![The Wayland Police Department have issued a warning on the rise of scammers during the holiday season. “Hang up [the phone]. if you get a text and you do not know who it's from, just delete it. Don't click on any links, nothing,” Wayland police chief Edward Burman said. “Every single one of them is a scam.”](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/img_0954_720-e1734676255647.jpg)
![WHS’s Connect Program ran its annual holiday gift drive to fulfill the wishlist of children enrolled in the Dorchester based non-profit daycare organization, the Yawkey Center. This drive brought the town together and impacted both the students in Connect, as well as the greater Wayland community. “You could see how helpful the town was and how our community came together and wanted to help out a community that wasn't our own [and] kids who were less fortunate than we were,” senior and Connect Program member Jordynn Lee said.](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/screenshot_2024-12-20_at_12.21.24___pm_720-e1734734228474.png)
After over a year and a half, 149 shows and five continents, world-renowned pop singer Taylor Swift performed her final show of the Eras Tour in Vancouver, Canada, on Dec. 8, 2024. In March of 2023, Swift began her world tour in Glendale, Arizona, with a setlist of 44 songs, merging each of her albums into a single show. The Eras Tour grossed over 2 billion dollars and sold 10.1 million tickets.
Between March 2023 and December 2024, Swift released “Speak Now (Taylor’s Version),” “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” and “The Tortured Poets Department” (TTPD), all albums that were rerecorded and included a few new songs. Swift had two breaks during the tour. Her first break was between Nov. 26, 2023 through Feb. 7, 2024. On Feb 4, 2024, Swift announced her 11th album, “The Tortured Poets Department (TTPD),” at the Grammy Awards where she won two awards. Her second break lasted from March 9, 2024 to May 9, 2024. This second break ended just over a month before she released TTPD. Once the tour resumed in May 2024, the TTPD set was added to the tour.
Sophomore Bresyln Voight attended the show in Los Angeles, where “1989 (Taylor’s Version)” was announced.
“Everyone went kind of wild, and started screaming,” Voight said. “It was really exciting.”
Several WHS students attended the show, whether it was in Foxborough at Gillette Stadium, or around the world at other venues. The tour has been highly rated by viewers, and widely renowned.
“It was probably one of my favorite concerts I’ve ever been to because it was so highly anticipated,” sophomore Grace Oppenheim said.
Some fans dressed in outfits that reflected one of Swift’s albums or “eras.” Some fans directly reference certain songs in their outfits.
“I dressed up as the ‘Lover’ era, and I wore a pink bodysuit that had tulle at the top of it, a denim skirt and pink cowboy boots,” junior Audrey Larson said.
Swift’s fans have also mentioned the kindness of the concert staff was, and how friendly and welcoming the crowd seemed.
“[The staff] wanted to make sure that people were having a good time, and the energy was very high,” freshman Fiona Strehle said.
In addition to the positive and encouraging attitude many of the fans embodied, fans exchanged friendship bracelets before and during the concert. This trend originated from Swift’s popular song, “You’re On Your Own Kid” with the lyrics, “So, make the friendship bracelets.”
“There was this little girl selling [friendship bracelets] on this street, so we exchanged with her, and some people at the actual concert,” junior Makenzie Macchi said.
Some friendship bracelets were handmade by the Swifties, a name for Swift’s fans, and contained colored beads with names of the albums, songs or niche song lyrics. When the tour initially kicked off, several attendees were unaware of the new trend, but it gained more popularity as the tour progressed.
“My sister and I made a lot of bracelets on the drive there because it was like six hours. We just traded with the people near us,” junior Aubrey Calabro said. Calabro went to the last night of the Eras Tour in Toronto, Canada.
During each show, Swift performed “surprise songs,” which were songs not on the original setlist. They were performed acoustically, either on the guitar or piano. As the tour went on, Swift became more creative with the surprise songs, as the unperformed songs became more sparse. She began mashing up songs that she had already played to make a unique experience without fully replaying the same songs.
“[We got] Message In A Bottle [with] Sparks Fly, and then You’re Losing Me [with] How Did It End.” Calabro said.
After nearly two years, fans were sad to see Swift take her final bow. Although some fans who were unable to attend were devastated that they couldn’t see Swift live, the need for Swift to bring the tour to a close was imminent.
“I think it’s reasonable that it’s ending now, but I do feel sad for people that couldn’t have gone,” Strehle said.
