Taylor Swift - new music & album "Reputation" (November 10, 2017)*

I needed this (though my wallet doesn't!) I've been on the fence about seeing her, but I checked the prices today, and they've gone from prohibitive to being very reasonable. Probably gonna take a few more days to meditate on it, but I think I'm going to go.

 

I've seen every tour from the 1st album through 1989 , most at least 2 times some 3 and i'll say i have NEVER seen a bad taylor swift show ............... It's certainly always an event , Glad to hear tiz are coming down to affordable & you'll be able to go if you want , it's certainly been a strange Ticket market from the pre-sales onward .

 

I was at the Friday show and would concur with my good friend PCM7027. I won four tickets and enjoyed the show very much - as did my wife’s niece and her friends.

 

Taylor Swift interviews Pattie Boyd
Taylor Swift Interviews Pattie Boyd About Marriage to George Harrison and Eric Clapton

 

For those who have seen this tour --

Which parts of the stadium do you recommend as the best seats?

Which parts of the stadium do you recommend staying away from?

 

There's honestly an element of "not a bad seat in the house" about this production, especially when we must assume that venues won't sell sections where the (slim and fairly unobtrusive) towers will give a restricted view.
It depends what you want to get out of it. Some people felt that premium priced Snake Pit people might have felt gypped because she does half a dozen songs on the satellite stages, which - for them - were some distance away. That's true, but they're still getting an up close and personal experience when she's on the main stage.
In some ways, pitch seats are good, because unless you've got over-zealous stewards, it's pretty easy to make your way to the foot of the satellite stages and stand there for her performances. The pitch standing section is close to the small stages too, but you'd need to get there early to be up the front, as there's a barrier there, whereas the seated audience can shrewdly move into position once Taylor heads for her "cable car".
The screens are massive and the pyrotechnics and fireworks are very impressive. I was in a seat in the middle section of the rear stadium stand (so pretty far back), slightly left of centre, which for a lesser show might have felt a bit detached, but such was the scale of the production, I was delighted with where I was, because I could see everything.
I would say in conclusion that if you're even half interested, go. It's a superb show.

 

Like all Taylor shows, get front row at one of the back stages, preferably the one to your left if you are facing the main stage! But there are no bad seats at a Swift show.

 

of course I am presuming that, since you are a Swiftie and you are on SHF, you'd prefer to see her play a new version of a song on a real instrument solo than be amazed by a Bob Fosse style dance routine but YMMV as they say on here! Also she's done something cool with those towers the prior poster mentioned - they are set up popping out of the alt stages so that the jumbotron won't be out of sync for the folks in the back due to speed of sound issues in huge venues - that's the kind of care you get at her shows and it really pays off.

 

It’s astonishing to me that Taylor Swift would have this much trouble selling tickets. Bothe Michael Buble and Bruno Mars have sold out 50,000 capacity Hyde Park shows this weekend with premium prices being paid for decent seats (no last minute price drops for good seats). Paul Simon is not sold out, but that may be attributable to the show taking place on the same day as the World Cup and Wimbledon finals.

I think the promoters have paid a price for their fleecing of fans in the initial pricing. To charge investment banker prices to her best fans and then lower them for the general public is a slap in the face. You could say that she’s no worse than the Stones, but that, as they say, is setting the bar really low.

 

This is weird. Fans complaining about being moved to the pit because they paid £250 stand seats? The pit should be the best in the house, no?

 

I don't know, I generally avoid being on the floor for an arena or stadium show.

