Anyone with an ear tuned to the world of pop music knew the Eras Tour was going to be a big one.
It was Taylor Swift’s first tour in almost five years, the longest gap of her career. And Swift, long the biggest star in pop music, had become even bigger, transcending the Top 40 to become a cultural phenomenon.
Moreover, this tour would include extensive music, not just from her most recent album, “Midnights,” but from her entire career, from the country of “Fearless” to the pop of “1989” to the indie pop of “Folklore.”
The first concert came in March 2023 in Glendale, Ariz., and it was even bigger than anyone imagined: three hours, 15 minutes without intermission and more than 40 songs.
And the excitement just kept building, with frenzied anticipation in every city, attendance records broken and vast economic impacts in regions and even entire countries.
Tickets vanished in seconds, then quickly popped up on the secondary market at 10 times the price. Fans who couldn’t obtain or afford tickets came to the venues anyway, content to commune with others like them and sing along with the amplified music coming from inside.
Now, almost two years later, the tour is coming to an end on Sunday night in Vancouver, Canada.
Destination Vancouver, a tourism agency, estimated the concert series poured $157 million into the local economy.
“It’s turned the city upside down,” said Jarrett Vaughan, a business school professor at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. “For one person to have such a big impact, it’s really unprecedented.”
A few blocks from the Vancouver concert venue, BC Place, on Saturday night, the perimeter was barricaded with dump trucks and lots of police. But closer to the concert site, the atmosphere was bubbly and friendly, with people giving away pink hats with fur.
Melissa Pallin, 39, of Portland, Ore., said she spent about $1,900 per ticket for a family of four but that it was worth it. Her family drove nine hours to celebrate her daughter’s 16th birthday, which comes on Dec. 12, one day before Swift’s.
Val Iddings, 43, of Rapid City, S.D., said her family has followed the Eras tour across several time zones, from her home state to Cheyenne, Wyo., to Denver, and now Vancouver. Her daughter Kaylee, 18, attended her first Swift concert at age two.
As much as the tour’s success was expected, much happened over its course that could not have been anticipated.
Ticket snags led to lawmakers demanding that Ticketmaster clean up its act and even threatened to break the company up. The Justice Department opened an antitrust investigation and a Senate subcommittee held hearings.
Things changed during the tour.
When it began in March 2023, Swift was still in a six-year-long relationship with the British actor Joe Alwyn. But a month later, reports began to circulate that the relationship was over.
The N.F.L. star Travis Kelce attended one of the Eras concerts but said he did not get a chance to give Swift a friendship bracelet with his phone number on it. Nevertheless, by the fall dating rumors were swirling and Swift began to attend Kansas City Chiefs games.
She popped up often enough that some football fans hyperbolized that she was being shown on TV more than the players. Swift and Kelce remain together.
In July 2023, she released “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version)” and in August onstage in Inglewood, Calif., she announced “1989 (Taylor’s Version),” which was released in October.
In October 2023 some of the fans shut out by high ticket prices and sold-out concerts were able to see the film “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour,” which Swift got into theaters through AMC, a theater company, rather than a movie studio. It grossed more than $250 million worldwide.
The Eras Tour got a shake-up in April 2024 when Swift released a new album, “The Tortured Poets Department.” When the tour resumed after a two-month break in May, she had added a new era.
In a darker twist, promoters in August canceled her three scheduled concerts in Vienna after two men were charged in connection with plotting a terrorist attack targeting the tour. Fans made the best of it, trading bracelets and gathering on Corneliusstrasse, an allusion to her song about New York City, “Cornelia Street.”
Even a presidential election was not untouched by Swiftmania. Swift, who in recent years has become more outspoken on political issues, endorsed Kamala Harris in September.
The list of celebrities attending the tour almost seemed to be longer than the list of those who did not.
A sampling of those at one or more shows: Bradley Cooper, Flavor Flav, Selena Gomez, Hugh Grant, Mindy Kaling, Alicia Keys, Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Lawrence, Simu Liu, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Katy Perry, Julia Roberts, Paul Rudd, Emma Stone, Sydney Sweeney, Justin Trudeau and Prince William.
In Vancouver on Saturday night, Kelly Rogers, 42, and Bac Walker, 32, said they hadn’t planned to come to the show but they drove from Everett and Kent, Wash., after scoring tickets on Thursday night.
They threw together last-minute costumes inspired by the Anti-Hero music video. They wore flowered sheets over their heads, along with heart-shaped sun glasses. “We didn’t have time to put together something super cute, so we decided to stay warm,” Rogers said.
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