A lesser star than Taylor Swift might have been broken by the events of the last few weeks. First, the awful events in Southport, when three little girls were killed at a Swift-themed dance class. Then, the cancellation of her Vienna gigs over a credible terror threat. If Swift had called off the Eras Tour, few could have blamed her.
Lesser fans, too, might have given these Wembley dates a miss over security fears. But here they were, nearly 92,000 of them, a mass of sequins, friendship bracelets and slogan T-shirts (A Lot Going On At The Moment was particularly popular). The mood was so sweetly wholesome that when everyone started cheering and waved madly at someone arriving in the VIP tent, it wasn’t for an A-lister, but for a middle-aged lady they had identified as Taylor’s mum.
“Fancy meeting you here at Wembley Stadium,” Swift told the crowd when she arrived on stage, dressed like a super heroine in a silver bodysuit. When she tells her fans that it’s an “absolute honour” to play for them, she sounds like she really means it. “I know how much planning, how much energy and how much effort it takes to come to these shows. It means the world,” she said.