Taylor Swift - Speak Now (Oct 2010) - hype, anticipation &c

1hr 30 min as best I could time it, maybe a few minutes short of that. Setlist is short but she mixes up things a bit, some songs go on for longer, goes to another stage for the acoustic part etc.

cool, thanks (am checking whether i can make a second gig afterwards :/ )

Clearly different from location to location, but she did not start on time... by some margin. I think it might have been because the organizers were slow to get the crowds into the hall, though.

that's useful to know (in an oh-well-guess-i-can't-make-nicolas-jaar-then way) - i don't trust anything happening at the O2 to be on time, really

great night. she was on at 8.35 in mcr tonight, finished at 10.05. it's a pretty well-drilled set by now i think. high on polish and choreography, leavened by her clever acting of genuine astonishment at the adulation she receives.

hit the high notes in dear john (the backdrop was particularly nice on this one). the only bum note i could hear was the very last one of that song, but by then the screams had already restarted.

my daughter was overjoyed, she touched taylor flesh.

how had i not seen taylor swift rapping a nicki minaj song before!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TSSwUzdk8rU

<3 <3

she should've done the line about selling coke though :(

She and Michelle Trachtenberg should start a Minaj tribute act:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEW73k0bgDw

i just rapped along to michelle trachtenburg rapping along to nicki minaj :D

fuckin lasted longer than she did too

selena gomez too!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MVlS5Uj8Xs

and she did the coke line! (but it was faded out :( )

It doesn't surprise me, but I'm sure a lot of people would be astonished to learn that Taylor is really into Nicki Minaj.

OMG HER SHOW TONIGHT

DROP
EVERYTHING
NOW

#taylorswiftsurprisedface and #taylorswiftjesuspose both made several appearances, plus adorable audience interaction that was somehow even more adorable for being so obviously practised. she has a ton of stage presence!

so much ~relating~ going on in that arena. hearing all those thousands of teenage girls (and myself and cis) sing along to every word was amazing - in particular the coda of "enchanted" sticks out - "please don't be in love with someone else, please don't have somebody waiting for you" - everyone singing it, everyone in that arena had been there, heartbreaking and incredible

LOVE HER

Did she play Back to December??

(that's probably a harder communal singalong..)

yes! solo piano for first verse. everyone still sang along!

hearing all those thousands of teenage girls (and myself) sing along to every word was amazing

lol, story of my t.swift concert ^

"you know, one of the ways you know you're in love is when you finish each other's sentences. i wonder if..." [SINGS FIRST FEW WORDS OF CHORUS]

:D

nice review dorian! http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2011/mar/31/taylor-swift-o2-review

in other news, i only just realised that in "back to december" she apparently sings "your tan skin" - had always thought it was "your tense skin". i like my version better

i first always heard that as "your textin'" but knew it wasnt

Have you guys going gaga over Taylor live seen many contemporary/mainstream country shows before? Because this all sounds pretty par for the course on that front, from the pacing to the acoustic stage to etc. I'll still probably get tix to take my daughter this summer, because 6 years old seems about the right age. ;)

I'll still probably get tix to take my daughter this summer, because 6 years old seems about the right age. ;)

mine was 7 at the time, and to be fair she was among the younger girls in the crowd (most probably in the 10-18 range) but i'd be lying if i said she didn't have the time of her life...

Have you guys going gaga over Taylor live seen many contemporary/mainstream country shows before?

ha, no, certainly not in the UK - there really can't be many mainstream country shows in venues that size over here. i mean, part of us going gaga over taylor is because of hearing those songs live.

I've seen a lot of the "big" country acts - Garth, Shania, Reba and plenty more - and they're more or less like, I dunno, Bon Jovi shows, but more wholesome and with different songs. That is, akin to pretty generic (if enjoyable!) '80s arena shows. Gaudy, silly, corny, safe but aiming to please. Dixie Chicks were much better than the norm, though, from the playing to the stage design.

