our musical family, just our musical family. Sometimes my brain just doesn’t do the words and the piano at the same time. Would you please join me in welcoming to our musical family Lover, and then we have folklore, then evermore, and last but certainly not least, Midnights. And you were so kind in supporting and embracing those albums, and I remember when I was releasing these albums and you know—I used to just be like ‘Okay, so I’ll put out an album, and then we’ll do a tour called that album’s name.’ That’s what I always used to do before. This is the first time I’ve ever done anything other than that. And during the five years I wasn’t touring, people kind of would come up to me and be like, ‘You put out like, it’s been like four, five albums that you haven’t toured on. You haven’t played them live. Like, what’s the plan? What are you going to do? Are you going to do a three-and-a-half-hour show? And like, play all of them?’ And I said ‘Yes. It’s called the Eras Tour.’ But you know, there were some moments when I didn’t know when we were going to get to go back on tour that I would write a song, and then I would feel truly wistful, and I would feel a sense of longing, that I really, really wished that I could play that song live with you, and one of those songs— excuse me, this [wind] is unacceptable, there are 73,000 people here—and one of the songs that I really wanted to play with you after I wrote it, that was called champagne problems."

Taylor Swift before singing All Too Well (10 Minute Version) in Denver, CO on 14th July 2023

"Are we enjoying the Red era so far, Denver? So the Red album is actually an album I’ve gotten to record and release twice now. The reason for that being that ever since I was a teenager, it’s just been really, really important for me, like it’s been a lifelong dream for me, to one day own my work, to own my music. And so a couple of years ago, I announced that I was going to be re-recording and re-releasing my entire first six albums, and I was going to call them Taylor’s Version. And you know, that’s kind of the definition of a passion project. It was something that I knew I was doing personally for me, and so I wasn’t going to demand or expect that you get behind this, or support this, or like my versions better, or something. But the most generous, wonderful surprise came my way when you guys were just like, ‘Nope, if this is important to you, it’s important to us. Let’s do this world,’ and we did this together. And so I’ve gotten to embark on this really exciting adventure where I get to revisit my past, and my past work, and try to improve upon it, and try to show you more of what the project actually originally was, so I’ll include songs that were originally written for that album, but didn’t make the album for one reason or another. If I’m still proud of that song, I’ll go back to it, I’ll re-record it, and I’ll give it to you, because I think you deserve to see the entire, full project of what the album was. And sometimes that’s a song you haven’t heard before, because we didn’t release it, or in other cases, it’s a song that was originally a lot longer, and didn’t end up on the album. So there’s another song I want to play from Red if you happen to have about 10 minutes to spare?"

Taylor Swift before singing betty in Denver, CO on 14th July 2023

"And so we have brought the folklore cabin to Denver! Folklore was, it was an album I started about two days into the pandemic—you can hear that, right? Okay, eventually they’ll figure out why I can’t hear it. Ah, there it is. So I started writing folklore about two days into the pandemic, and it was really sort of this imaginary dreamscape for me to sort of escape into. I think we all kinda did that during the pandemic. We all just figured out ways that we could just be somewhere else in our minds, or just watch so much TV, or just drank so much wine. I did all of those things, so basically folklore was the productive thing that I did during the pandemic. And this cabin was kind of something that I just imagined, you know? But when I did imagine it, to be perfectly honest, it kind of like, I did picture it in Colorado a bit. It’s pretty here! It’s really, really pretty here! And anyways so folklore was like, a way to escape from the pandemic, reality, and also a way to escape from writing excruciatingly autobiographical songs. Cause I started toying with the idea of like, writing fictional stories about characters that I would create, and having those characters interact, and see what happened, and see if you guys were into it, and you were, which was really cool, because it was a blast. And there’s a few characters I really love, and they’re in what I fondly refer to the teenage love triangle portion of the album. And so there’s this character, this teenage boy named James, and he really, really, really screws things up with the love of his life, and he realizes it, and he has to make it right. He has to apologise, really sincerely apologise, and try to win her back at a party where all her friends are and anyway. Her name is Betty!"

Taylor Swift before singing Picture To Burn (guitar) in Denver, CO on 14th July 2023

"Welcome to the acoustic portion of the evening! So this is a new tradition that, I haven’t done this until the Eras Tour, but the fact that it’s called the Eras Tour, and I’m kind of trying to go back and explore a lot of my music that I haven’t played live before, or that I haven’t played in ages, like such a long time, because I feel like, if we’re, I don’t know, in the spirit of nostalgia, we should be exploring all the eras, you know, including like my first album that I wrote when I was like 14? This is Picture To Burn!"

