Shannon’s article and it’s the same but it’s a Sweat tour review so it’s not
A green banner is dropped onstage with a four letter word written in Arial font: Brat. It's Monday night, and the crowd is screaming at a sold-out concert in Madison Square Garden–but who are the individuals who are eliciting such a strong reaction?
It's none other than Troye Sivan and Charli XCX, who joined forces for their joint tour Sweat. I've been a fan of the former since my Musically making days, and I saw the latter open for Taylor Swift's Reputation tour. Sweat created a storm on social media, flooding my 'For You' page with concert clips of the two celebrities: Sivan opening the tour with his ‘Got Me Started’ choreography, Charli XCX licking the stage, Troye’s ‘One of Your Girls’ prelude video, and Charli XCX picking fans in the audience to do the ‘Apple’ Dance. With the public claiming it to be one of the best and most iconic joint tours from the past decade, I knew that I just had to go.
My journey to the concert was long, and began much prior to the actual concert date on September 23. Several months before the concert, I was scouring Ticketmaster, SeatGeek, and other ticketing apps for relatively affordable prices to see these two singers on stage. The prices in New York especially were astronomically expensive, thanks to Charli XCX’s hit hyper-pop club music album Brat breaking records and growing in immense popularity. Despite being ticketless the day before the show, I remained hopeful. My friend, Susie, and I decided to take matters into our own hands and wait for the box office in the morning to purchase face-value tickets.
Because Madison Square Garden and other concert venues typically release more concert tickets on the day of the show, many people tend to wait until 10:00 A.M. for these tickets to be released. Knowing this, Susie and I woke up at 5:00 A.M. to make the trek to Madison Square Garden. There, we found a line outside the venue and were given the line numbers 36 and 37. A green sharpie was handed to us, and we were instructed to label ourselves to prevent cutting the line.
10:00 A.M. finally arrived, but to our surprise, security guards came to inform us that there were no more tickets available. The guards then offered for us to wait for the cancellation line on the side of the building. As the guards were speaking, Susie and I realized that there were lines separate from us filled with people who did not number themselves as instructed. The moment that these guards told us about the cancellation line, all separate lines merged and formed a stampede towards the side building. Running with a horde of people was pretty scary, but Susie and I managed to survive and stand near the beginning of the line. One's order in the cancellation line was now entirely determined by where you stood, which made several concertgoers upset about the disorganization of the previous number system.
I held out in line until 12:20, but left briefly to attend class. Five minutes into my walk to the Subway station, I got a call from Susie that she got invited to buy tickets. After bracing for disappointment in the cancellation line for so long, I was super ecstatic hearing her news. Once I arrived at Bobst, to my excitement, she had managed to score two obstructed seats for Sweat!
When we arrived at the venue, I ecstatically raced up the escalators to our obstructed seats. When we got to our seats, I saw that they were indeed obstructed, but luckily very close to the stage. Tights soon went down, and Sivan started his first section of songs: ‘Got Me Started,’ ‘What’s the Time Where You Are,’ and ‘My, My, My.’ Then, the iconic green banner came up with flashing, strobing lights. We heard the beginning ‘bumpin thats,’ and knew that Charli XCX had graced the stage.
Sivan and Charli XCX transitioned between songs very seamlessly throughout the concert, often delivering remixes to lead up to the other's performances. My personal favorite transition was ‘Stud’ to ‘365’, in which Troye greets Charli with ‘What’s up, Charli?'--to which Charli responds, in her iconic British accent–‘What’s up, Troye?’ I just love that transition so much. Other unforgettable parts of the show were Addison Re coming to perform 'Diet Pepsi' and the 'Von dutch' a.g. cook remix with Charli, Sivan hyping the audience up before breaking out to ‘Rush,’ and the end of the night with both artists singing the ‘Talk, Talk’ remix. But the most memorable part of all was when Lorde surprised the audience by performing a ‘Girl, so confusing’ remix with Charli XCX. Since our seats were a little behind the stage’s set, our section got to see Lorde walk off stage–and in true Shannon fashion, I sobbed, ‘I love Supercut!’ when she left.
The whole concert felt like a rave, and I kind of wished I brought sunglasses to prepare for the strobing lights. Nonetheless, I have zero regrets, and Sweat may.even be the best concert I have seen to date. The whole concert felt so immersive, giving Susie and I an experience akin to partying alongside the two celebrities. I definitely sweated gallons, but I had the best time ever.