 

I think with that one it was a Price issue , what she originally bought was a lot more $$$ and she wanted the Difference & it seems she only got pit from complaining ? this whole tour seems a bit shifty , Pricing keeps changing ........... and as Revolution said standing with no seat a lot of people don't like for that long , i was in the pit a few times for Taylor & it was pretty cool , Crowd was not that crazy & at that point it was $75 ....... boy have things changed ....... now the pit may be more rowdy a lot of her longtime fans are now Drinking age & if you read her facebook parents are kinda pissed how drunk some fans have been getting & throwing up all over the place :O


This women should certainly be mad

 

Interesting. Pit tickets were $800 in the US

 

Well Taylor played at Wembley twice, that's a lot more than 50,000 capacity (I'd say 100k+? maybe 120k?). She's also not as big in the UK as you'd expect compared to other English speaking artists. It seems like her popularity levels are roughly Philippines & Singapore --> Canada, Australia, US, Japan, Malaysia, China, Taiwan --> Indonesia, Thailand, UK, Ireland, New Zealand, South Korea --> Scandinavia & Germanic countries and Eastern Europe --> Latin America, Southern Europe, France

I don't know how ticket sales worked in the UK, but in the US and Canada, the cheapest tickets were available to the fans that got codes from buying her albums or merch during the presale. The prices were highest at the start of the general sale, then dropped a bit after a month or two (I think?), and then it seems they drop some on the last 1-2 days of sales.

 

Actually, Hyde Park is probably around 65,000. Wembley is big, but could only hold 100,000 if every single seat is sold and they manage to squeeze 10,000 on the field. A typical end stage setup takes away 25- 35% of capacity, so conservative estimate would put it at around 70,000+. But I see that she did play two nights, which is somewhere around 130,000-140,000, probably was too ambitious at those prices. She’s a huge draw, though

 

Yeah, I meant the combined capacity for two nights. Looks like per night attendance has range from 57,000 for Roger Waters to 78,000 for Take That, so my estimates were probably too low - yours sound about right.

I suspect that her team prefers playing two nights in one city than in two cities for one night each since it's a big production and probably costs a lot to transport and set up everything.

 

some got them for $100 , $150 , i think it was some of the California shows they dropped the prices a day or two before the shows ............. they are scaling prices to what they can get at any given time/show it seems .

 

I didn't ever see the "Snake Pit" tickets pop up at all for the 2 DC shows, much less at a discount.

Reserved tickets in the seating sections close to the stage were out there for $250-ish but no GA.

I thought about going but realized I'm not a big enough TS fan to drop $250 for a ticket!

If I'd seen GA for $150, though? I'd have been there!

 

From the research I've done, I don't think the pit tickets are worth it. It's just a small area in the corner of the stage. The stage is quite high so if you're short you might have difficult looking over it if she's at the other end of the stage or on the secondary stages. You can't sit. If you leave to go to the washroom, grab food, or go to the secondary stages, it's hard to get back. She'll probably be looking past you towards the more distance parts of the crowd for most of the show. It's also not an area where she high fives the fans. And apparently people that get chosen for meet and greets are usually from the seated areas. This is for $900 + fees.

You can see the show from just as close up in the front rows of seats for usually $300-$450 depending on the show, and at least you'll be able to sit during the breaks between the opening acts and move around.

The rear sections of the pitch sections are not bad either, since you'll be close to the secondary stages when she performs the songs there (3 songs at the first stage, 2 at the second stage) and you can leave your row to get closer when that happens. There's also the two songs she performs in her gondola that carries her from the main stage to the secondary stage. And the corridor between the two secondary stages is where she walks through to high five fans. Those seats are $150-$200 at most shows. The lower bowl tickets at the sides between the main and secondary stage should be quite good too, especially if you'd have a hard time seeing over people in the pitch seating, they seem to be around the same price as rear pitch.

Don't know about the mid/upper bowl, if I get a chance to go (I live far from any shows) and get tickets there, I'll let you guys know how it is.

 

Moot point since TS has come/gone from DC, but I still woulda wanted pit.

I've done pit circumstances at a bunch of shows - Bruce, Madonna, Katy Perry - and never been unhappy. It's always been the place to be!

 

What time has taylor been going on ? 9 pm i'm guessing with 2 opening acts starting at 7pm ?

 

Makes sense. She's also gonna wanna wait until it's dark, which means close to 9 in the summer. With such a big production at work, it doesn't play well in daylight!