No speech before singing Timeless (piano) in Denver, CO on 14th July 2023

Taylor Swift before singing Lover in Denver, CO on 15th July 2023

"What an absolute treat, and thrill, and honor, and privilege it is to say these words to you: Denver, Colorado, welcome to the Eras Tour! I am looking out at one of the most stunning, enthusiastic, well-prepared crowds, let’s talk about, and just give yourselves a hand for the amount of preparation that you put into being here on this Saturday night! It takes a lot of effort to go to a stadium show, and it takes even more effort to show up looking like this. It’s very cute, Denver, it’s very cute. I love it when my show starts out in the daylight, because I get to take a really good look at every single one of the 73,000 people here who were kind enough to show up and hang out with me. So you’ve also been hanging out with our incredible opening acts that we have here on the Eras Tour. I would like to talk about them for a second. You started off your evening seeing an incredible singer-songwriter who I love so much, I love her so dearly, so would you please make some noise again for Gracie Abrams? Next up, you saw a band who has been absolutely killing it on the Eras Tour. They are so incredible every single night of this tour that they have played with us, and actually, it’s very sad, this is the last night that we have with them, so you need to scream as loudly as possible for Muna! To get back to us, we’re about to go on a little adventure, and it’s about to span 17 years of music and we’re gonna do this one era at a time. How does that sound, Denver? Great! So I’m going to tell you my little goal for the evening, okay? These songs started out being written about something that happened to me in my life, or something I felt at one point in time but after tonight my goal is this: that every single time you hear one of those songs after tonight, you’re going to think about us and the memories we made together on this Saturday night in Denver, Colorado! I’ll be your host this evening, my name is Taylor!"

Taylor Swift before singing champagne problems in Denver, CO on 15th July 2023

"Oh you guys, we have so much to catch up on! So much! We haven’t toured, I haven’t toured in five years. So you know, I’ve been writing songs, and then playing shows, and playing those songs in those shows with you guys since I was 12 years old, so that—doing something for that long, it kinda becomes a part of your personality, like part of my entire personality is that I feel something, I write a song about that thing, and then I go, ‘Do you guys like it? Did you feel that? Or is it just me? No, it’s you too?’ And that makes me feel so much better. So that’s been a massive coping mechanism for me. And then, you know, we had a global pandemic, and there were much more important issues at hand than when I would get to do another show, so those took precedence—rightfully so—but I just kept thinking, ‘How can I stay in touch with them? How can I keep this connection going that we’ve been building together for years and years and years?’ So I just figured, ‘You know what I’m gonna do if I can’t play shows? I’m gonna write, record, and put out as many albums as humanly possible in this time.’ So that’s what I did, and so we have some new musical members of the family I would like to acknowledge, and their names are Lover, folklore, evermore, and last but certainly not least, we have Midnights! And so the way that I used to always do things before—the Eras Tour is a new thing for me, this is a new concept of playing songs from a million different albums—I always used to make an album, put out that album, and then do a tour that was called that album name tour, like Red Tour, Speak Now Tour, Fearless Tour, reputation Tour, 1989 Tour. And so when all these new albums were coming out but I wasn’t touring them, I’d have people come up to me and say, ‘What are you gonna do? What are you going to do, like just do a tour with all of these albums, and then it’ll be like three-and-a-half-hours long?’ I said. ‘Yes, that is exactly what I am going to do, and it is called the Eras Tour. I think they might like it, I don't know.’ So here we are. I will say though, that in the time that I was writing albums during the pandemic—evermore was the second pandemic album that I made, and there was this time when I finished writing a song and I just thought, ‘Ugh, it would just be so much fun to get to play champagne problems with all of them.’ So let’s do it."

Taylor Swift before singing betty in Denver, CO on 15th July 2023

"And so we have brought the folklore cabin to Denver, Colorado! folklore was an album that I started writing about two days into the pandemic, and you know how it was. We were all trying to figure out methods of escapism, and we all had different ones, and one of mine was writing folklore—that was the only productive one. But I definitely feel like folklore was a different album for me in a lot of different ways, because I had always, before folklore, I’d always just written sort of excruciatingly autobiographical songs about my own life, with lots of details, and that—and as fun as that is for everyone, including me sometimes, it can also get a bit stressful if you do it enough times. And so, it was actually sort of relaxing to sit back and be like, ‘No, maybe I can tell stories about fictional characters, and these fictional characters feel this way about this other fictional character,’ but of course, of course, of course I will like, you know, I’m imposing my own feelings onto these fictional characters, right? And I’m still doing the things in folklore that I’ve always kind of done in terms of common themes. Like, I love, I have certain kind of patterns in my songwriting, like I love to write songs about 2am or the middle of the night. I love to feature that in lyrics. And another thing that I love to do in songs is I just love to womansplain to men how to apologize. It is genuinely one of my favorite things to do in a song. And I’m actually, I’m not saying that any man who is here tonight needs to know how to apologize, because if you are here you are clearly so emotionally intelligent, so this is not for you. This is for those other ones, who don’t know how to apologize. So I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be so fun, and radical, to have a song where like, a teenage boy is apologizing sincerely for something he’s done wrong, and really, really meaning it.’ So I invented this character named James. He’s a teenage boy who really screws things up with the love of his life, and he very sincerely apologies to her, and her name is Betty!"

Taylor Swift before singing Starlight (guitar) in Denver, CO on 15th July 2023

"So welcome to the acoustic section of the evening! So on this tour, since this is the Eras Tour, and I’m trying to really re-explore all these different parts of music that I’ve written and that you’ve been so nice, and encouraging, and supportive of over the last 17 years that I’ve been putting out albums, and so I’ve been trying to do different songs every night, and do ones that I haven’t done in ages or just, I’ve really tried not to repeat any and I don’t think I have—I only have when I messed up. That’s the other rule: If I mess up, I get to do it again so I can redeem myself. But for the most part, these are all just songs I haven’t really performed very often, or at least in like a decade or something. This is one of those songs that I haven’t done in a really long time. It’s called Starlight!"

No speech before singing Back To December (piano) in Denver, CO on 15th July 2023

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