Taylor Swift’s fans have noticed a change in the pop star’s performances during her Eras Tour—and many are speculating that may have been influenced by her romance with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce.
In a recent interview with Time, Swift revealed she first started dating Kelce in July after he attended one of her concerts then spoke about it on his podcast with his brother and Philadelphia Eagles player, Jason Kelce.
“This all started when Travis very adorably put me on blast on his podcast, which I thought was metal as hell,” she said. “We started hanging out right after that. So we actually had a significant amount of time that no one knew, which I’m grateful for because we got to get to know each other.”
The couple made their first public appearance in September when she attended a Chiefs game alongside her new beau’s mom, Donna Kelce, who has proven to be a passionate Swiftie in her own right.
“By the time I went to that first game, we were a couple. I think some people think that they saw our first date at that game?” Swift told the publication. “We would never be psychotic enough to hard launch a first date.”
well she did pic.twitter.com/yaQuyLxiMj
With that information in mind, some of Swift’s eagle-eyed fans questioned if the romance coincided with the singer-songwriter no longer touching the bare chest of one of her muscle-bound dancers while performing her hit “Lavender Haze.”
In previous performances, Swift has been seen briefly placing her hand on the dancer’s chest while singing the lyrics, “Get it off your chest / Get it off my desk.”
However, a GIF was shared on social media that showed Swift merely motioning over her dancer’s torso without actually touching it. Swift’s Eras Tour movie was made available for streaming on Wednesday, the same day the star turned 34.
when did she stop touching his chest during lavender haze? pic.twitter.com/K4fWVP8tEs
— ver🪩nica⸆⸉ (@VIsOnCorneliaSt) December 13, 2023
“When did she stop touching his chest during Lavender Haze?” a fan asked as they shared the GIF in question on X, formerly Twitter.
Another fan said that the touching stopped “in August,” explaining that they “saw a tweet where someone said she must be in a relationship if she stopped touching him. They were ahead of their time.”
The post the X user referenced was shared on August 30, with the uploader stating that “it’s beyond evident that she stopped touching him because she’s in a relationship again. She becomes like a chaste woman whenever she gets committed.”
Another X user shared their theory that the touching stopped “right when [Swift] started dating Travis because I remember noticing that she hadn’t touched him.”
Others insisted that they had noticed Swift having no contact with her dancer earlier in the year, with one fan saying that she “didn’t touch him [at the] beginning of June [in] Detroit.
Taylor Swift (L) on December 14, 2023, in New York City. Travis Kelce (R) on July 11, 2023, in Hollywood, California. Swift’s fans think she’s changed how she interacts with one of her dancers since dating Kelce.JAMES DEVANEY/GC IMAGES;/STEVE GRANITZ/FILMMAGIC
Going back earlier still, another Swiftie said they saw Swift touch the dancer at a show in April and posted a link to TikTok footage of the star not having any contact with the same man during a Nashville concert performance in May.
Swift split from actor Joe Alwyn, her boyfriend of six years, in April. She was spotted hanging out with The 1975 singer Matty Healy in May, but they reportedly called it quits shortly afterward.
Contradicting the idea that there was an indefinite pause on Swift’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment with her dancer, one fan said that they had attended one of her shows later than May and saw her touch his chest.
Elsewhere, some fans speculated that the lack of contact is likely just based on practicality. “Maybe [it] depended on her mood or how sweaty either of them were, wrote one fan on X. “I know I wouldn’t love touching someone if they were super sweaty (or if I was).”
Swift’s Eras Tour recently broke the Guinness World Record for the highest-grossing tour of all time after crossing the $1 billion mark earlier this month.
The tour began in March 2023 and is set to conclude in December 2024 after a total of 151 shows worldwide. It’s seen unprecedented demand and, according to Pollstar, has earned $1.04 billion to date. The tour is also projected to generate close to $5 billion in consumer spending in the United States alone, bringing fans together from across the globe.
Swift broke the previous record set by Sir Elton John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour, which brought in $939 million over five years and 328 shows. Swift’s tour is also the first to cross the 10-digit threshold, per Pollstar.
Her sixth concert tour has been so successful that it has made more money than the combined earnings of the next two highest-grossing tours of this year—Beyoncé and Bruce Springsteen.
