Taylor Swift lashes out at ticket company for tour sale fiasco

The singer has issued a scathing statement amid mounting backlash from millions of fans, revealing the criticism has been “excruciating for me.”

Australian fans waiting for Taylor Swift to announce tour dates down under, prepare for a battle to get your hands on tickets when the time comes.

The 32-year-old pop star, who recently dropped US dates for her ‘Eras’ tour – her first tour in five years – has lashed out at ticket company Ticketmaster after it cancelled the public sale this week due to “unprecedented” demand.

According to Ticketmaster, up to 14 million Americans tried to buy pre-sale tickets for Swift’s tour on Tuesday – enough to fill 900 stadiums – despite the fact only 1.5 million fans were authorised to access the site early as part of its ‘Verified Fan’ program.

Subsequently, fans experienced a nightmare buying experience and hour-long waits to no avail, before the follow-up public sale had to be cancelled. Ticketmaster wrote in a tweet on Thursday, “Due to extraordinarily high demands on ticketing systems and insufficient remaining ticket inventory to meet that demand, tomorrow’s public on-sale for Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour has been cancelled.”

Swift has since lashed out at the company in a furious statement posted to her Instagram stories, saying she was trying to figure out how to “improve” the failed rollout of tickets.

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Taylor Swift is furious about the Ticketmaster rollout for her Eras tour. Picture: Amy Sussman/Getty Images

“It goes without saying that I’m extremely protective of my fans. We’ve been doing this for decades together and over the years, I’ve brought so many elements of my career in house,” she began her statement.

“I’ve done this SPECIFICALLY to improve the quality of my fans’ experience by doing it myself with my team who care as much about my fans as I do. It’s really difficult for me to trust an outside entity with these relationships and loyalties, and excruciating for me to just watch mistakes happen with no recourse.”

Swift added that over two million people did end up securing tickets, but she was furious they went through “several bear attacks” to get them.

“I’m not going to make excuses for anyone because we asked them, multiple times, if they could handle this time of demand and we were assured they could,” Swift continued.

“It’s truly amazing that 2.4 million people got tickets, but it really pisses me off that a lot of them feel like they went through several bear attacks to get them.

“Thank you for wanting to be there. You have no idea how much that means.”

Swift’s first tour in five years is sparking unprecedented demand for tickets. Picture: Terry Wyatt/Getty Images

Multiple outlets are reporting the US Justice Department has since launched an investigation of the parent company of Ticketmaster, Live Nation Entertainment, for possible antitrust violations in regards to the botched rollout.

Swift was due to go on tour in 2020 in support of her seventh studio album, Lover, but she was forced to cancel the dates once Covid-19 swept the world.

She’s since released three albums, the hugely successful pandemic dropsfolklore and evermore, as well as her record-breaking tenth album, Midnights, which was released in October.

Her Eras stadium tour will encompass her entire body of work spanning the last decade, with the show kicking off its US leg in March 2023.

I’m enchanted to announce my next tour: Taylor Swift | The Eras Tour, a journey through the musical eras of my career (past & present!) The first leg of the tour will be in stadiums across the US, with international dates to be announced as soon as we can!https://t.co/KFuqvrhSGopic.twitter.com/eVyTcuW8sK

— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) November 1, 2022

Swift said international dates would be announced as soon as possible.

Swift last toured the world in 2018 to promote her sixth album, Reputation. It was the highest-grossing tour of all time, and the Texas stop was filmed for a concert special that premiered on Netflix later that year.

The global tour netted the star a reported $US345 million ($AU516 million).

Originally published as Taylor Swift lashes out at ticket company for tour sale fiasco