Taylor Swift's fans have organized a "pilgrimage" to the Black Dog pub in Vauxhall, London. The reason for this was the mention of this establishment in the singer's new album. Journalists of The Guardian visited the pub to understand the cultural phenomenon, UNN writes.
Details
Last Thursday, the popularity of the Black Dog pub in South London began to grow rapidly. The reason was that the name of their establishment was mentioned in Taylor Swift's new album. Moreover, Swift has a song with the same name as the pub called Black Dog.
An hour after the track was released online, a small venue in South London was packed with excited fans, and its employees were watching CCTV to see the world-famous pop star.
Over the weekend, thousands of loyal Swifties, as Taylor's fans call themselves, flocked to the Vauxhall to feel closer to their favorite artist. The lyrics of the song Black Dog mention that an ex-boyfriend came to the pub - most likely, it's about the British actor Joe Alwyn, who lives in this area of London.
Lily Bottomley, events and social media manager at SC Soho, the small hospitality group that owns Black Dog, said she was surprised to hear the pub mentioned in the song.
I thought, wow, what a coincidence, this is crazy. Then the traffic increased and then just exploded when her album went live. We created TikTok, started publishing posts, communicating with fans. This week we are completely full, and we are almost full for her tour dates. It's been great for business, the fans have been extremely positive.
To cope with the surge in customers, the pub hired security at the last minute.
Bottomley told reporters that fans of the pop star are particularly interested to know whether it was Alvin or Swift's other British ex-boyfriend, Matty Healy, mentioned in the song. She, in turn, confirmed that there was "a blonde guy in the pub a few times," modestly mentioning Alvin's hair color.
Bottomley herself is "100% sure" that the song mentions her pub, as Swift has previously talked about nightly walks in neighboring Brixton.
We went through the past security camera footage [for Swift]. But we didn't find anything. I heard that she wears a cap when she visits facilities, so we might have missed it. We'd like her to come back.
For reference
Taylor Swift's song "The Black Dog" appeared on YouTube on April 20.