At 79, I often get funny looks when I say I’m a Taylor Swift fan. At the Eras tour last night at Wembley, I didn’t see many people older than me – most of the people there were young teenage girls, some of them with their parents, who seemed to know every single lyric. And there were a few men there too, but the crowd was predominantly female. I felt downright antediluvian – but my admiration for her is genuine. I think she’s amazing.
I was there last night with my wife, son and daughter-in-law. It was a very joyous occasion and everyone was on their best behavior. The show more than lived up to my expectations. It was an extraordinary spectacle that sparkled and dazzled all evening long. I’m not usually one to dress up, but I found it kind of charming to see so many people come in typical Taylor Swift costumes, conveying a sense of belonging to their idol, unlike any other pop concert I’ve ever been to. My wife and I almost wished we had come in something more sparkly to show our loyalty, but for me with my non-conformist views, this was a step too far.
She is probably the most complete genius we have ever had in the world of pop music. I was a huge fan of Bob Dylan – but it is the completeness of what Taylor Swift is that sets her apart. She is a songwriter, a poet and a storyteller. She is also very intelligent and an extremely savvy and capable businesswoman who owns most of her own records. She has over 250 songs in her portfolio. She has never taken drugs or alcohol and is still very preppy. What she has achieved as a single artist with no band at the age of 34, combining all of these things, is extraordinary.
I hadn’t really listened to her, except for one or two songs, until always came out in 2020 – that was the first album that really caught my attention. The song that really grabbed me was “Champagne Problems”. It’s a little bitchy in a way – it tells the story of how she decides she can’t go through with a relationship when her boyfriend is about to announce their engagement. There are some beautiful lines, like “Left you there standing crestfallen on the landing” – I just think the way she describes it is sensationally brilliant.
Last night at Wembley, this song got a standing ovation that lasted about 10 minutes – it was the biggest standing ovation of any of their songs. This is my absolute favourite, but I liked all of always – “Marjorie”, “Willow” and many others, such as the breakup songs “All Too Well”, “Betty” and “Blank Space”.
I am normally a big jazz fan, so in some ways this is a bit of an unnatural territory for me. I had a discussion with a friend over the weekend who said he couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about and he found her songs banal. But I told him to try to listen more to the lyrics – which is what I do. I always try to interpret the meaning of the lyrics, so I started to study her intensively. As always came out, I started listening to all the songs with the lyrics in front of me and admiring the way she wrote them.
I like her voice, but she’s not exactly Dolly Parton – it’s her ability to tell stories that’s special. I’m a journalist and a writer, so I’m interested in words – and although she writes great melodies, her lyrics are extraordinarily deep. “Marjorie,” for example – she wrote that to her grandmother, who she obviously loved very much and who had died. She was trying to capture what her grandmother had said to her. The opening lines of that song are, “Never be so nice that you forget to be smart / Never be so smart that you forget to be nice.” What a brilliant opening line.
There’s a sardonic, sarcastic side to her songwriting too, which I love – like in ‘The Tortured Poets Department’, the title track of her new album. She’s got someone who sees themselves as an artist or a poet, and the whole track starts: ‘You left your typewriter in my apartment / Straight from the tortured poets department.’ Then she goes on to say: ‘I’m thinking of things I’ll never say / Who uses typewriters anyway?’ What an idiot to have a typewriter when they could be using a computer! You get this image of a rather tortured, fragile soul, slightly pretentious, probably smoking a Gauloises or something – it just makes me laugh.
Although some of her stories are a bit corny – boyfriends, being dumped and all that stuff – they’re the feelings we all grow up with and she interprets them really well. People can relate to them – that’s why she’s such a huge hit. Of course I’m quite curious about the specific things she talks about – sometimes I try to look it up, is it Harry Styles or whoever – but really I’m interested in the universality and her perception of what’s going wrong. Even though I’m a man so it’s a bit different, you can relate to the feelings. Being a teenager is very difficult – am I in, am I out, am I popular, am I not, one night I’m dancing in my Levis and the next I’m crying on the sofa. It’s a bit indulgent – but it’s also extraordinarily honest.
I suspect her current boyfriend won’t be her last. I don’t know much about him – but she’s had a few relationships before, and maybe that’s because of her personality. She might have a pretty hard time settling down with one particular person. She’ll have very intense feelings and then move on. She has a really poetic sensibility – will being in a relationship with an All-American football player be enough? I don’t know.
She’s a great role model for young people. I grew up in a generation of pop and jazz musicians who used serious drugs like heroin. The Rolling Stones and others all had their problems with drugs and alcohol. That brought out the rebellious side in us. Maybe Taylor Swift is a bit saintly, but a lot of young people can relate to her because they go through similar problems. That’s part of their growing up. I think that’s really healthy – being young can be incredibly lonely, and I think they listen to her and think maybe there are solutions out there.
The British will always be cynical about her because she is so successful. There is a famous quote by Oscar Wilde: “A cynic is someone who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.” I would have paid any price to see last night’s show. I know a lot of people will criticise the price of the tickets, but the whole tour is much bigger and better than anyone could have imagined.
I remember when Abba first came on stage, everyone said it was rubbish music – and in the end they all celebrated. I think Taylor Swift has an eternal appeal. She’s not going away for a long time – and she deserves to be celebrated.
Narrated by Emily Bootle
