Touring with Tay-Tay
TAYLOR SWIFT is one pop superstar who gives her support acts the full rock star treatment. Kiwi duo Broods were handpicked by Swift to open the Australian and New Zealand legs of her Reputation tour after she checked out their show in Los Angeles.
Most stadium-worthy artists place heavy restrictions on how much stage they can use for their set but Swift told the Kiwi brotherand-sister duo to shake it off and enjoy the experience of performing on her massive catwalks and wings to more than 50,000 people.
“She’s more like ‘What do you need from me to make your show dope?”’ says Caleb Nott, one half of the duo.
“She wants you to put on the best show that you can because she hired you because she thinks you are good.
“We’ve been on tours where they have slowly taken stuff away from us because they didn’t want us to have a good show.” Broods, whose latest single,
Peach recently made waves on Aussie radio, discovered Swift had been championing them with radio bosses while she was in Australia. Ever the businesswoman, Swift regularly holds meets-and-greets with the commercial radio tastemakers just before Broods hit the stage.
And she expects them to be in their seats to watch the Kiwi duo.
“She meets all the radio heads before the opening acts start and makes sure they all go out 10 minutes before the show starts so they are out there watching them,” says Caleb.
Tequila shots and plenty of practise backstage help to quell Georgia Nott’s nerves before she joins the Reputation star and seasoned Swift opener Charli XCX to sing Shake It Off during the show.
The Broods singer says it’s been surreal standing next to Swift singing one of her biggest hits just a decade after she was a teenager playing Love Story over and over in her bedroom.
“After we play, I’ll have tequila shots, psych myself up, practise before Shake It Off,” she says.
“I was freaking out in Perth at the first show. It wasn’t until the day after on the Saturday morning that I realised what I had just done.
“I was lying in bed looking at the photos and videos of it and I started crying. I can’t believe that this is my job. It’s quite overwhelming.”
The pop pair say they’ve already seen evidence of the Taylor effect on their career. After a tough year, which saw them dropped by their international label and face the challenges of finding a new record company, they are now finding new fans among the massive army of Swifties.
“A lot of Taylor’s fans are at their very first show. It’s exciting to be reaching new people,” says Georgia. “We’ve had a stream of Taylor fans leaking into our social media following and it’s been crazy to see it rise and rise just from being on this tour.”