 

yeh she's usually done that at the shows i've seen 8:45 - 9 pm ish , i usually skip the Openers Otherwise you sit in a traffic jam for 3 hours .............. I live about an hour from my stadium & head down when the openers are on , usually Drive right in at that point .
I like Charlie XCX & would like to see here but don't like the 2nd artist at all ....

 

For anyone in Aus/NZ/JP that's considering buying tickets. I've been to 3 shows now, one in the nosebleeds, and two with floor tickets.

IMO there's not that much of a difference between seeing her from a distance of 100 ft or 300-400ft (aka nosebleeds) - you'll be able to make out the choreo and special effects but will need to look at the screen to see her face.

The main stage basically has two screens which are angled a bit sideways, so fans sitting at the sides of the stadium can still see the screens pretty well. Dallas had an overhead screen but Toronto didn't.

A big advantage of the floor is being able to leave your seat to get closer to the stages or move into the aisles where you'll have more room to do your dancing or headbanging or what not. You can also get closer to the barricade that way to try and get a high-five from Taylor, or collect the special confetti that gets sprayed onto the floor as a souvenir. I think some venues might be more strict about leaving your seats, but Dallas on Saturday didn't care at all since they made a special deal to sell general admission standing room only (non-pit) floor tickets after everything else sold out. That wasn't the case on Friday but they were still pretty lenient, you still had a lot of fans leaving their seats to crowd around the B-stages and barricade.

You can expect fans to stand the whole time in most sections of the stadium, so if you're short you might want to consider seats in the stands. Some fans might try to stand on seats, pretty much everyone does if they're close to a B-stage that Taylor is performing at, and little kids do it too. Security at Dallas was relatively lenient about standing on seats under those circumstances but probably wouldn't be if you're an adult standing on a seat when no-one else near you is doing so.

The fans in the nosebleeds in Toronto did seem more casual than those on the floor in Dallas where there were a fair bit of hardcore fans (mainly 15-30 yo). You can count on them to be dancing the whole time and sing along to all the lyrics until they lose their voice, and many of them will be wearing outfits from Taylor's performances and music videos, or that reference her song lyrics. My impression is that they weren't drinking as much as the more casual fans in the nosebleeds though.

There were a few concert goers that seemed a bit out of place, like they expected this would be more like a night at the opera than a rock show. The crowd will be more visibly enthusiastic and hyped up than that and I think that's part of the appeal of Taylor's concerts.

In addition to the 15-30 crowd, there were also many families with moms, dads and even grand-parents, young couples, and even a few older fans going without kids. The parents often seem to be trying to keep their younger kids excited as they can be a little shy around the 15-30 fans and also start getting tired - many left before the night was over.

I don't think the sound quality on the floor is better, it might be slightly better in the bowl seats actually. Another advantage of bowl tickets is you get a better view from above, so you can see the light show her team makes using the light-up bracelets, and the stage itself also has lights built into the floor which you can't see from the floor. You can also take in everything in one view - the light show with the bracelets, the view of the screen, and Taylor and her performers.

As for the openers, I think Charli XCX is a more energetic performer, she's good at getting the crowd hyped up and has a lot of party type songs. Camila Cabello comes off as a bit more sensual and has more love songs, although she'll be replaced by Broods in Oceania. Special guests are a possibility, but don't count on it, she's only had a few so far.

And regarding Taylor, I don't want to spoil too much... Several songs were adapted for a stadium setting and to make use of her band (so they sound more like rock songs), there's several older songs, mostly mashed up. She also plays a few acoustic songs, including some at the B-stages. There's more choreo than previous shows, and she still has her back-up singers and dancers. She does make use of backing track which I think was inevitable considering how the songs were produced, she'll have some pretty solid vocal moments and also times when she's a bit overpowered by the backing track. And the old Taylor is not dead - the production is as over-the-top as ever.

 

Taylor Swift's Reputation Stadium Tour Breaks Record for Highest-Grossing U.S. Tour