Taylor Swift ain’t cool, but boomers get her musical language
Taylor Swift’s talent as a songwriter and volume of work are key reasons why the 33-year-old can captivate an audience twice her age.
A cardholder-exclusive American Express pre-sale implies the existence of a boomer Taylor Swift fan base. That the 33-year-old pop monolith can captivate an audience twice her age will come as no surprise to Swift concert veterans.
We all had our limits tested by Opal card-befuddled elderly in the battle arena of Sydney Olympic Park train station as we exited from her 2018 Reputation tour.
What truly astounds is the sheer magnitude of Swiftie boomers: a March survey revealed them as the second largest demographic group (23 per cent), trailing only behind millennials (45 per cent), and surpassing the representation of Generation Z (11 per cent) by a factor of two.
As an honorary young (ish) person, I was asked to write about why I think boomers are embracing Swift over other stadium-filling artists such as (the chronically boring) Ed Sheeran.
As somebody who has nought to do with that generation, speaking on their behalf feels ill-advised. As does dropping $379 on an A-reserve ticket.
Two things to pursue with gusto.
The most obvious starting point is that Swift is first and foremost a songwriter, one whose musical language has been shaped by Nashville’s values of artistry and good old-fashioned storytelling.
When I think of great boomer albums I think of Joni Mitchell’s Blue and Tapestry by Carole King – the latter of whom Swift inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2021.
On Swift’s masterpiece, 2012’s Red, Mitchell’s influence has never been more obvious – down to the album cover and title, a hat tip to Mitchell’s 1971 album.
Both records are masterclasses in achingly specific, confessional narratives about love and heartache – brimming with lyrics that relish in the minutiae.
Take, for example, the opening lines of Mitchell’s The Last Time I Saw Richard: “The last time I saw Richard was Detroit in 68/And he told me all romantics meet the same fate someday/Cynical and drunk and boring someone in some dark cafes” compared with the opening lines of Red centrepiece All Too Well, “I walked through the door with you/The air was cold/But something about it felt like home somehow/And I left my scarf there at your sister’s house/And you’ve still got it in your drawer even now.”
Swift frequently earns comparisons with Bob Dylan, and, when it comes to the matter of crafting songs that encourage feverish parsing for meaning among writers, journalists, and fans, is perhaps his only rival. Though where Dylan begrudges this kind of lyrical dissection, Swift gleefully encourages it with the hard-to-crack clues in her liner notes.
It was just a couple of years back when Swift reprised her 2012 album Red, specifically All Too Well – a takedown of former boyfriend Jake Gyllenhaal who left her on her 21st birthday. It was a moment when boomers began to take her more seriously as a songwriter.
There’s also the matter of Swift’s output, with 200 songs published, her discography is a grab-bag with something for everyone. If you’re more of a Bruce Springsteen fan than a folk lover, anything produced by The Boss-worshipper Jack Antonoff should tickle your fancy. In the mood for big glossy pop songs a la the Eurythmics? There’s 1989 for that.
She’s also a clever businesswoman. In 2019 Swift launched a feminist crusade against label executive Scooter Braun, the owner of her masters, and began re-recording her first six albums. Those re-recordings positioned her as reclaiming ownership of her catalogue and made her the second-richest woman in music.
A huge part of Swift’s draw is that she has expertly cultivated a persona that doesn’t run the risk of alienating an ageing audience – or anyone, really.
She was politically silent until 2018 when she publicly declared her support for Democratic Senate candidate Phil Bredesen and Democratic congressman Jim Cooper ahead of the midterm elections in her home state of Tennessee – to the chagrin of her fans.
Politics aside, there is very little about Swift that is cool and thus alienating. The same can’t be said for her megastar contemporaries such as Beyonce or Rihanna.
She is also inescapable. You can’t turn on the radio or enter a shopping centre without being pummelled by the shimmering synths of Anti-Hero.
Perhaps her popularity among older listeners can be boiled down to her omnipresence. On an ARIA chart level, the pickings of songs I imagine resonating with boomers are slim. Yet there are so many musicians working today that an older audience would find a lot to love if their music were as easy-to-access as Swift’s.
With all that said, boomers may be the only generation among us able to afford tickets. Within hours of pre-sales opening, tickets were being resold on secondary platforms at preposterous prices, leaving fans frustrated and raising concerns about unfair practices in the ticketing industry. The initial limited batch of tickets, available through American Express and official seller Ticketek, featured two exclusive VIP packages for shows in Sydney and Melbourne, which included a ticket and a swag of merchandise, for $899.90 and $1249.90 respectively. The packages sold out in less than 24 hours.
In Victoria the Andrews government triggered its special consumer legislation as the Amex-specific packages were quickly resold for more than $3000.
That it has been five years since the megastar last toured the country, combined with the fact the only Australasian dates on the Eras tour will take place in Sydney and Melbourne, has only added to demand. The limited locations left Swifties from every Australian state and thousands more from New Zealand and neighbouring Pacific nations scrambling for the 450,000 tickets on sale.
To add to the fanfare is the tour’s technical and conceptual ambitions: each concert recaps nine of Swift’s studio albums (her 2006 self-titled debut has been left out), with each album or “era” presented with its own elaborate sets and costumes.
The spectacle is long with a 44-song set list running more than three hours.
Some fans have confessed to wearing adult nappies to the shows so as not to miss a single song. Fans in the US have been treated to several surprise guests who have joined Swift on stage. They have included Phoebe Bridgers, who joined Swift for a performance of Red (Taylor’s Version)’s deep-cut Nothing New, and Bronx-born rap phenomenon Ice Spice, who performed their remix of Karma. It’s an epic tour that, as The Wall Street Journal reports, is on track to becoming the biggest in concert history with the potential to gross more than $US1bn ($1.5bn).
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