Taylor and Dolly are probably the only ones big enough to play the O2 - no one else springs to mind though I heard whispers of Brad Paisley playing there (he'll never fill it). Everyone else mainstream country (not some alt rubbish) seems to play Shepherds Bush Empire (2000 capacity) or Hammersmith Apollo (5000) at a push. Taylor's first UK show was at Kings College Student Union I believe which is about 400 (also the first place arcade fire played in Europe fact fans). Me and the wife had been listening to the first lp when it came out so were pretty pissed off to miss it.

at the O2 she was all "when i cam here first and played in Shepherd's Bush..." -- totally erasing the King's College gig from history :( (i remember it! i was there! i will not be silenced!)

*came here first

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKwWq4mnaiw

'I can do country as well'

Liked it. Screw the Mean naysayers.

xpost Apart from the Dixie Chicks in 98, I haven't seen another mainstream country show but for me the Taylor one was all about her songs and persona rather than the staging - the set-up seemed pretty formulaic, but then so do the structures of her songs - it's what she does inside the formula that counts.

The back-and-forth, re-tweeting and referencing between Roger Ebert and Taylor Swift since they started following eachother is pretty funny, and should lay to rest any belief that hers is a world of conservative ideas (because no one would be able to sit through Ebert's 186 anti-republican tweets a day if they were inclined to vote for them).

but he doesn't follow her? i can only find one actual communication between them. i'm fairly sure taylor (and most slebs) don't actually read their timelines that much.

the last two minutes of that mean performance are great. her facial expressions.

back to listening to 'speak now' each teatime, since the concert. and two songs that i wasn't sure about before the concert have become huge stayers: 'sparks fly' and 'long live'.

Liked it. Screw the Mean naysayers.

― abcfsk, Monday, April 4, 2011 9:14 AM (9 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

thanks for the link, thats a belter.

long live is noticeably cheesier than the rest of the album but i like it too. a good friend called the line "AND THE CYNICS WERE OUTRAGED / SCREAMING 'THIS IS ABSURD'" "unfortunate" and he's right but i can dig the song's prideful excess. it's kind of like "juicy" for someone who grew up with disney princesses.

xp Ah, he did follow her, though, and even made a blog 'page' on her birthday http://twitter.com/#!/ebertchicago/status/14455108200824833. She must read his tweets since she's retweeted stuff not directed at her.

ebert: america's uncle

fantastic song, but the worst line's gotta be when she calls her touring band & herself "a band of thieves in ripped-up jeans" o_O

xp re: "long live"

yes some of the lyrics might have been better written but she turned the song from one about her band into one about everyone else in front of her. i looked down the row of seats and my daughter was clapping and crying. and it was happy and sad for me in the same instant.

and i wished i were her age again.

i like the thieves/jeans rhyme fwiw

"Long Live" is my least favorite track; the chorus sounds like it could have blasted over the end credits of an Ann Hathaway vehicle from 2001.

"long live" rules

I've warmed up to "Long Live" a lot, didn't care for it much at first. I like how it plugs into her obsession with recognizing, cataloging and holding onto specific emotions and experiences because she knows they won't last -- it goes from "Remember this moment" in the first verse to imagining some future when she's not even in touch with any of these people any more and they're showing their hypothetical kids pictures of it all.

The song it reminds me of most, thematically and in its embrace/effective deployment of clichés is Springsteen's "No Surrender."

That's a great way to put it, tipsy. It's def. a highlight of the album for me---my attention lags a bit (a bit!) after "Mean" but peaks again with the last two songs.

and each night she plays it she's with another crowd/moment telling herself and them to hold onto it.

it's cheesy in a stagey way, but it works.

like elvis doing 'can't help falling in love' in ever more cabaret-esque stylings at the end of each show.

"long live" has always been a favourite of mine - you don't need to think about who she wrote it about (just like the love songs), but she totally nails that one moment of being at your absolute best - at the absolute height of that thrill, when you feel invulnerable and 73 feet tall (cf t.i.'s "what you know"). i listened to it a lot around the time of the london protests in december and last week.