all 13 surprise song duos from the latin american leg of the eras tour ranked
Oh hi! Let’s do this again, now that Taylor Swift has graciously performed a magnanimous thirteen shows in three entire Latin American countries (out of twenty).
#13: “Is It Over Now?” (feat. “Out of the Woods”) + “End Game” (Buenos Aires, Night Two)
The new 1989 is out! I like it even less than the original! And I don’t like any of the vault tracks, because THEY ALL SOUND EXACTLY LIKE “OUT OF THE WOODS.” So much so that she effortlessly slotted the “Out of the Woods” bridge into “Is It Over Now?” for the bit. “End Game” is a bad Reputation song where Ed Sheeran raps.
#12: “Afterglow” + “Maroon” (Mexico City, Night Four)
“Maroon.” You motherfucking motherfucker. I brought this on myself for making and keeping a “cheap-ass screw-top rosé” bracelet when my friends and I saw the concert movie. “Afterglow” is mid-tier A major yearning. I’ve heard better from Taylor Swift. I’ve heard better from Taylor Swift on the same album.
#11: “Me!” + “So It Goes…” (Rio de Janeiro, Night Three)
Ughhhhhhhhhghhhhhgghhhhhhghhhhh
#10: “I Forgot That You Existed” + “Sweet Nothing” (Mexico City, Night One)
“I Forgot That You Existed” and a song that I didn’t put on my predictions list because I actually forgot that it existed. “Sweet Nothing” indeed.
#9: “Cornelia Street” + “You’re On Your Own, Kid” (Mexico City, Night Three)
“You’re On Your Own, Kid” is growing on me. Purely through overexposure, and against my will, but it is. I was in New York a few months ago for a wedding, and I walked across Cornelia Street on the way there, and it’s a glorified alley. Much like the song bearing its name HEYO.
#8: “Stay Beautiful” + “Suburban Legends” (Rio de Janeiro, Night One)
“Stay Beautiful”, as is typical songs from Taylor Swift, is doing all the heavy lifting here. It’s not even a favorite of mine, but whenever she remembers that non-singles from 2006 exist I am so relieved. My comments on “Is It Over Now?” also apply to “Suburban Legends.”
(Also. Someone died at this show, and that’s horrible. Her name was Ana Benevides. She was twenty-three.)
#7: “The Very First Night” + “Labyrinth” (Buenos Aires, Night One)
HOT TAKE: “The Very First Night” is the best Red vault track. Yes, better than that one. Which is good news for the placement of her very first night in Buenos Aires on this list, because “Labyrinth” fucking sucks so much, oh my god! Why did she hide so many random scary noises in it???? Whatever, I’m sure it’s tolerable without them. Not good, but tolerable.
#6: “Now That We Don’t Talk” + “Innocent” (São Paulo, Night One)
I cannot believe she played “Innocent.” I thought it was as donezo as its subject (Kanye). She played a lot of songs this leg that I thought were donezo, actually. My comments on “Is It Over Now?” also apply to “Now That We Don’t Talk.”
#5: “Say Don’t Go” + “It’s Time To Go” (São Paulo, Night Three)
“Say Don’t Go” is the least awful 1989 vault track, and “It’s Time To Go” is the least good song on Evermore. What can you do?
#4: “Better Than Revenge” + ““Slut!”” (Buenos Aires, Night Three)
This would be higher if ““Slut!”” was good. If ““Slut!”” sounded like its title implies. I wanted “Take A Hint” from Victorious; I got a Miami-themed sleep aid. This song should be called “~slut~”, not ““Slut!”” I’m using double quotations because there’s a set in the actual song title. That said, it is absolutely hilarious to pair this with “Better Than Revenge.”
#3: “Safe & Sound” + “Untouchable” (São Paulo, Night Two)
I fucking knew she was going to play “Untouchable.” Do you know who I knew that? Because while driving to a party that night, I was listening to “Crush” by Ethel Cain, and I thought, (not for the first time) This sounds so much like “Untouchable” by Taylor Swift. When the fuck is Taylor Swift going to play “Untouchable?” And then the microchip that I have no doubt her team planted in my head when I walked across Cornelia Street was like, “Come on, come on,” and Taylor Swift was like, “Little taste of heaven.” I do not care about “Safe & Sound.” Nice Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes tie-in, shill.
#2: “Tell Me Why” + “Snow on the Beach” (Mexico City, Night Two)
IT’S A STANDARD EDITION FEARLESS SONG!!!!!! I’m sick and tired of “Snow on the Beach.” I love how she complains that her flight was awful, even though it’s her own plane with which she is ruining the planet. If we do start seeing snow on beaches soon, Taylor Swift will have played a not insignificant role in that.
#1: “Dancing With Our Hands Tied” + “Bigger Than The Whole Sky” (Rio de Janeiro, Night Two)
The metric for all other shows on this list is whether I like the songs, and how much I like them. I thought it would be inappropriate to grade Rio Night Two in such fashion. It’s inappropriate to grade it at all, really, because the question on everyone’s minds was not, “What songs will she play?” but “Will she acknowledge the death of Ana Benevides? How will she acknowledge it? Should she acknowledge it?”
In her official statement, Taylor Swift wrote, “I’m not going to be able to speak about this from the stage because I feel overwhelmed by grief when I even try to talk about it.” But this is Taylor Swift we’re talking about. The woman lives her (public) life in code. If she wants it to be, the vaguest allusion to something will be correctly interpreted as an official statement by Swifties. And then passed on to us regular folk.
So it wasn’t totally unfathomable that Benevides would receive some sort of indirect tribute. And it came in the form of “Bigger Than The Whole Sky”, a bonus track from Midnights that I never, ever assumed Taylor would play live. Even if you don’t believe the theory that it’s about a miscarriage specifically, it’s still a quietly devastating reflection on loss that I figured was way too personal to perform for a stadium of adoring strangers.
But I can’t think of a better memorial.
I give Taylor Swift a lot of shit, but this genuinely impressed me. When I said I couldn’t think of a better memorial, I meant objectively. As someone totally removed from the situation and the people involved, I can look at Taylor Swift’s discography and go, Oh, she should play that really sad miscarriage song as a tribute to the girl who died, because that’s what would happen in fiction. It’s very cut-and-dry to my writer brain. Let’s review. She should play that really sad miscarriage song, says a person who’s never had a miscarriage to write a really sad song about. As a tribute to the girl who died, suggests someone who’s never hosted an event at which someone lost their life. It’s poetic, but it’s easier said than done.
So the fact that she did is kind of incredible.
I can’t speak to the inclusion of “Dancing With Our Hands Tied.” Another idea I saw tossed around was that someone should let Taylor Swift know which song of hers was Ana Benevides’s favorite so that she could play it, and I don’t know if that information was ever communicated. If it was, that’s great. It was also very difficult to perform, I’m sure. But “Bigger Than The Whole Sky” is next level. I hope she never has to play it again.