The US singer launched her second run of Wembley Stadium shows this summer last night to glowing reviews from critics
A week after cancelling three Austrian dates due to a terror threat, Taylor Swift returned to the stage for the first of her five nights at London’s Wembley Stadium.
The singer was joined by surprise guest Ed Sheeran during the acoustic section of her set to play their Everything Has Changed and End Game collaborations, as well as a rendition of Sheeran’s Thinking Out Loud.
In a five-star review of last night’s (15 August) 45-song, three-hour-plus performance, the Telegraph says: “Midway through the set, proceedings were temporarily halted by an ovation so long and loud and heartfelt that Swift took out her ear monitor to experience it fully.
“She likened the audience’s appreciation to ‘a love system overload’. You could apply that to the whole show. It’s what the world needs right now.”
The Times awarded the concert four-stars, concluding: “The Eras tour is a well-oiled machine, delivering the greatest (or most successful) hits from each album in a set routine with no encores. This could make it seem impersonal… Yet the faces around me seemed enraptured.
“People are paying mega money for this (for two women I met it was £800) and you can’t say she doesn’t deliver as a performer, making her crowd deliriously happy and emotional.”
“To support with the safe entry and exit of everyone within the stadium, no one is allowed to stand outside any entrance or on the Olympic Steps at the front of the stadium”
The 92,000-cap shows will continue at the UK venue on 16-17 and 19-20 August to mark the European finale of The Eras Tour, which is set to conclude in North America this December. Swift played three nights at Wembley in June, bringing her total number of Eras Tour shows at the London stadium to eight – more than any other city in the world.
The run will see her crowned as the biggest-selling female artist to ever perform at the London venue, in addition to setting a new record for the longest residency of a solo artist at Wembley.
Last month, in a practice known as “Tay-gating“, an estimated 40,000 fans gathered on a hill outside the Olympic Stadium in Munich, Germany, to listen to Swift’s performance. In light of the Vienna arrests, Wembley Stadium posted a reminder to ticketless fans that they would be unable to stand outside the venue during the shows.
“To support with the safe entry and exit of everyone within the stadium, no one is allowed to stand outside any entrance or on the Olympic Steps at the front of the stadium,” said a statement. “Non ticket holders will be moved on.”
Upon the conclusion of the Wembley residency, the tour will take a two-month break before restarting in the US at Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium on 18 October.
Meanwhile, the UK government quoted Swift songs to announce it will launch a consultation in the autumn regarding new consumer protections on ticket resale.
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