‘Wait, that’s me’: Security guard’s emotional moment at Taylor Swift show in Pittsburgh goes viral on TikTok

This article was originally published in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette on June 6, 2023.

She’s been feeling 22 since March when she celebrated her birthday while wrapping up her senior year at Kent State in Ohio. 

But the feeling Bailey Myers has had since June 17, when she was among 73,000-plus people packed into Acrisure Stadium, has lingered — in a viral way. 

In a yellow Landmark Event Staffing Services shirt, Myers stood just feet from the stage.

It was the second night of “Swiftsburgh,” and Taylor Swift was about to start the last of four surprise songs she played during the two-night stop in Pittsburgh on the Eras Tour. 

Hands folded in front of her while working security at the show, Myers — already soaking up the incredible energy of a massive crowd singing every word to every song — got the surprise song she was hoping for: “The Story of Us.”

“When she announced that she was singing that, I couldn’t move the rest of the concert,” Myers told the Post-Gazette this week. “My muscles were so tense because I was just so excited.”

Myers faced away from the stage and toward the crowd — a requirement of her role to ensure no one was “Trouble” when they walked in. 

But — for this particular song — she sang along, closing her eyes and cherishing every second.

“That was the one song I wanted her to play, so I definitely snapped out of it for a second and forgot that I was working security,” she said. “But I tried to keep myself as composed as possible.”

Myers was living in the moment. She just didn’t realize the moment would live on forever. An attendee captured it on video and posted it to TikTok days later with the caption: “Someone find this security guard from Pittsburgh night two and give her the world.” 

The 17-second video has since garnered more than 5.5 million views on TikTok and nearly a million likes.

One of Myers’ managers came across the video and sent it to her when it had only about 250,000 views.

“I thought she was just sending me a video of somebody else,” Myers said. “And then I was like, ‘Wait, that’s me.’”

Myers now has more than 8,000 followers on TikTok, compared to 700 before the video was posted. Barstool Sports reshared the video on its TikTok account, which has 29.7 million followers.

“It’s been almost a week now, and I’m still getting hundreds of notifications every time I log into TikTok,” Myers, who is from Independence, Ohio, said. Many people reached out to her after the video surfaced, asking her how she got the Eras Tour job.

Myers, a fan of Taylor Swift since the early days of “Teardrops on My Guitar,” has been working as a security guard for two years. Drawn to the job by her passion for the sports industry and stadium events — she got her degree in business administration from Kent State — Myers found the position offered the flexibility she needed while she was in school. Working various music and sporting events was a perk.

But none of those prior events rivaled the spectacle of the Eras Tour’s sold-out record crowds — not to mention the tens of thousands gathering outside stadiums just to try to catch an earful and scream along with the “Cruel Summer” bridge or how “We Are Never Getting Back Together” during Swift’s nearly 3½-hour set.

Landmark Event Staffing Services, the conglomerate Myers works for, regularly employs security for Acrisure Stadium through its Pittsburgh branch. Knowing the scope of the Eras Tour, the Pittsburgh branch manager, whom Myers went to school with, reached out to the Cleveland location and requested more staff. Bailey Myers signed up to work Swift’s show a state away without hesitation.

On June 17 at 9 a.m., Myers and a group of her coworkers traveled from Cleveland to Pittsburgh for the much-anticipated performance that night.

“I have been to so many concerts, and it’s just nothing I’ve ever experienced before,” Myers said. “You could go to that concert, not know a single song and still be amazed by the energy. It was just that crazy. It’s so easy to feed off everyone’s energy because it’s just that good.”

As part of standard protocol, Myers knew she couldn’t use her phone while working the event. Before the concert started, she asked her section if they could take videos for her, which they sent her after the show.

“You’re not really supposed to be watching the concert — everyone’s gonna catch a glimpse every once in a while — but really paying attention to fans to make sure that everyone’s staying safe,” Myers said.

She recalled having to de-escalate and remove an attendee from her section after the person dumped a drink on someone else’s head.

“Luckily, that was the only issue that we encountered,” Myers said. “Everyone else was super nice, took a bunch of videos for me and just overall cooperated with everything.”

Myers said she received more than 25 friendship bracelets from people in the crowd and went home with 17 after giving some away — even though she didn’t bring any of her own to trade. 

Her favorite was a bracelet with the acronym of her favorite song, “TSOU,” which a fellow Swiftie gave to her in front of her.

“When she sang the song, he looked right at me and he started screaming at me,” Myers said. “He goes ‘The bracelet, the bracelet!’ I like that bracelet just because of the connection that we had made there.”

She doesn’t do the job to enjoy the events. She does it to network, to meet people who could connect her to event management work as she looks ahead at her career prospects.

Still, you might say the Eras Tour “Hits Different.”

“I’m definitely still on a high from that concert,” she said. “It was incredible.”