Tokyo: Taylor Swift fans in fury as her concert approaches

Freshly crowned by her historic consecration at the Grammy Awards, singer Taylor Swift kicks off a month-long sold-out tour in Asia-Pacific on Wednesday February 7 in Tokyo, where an excited audience is impatiently awaiting the star .

More than a thousand fans braved the cold Wednesday morning in the Japanese capital, forming endless lines to try to buy products bearing the image of the American star before his four Tokyo concerts. They are part of his world tour Eras Tour, which has already grossed more than a billion dollars, a first in music history. “Hi, we are the Swifties of Taiwan,” proclaimed a gigantic banner decorated with photos of the singer, alongside which fans had their photos taken in front of the Tokyo Dome, the 55,000-seat baseball stadium where the tournaments are to take place. Japanese concerts of the star.

The luckiest were able to obtain tickets via a hotly contested lottery, some traveling thousands of kilometers to come and applaud their idol. “We came all the way to Japan just for the concert, because we couldn't get tickets in Australia,” Ebony Donohue, 18, told AFP, smiling. “I’m so excited to finally see her. All his music is so different. We can easily identify with her, she is strong and amazing,” she added.

Many fans dressed in mini-skirts, shiny jackets or t-shirts emblazoned with the initials “TS” posed in front of the stadium, before this concert that some had been waiting for for several years. “I've been listening to his songs since I was in middle school,” said Saya Matsuo, a 25-year-old Japanese man. “It’s the first time I’m going to see her in concert and I’m super excited. He is someone who touches people's hearts, makes them sing and dance. I love his personality.”

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“When I listen to his songs, I feel full of energy and it gives me self-confidence,” explained Hikari Oka, an 18-year-old student who had been queuing since early morning in front of the merchandise stand. The Taylor Swift wave reached its climax on Sunday when the 34-year-old artist made pop history by winning a fourth Grammy for the prestigious title of best album of the year, surpassing Frank Sinatra, Paul Simon and Stevie Wonder.

After her last Japanese concert on Saturday, the star will head straight to Las Vegas to attend the Super Bowl and applaud her boyfriend Travis Kelce, star of the Kansas City Chiefs. Their hyper-publicized romance made right-wing commentators and personalities cringe, who began to mass propagate a conspiracy theory according to which this union would be intended to rig the high mass of American football and even to influence the presidential election in the United States.

After this romantic-sporting interlude, the pop icon must then cross the Pacific again to perform in Australia and Singapore before reaching Europe, for a tour which could garner a total of two billion dollars in revenue, and provoke turmoil in local economies. Travel giant Amadeus has seen an “extraordinary increase in interest” in stopover cities on Taylor Swift’s Asia-Pacific tour.

Japan, which no longer knows where to turn this week, also welcomes another world superstar, footballer Lionel Messi, whose Inter Miami team faces Vissel Kobe on Wednesday in a friendly match in Tokyo. It is not yet certain whether the 36-year-old Argentinian, injured in his adductor muscles, will be able to play.