Prince William takes selfie with Taylor Swift at London Eras Tour

LONDON (AP) — Taylor Swift followers get pleasure from parsing the singer-songwriter’s lyrics for references to her romantic life and insights into her frame of mind.

However the pop celebrity’s followers within the U.Okay. didn’t should hear intently to her newest album, “The Tortured Poets Division,” to get the sense that Swift had soured on the nation’s capital metropolis after lengthy making it an everyday hangout after which her second residence. The document’s fifth monitor is titled “So Lengthy, London.”

As Swift brings her blockbuster Eras Tour to London’s Wembley Stadium this weekend, some Swifties subsequently are questioning if they’re witnessing the start of an prolonged goodbye.

London isn’t able to see her go. The realm round Wembley was reworked for the exhibits, with followers posing in entrance of an enormous mural of the singer and touring stairs christened “Swiftie Steps” and different tributes.

Swift introduced that 88,446 individuals have been in attendance at Friday’s present in what she referred to as “essentially the most exhilarating metropolis on the planet.” Among the many well-known attendees: Prince William celebrating his forty second birthday on the present and posing for a photograph with Swift together with two of his kids, Prince George and Princess Charlotte.

Swift gave followers a wink and a nod towards her London life throughout one in every of her two solo acoustic shock songs: a piano medley that opened with the London-set “The Black Canine” and segued into “Come Again, Be Right here” after which “Maroon.”

Along with this weekend’s exhibits, Swift will return to Wembley for 5 extra in August to shut the tour’s European leg.

London is the one metropolis on the tour the place Swift is stopping twice. Some fear the association might characterize a swan track of types, whereas others assume it simply displays a brand new period in Swift’s bond with the Large Smoke. Whether or not “So Lengthy, London” seems to be a closing chapter or a bookend to her valentine to the town, the track “London Boy,” Eras is arriving as an emotional milestone.

“Her relationship now sort of assumes London gained’t be someplace she can be. It’s not like there may be an American soccer participant dwelling right here,” stated Maggie Fekete, 22, a Canadian graduate scholar who credit the London references in Swift’s music with orienting her when she moved to the town three years in the past. “I believe there can be so much much less London in her music, which is gloomy.”

Stella Elgood, 25, of London, stated Friday she assumed Swift would sing “So Lengthy, London” sooner or later throughout her eight nights within the metropolis however that Swift “will all the time be welcome.”

“Particularly since she dated Harry Types, she’s been right here within the Zeitgeist,” Elgood stated.

For individuals who haven’t been paying consideration, Swift had a sequence of romances with well-known British residents (together with Types in 2012) that ended final 12 months, when she began courting Kansas Metropolis Chiefs tight finish Travis Kelce. The hypothesis surrounding “So Lengthy, London” and a mournful companion track that mentions a London pub, “The Black Canine,” stems from the 2023 breakup of Swift and English actor Joe Alwyn, who have been collectively for over six years.

Alwyn is assumed to have impressed “London Boy,” a track from her 2019 album “Lover.” A special-edition “Lover” CD included what gave the impression to be a January 2017 diary entry through which Swift talked about being “primarily primarily based in London” however making an attempt to put low. British tabloids later reported that Swift spent a lot of the COVID-19 pandemic sheltering with Alwyn in north London.

The Solar newspaper reported in December that the a number of Grammy-winner had purchased a big property within the space and was reworking it to be her base in Europe. After Swift launched “The Tortured Poets Division” final month, nevertheless, a author for the British version of ELLE journal noticed that Londoners had a gap “for an all-American A-lister who can slot into her place in our collective consciousness.”

“We had Swift earlier than we misplaced her to her record-breaking, field office-breaking Eras Tour and now, it will seem that her vacant place has been stuffed by Zendaya,” author Naomi Might playfully posited earlier than itemizing the assorted areas the American actor had been noticed together with her longtime boyfriend, British actor Tom Holland.

Both means, the capital is placing on fairly a present of its personal to verify Swift and her followers really feel appreciated. Guides are providing strolling, bus and taxi excursions that retrace her footsteps, together with a kebab store whose proprietor says his institution is supplying sandwiches for the singer and her crew on Friday.

Earlier than the top of August, Swifties can partake in a full food regimen of Swift-themed brunches and dance events, or trip the London Eye Ferris wheel accompanied by a string quartet taking part in her music. Memento stalls in Camden Market, one of many locations talked about in “London Boy,” stocked up on Swift-specific caps, T-shirts, baggage and stickers in preparation.

Amy Unsworth, 34, who’s from a small city close to Manchester, England, and was born a month earlier than Swift, stated Friday that the singer’s ties to the U.Okay. and vice versa prolong past the capital.

“I really feel like as a Northerner I’ve an affinity together with her,” Unsworth stated, noting that Swift wrote lots of the songs on her “Evermore” album whereas in England’s Lake District with Alwyn.

“It’s laborious to know the way she feels proper now, being again, given her historical past.”

Unsworth isn’t apprehensive Swift will flip her again on the U.Okay. Swift stated from the stage that her British followers “have been a few of the most supportive individuals in my nook since I began making music.” Swift carried out in London for the primary time at age 17, when she appeared on the scholar union of Kings School London.

“I believe she is going to come again” after Eras, Unsworth stated. “She has too many devoted followers to not come again. She’s constructed up an excessive amount of momentum right here to only overlook about us.”

Zachary Hourihane, who co-hosts a Swift podcast referred to as “Evolution of a Snake” and posts YouTube and TikTok movies below the title Swiftologist, stated Thursday that it’s too quickly to know whether or not the singer will retain her honorary citizenship or half methods with London. As her followers know all too nicely, solely time will inform with Taylor.

“Taylor is somebody who retraces her steps so much. Issues are by no means actually over together with her. She likes to revisit issues which have completed,” he stated. “Let’s be reasonable about it. Her relationship, even whether it is, ‘so lengthy, goodbye,’ she has good motive to be in London and good cash to make there.”