After more than 150 shows across five continents, Taylor Swift‘s record-breaking Eras Tour comes to a close Dec. 8 in Vancouver, Canada. It’ll likely be both a happy and a sad occasion for fans — but there may be some news before Taylor exists in a hail of fireworks.
Rob Sheffield, author of the New York Times bestseller Heartbreak Is the National Anthem: How Taylor Swift Reinvented Pop Music, tells ABC Audio of the tour’s impending end, “People have been thriving on the energy of it town to town, night after night, even not being there, just kind of tuning in for livestreams and the gossip. And so it’s kind of a period of mourning as well as celebration.”
But Sheffield thinks Taylor may use the tour’s end for one of her patented surprise announcements. “She loves to announce things in big moments when she knows that the world is watching,” he notes.
As for what she’ll announce, he points out, “She’s been teasing ‘Debutation’ really hard … a lot of her surprise song mash-ups; she’ll have a song from the debut and a song from Reputation. And because those are the two albums that she hasn’t done Taylor’s Versions of yet, it makes me think that she’s tantalizing people to be prepared for an announcement like that.”
Sheffield doesn’t think the tour ending means Taylor will go into hibernation — he suggests she’ll keep on releasing a steady stream of music.
“She’s not a big fan of downtime, as we know,” he says. “Even on this tour, the biggest stadium tour ever, she made a 31-song double album in her spare time. So I think it’s fair to say that she’s not going to be going to a beach and putting her feet up.”
