Gracie Abrams opened 49 Eras Tour shows and to hear her tell it the final day on Taylor Swift’s mega world stadium outing was a lot like the last, weepy hours of a high school year. “Everyone had been crying all day. It felt like the last day of school backstage,” she told Nylon magazine in a new feature about her magical year. “Everyone was walking around with their [Eras Tour] books, signing each other’s books. We were all walking around with Sharpies.”
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Abrams spoke to the magazine less than 36 hours after the final Eras Tour show in Vancouver on December 8 and admittedly was struggling with the stages of grief as she put the life-changing experience behind her. “I watched the live streams on shows that I wasn’t at,” she said. “I’m feeling emotional and grateful and in a state of shock that we don’t, as a global community, get to experience that source of light anymore.”
As she ascends to her own new pop plateaus — including a recent debut Saturday Night Live musical guest spot and a fifth week at No. 1 on the U.K. charts with her “That’s So True” single — Abrams, 25, said the time spent on tour with Swift was like pop star boot camp. “I was just soaking up every moment of her show, too. I’ve basically been studying it for a year-and-a-half,” she said of Swift, who returned the favor by scattered some of her musical pixie dust on Abrams’ The Secret of Us track “Us.” “Every time I’ve opened for her, I watch and learn. I learned from her every time we have a conversation about the weather, even,” Abrams said.
Though she initially got hit with the dreaded “nepo baby” tag thanks to famous parents Star Wars and Star Trek director J.J. Abrams and production exec Katie McGrath, Abrams said the tables are starting to turn. The Nylon writer described a recent New York show where they observed fans approaching director Abrams to take selfies with “Gracies dad.”
“They’re like, ‘What in the world?’” Abrams said of her parents’ take on her rising fame. “But it’s really sweet,” she adds, noting that watching the sweet way her mother interacts with people is the model for how she wants to be. “Her support and encouragement of my writing my whole life is the reason that I’m doing any of this now,” she said.
The one thing she didn’t want to discuss, however, was her rumored relationship with Gladiator II star Paul Mescal, who she’s been photographed with a number of times this year. Asked how she’s dealing with a high-profile relationship amidst her rising fame, Abrams kept things vague. “That has nothing to do with me,” she said. “It doesn’t affect me.”
The singer announced her own 2025 North American headlining tour the day after wrapping her Eras run and told the magazine that she’s re-teamed with The National’s Aaron Dessner at New York’s Electric Lady Studios with an eye toward releasing her third album by late 2025.
“I am inspired by Taylor in a million ways, but especially by the pace with which she puts things out into the world,” Abrams said. “There’s less pressure the more you release — that’s how I consider it for myself. I want to just keep it coming while I’m in this period of writing as frequently as I am. I think it would be a waste to not be open.”
Watch Abrams take the Rorschach Test with Nylon below.
