Taylor Swift’s ‘Red’ Tour: Her Amps Go Up to 22

Best fan sign at last night’s Taylor Swift show in Newark, New Jersey: “I Newark Were Trouble.” Second best: “Don’t Listen to Poehler & Fay [sic], You’re Great in Every Way!” Bonus points to the two girls shaking booty outside the venue, hoping for tickets, waving giant cardboard 2’s (because they’re feelin’ 22) and wearing homemade “Not a Lot Going On at the Moment” T-shirts, dancing around the parking lot to a boombox blasting Red. I hope they got in. Because what a massively excellent show.

Seeing Taylor Swift live in 2013 is seeing a maestro at the top of her or anyone’s game. No other pop auteur can touch her right now for emotional excess or musical reach – her punk is so punk, her disco is so disco. The red sequins on her guitar match the ones on her microphone, her shoes and 80 percent of the crowd. Her set is mostly new songs from Red, the slickest, smartest and just plain best mega-pop statement of our time. She’s a master of every rock-star move, except the one about dialing it down a notch. But who would ever want that? (Besides the whiny exes she keeps writing songs about?) “Hi, I’m Taylor,” she said by way of an introduction. “I write songs about my feelings. I’m told I have a lot of feelings.” You are told this accurately, Taylor.

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