share
The Black Dog pub in London shoots to stardom after Taylor Swift presumably mentions it on her new album. Google searches for “The Black Dog” exploded the day Swift released “The Tortured Poets Department”.
A new analysis from restaurant furniture manufacturer Affordable Seating found that, on April 19th, worldwide searches for “The Black Dog” overtook those for many British landmarks.
The Black Dog – more Google searches than four UK landmarks
People around the world searched for “The Black Dog” 909% more than the iconic Big Ben. They were also 1,250% more interested in finding out more about the bar Taylor Swift mentions in one of her songs than about the London Eye.
The bar’s popularity is even more striking when compared to Tower Bridge or even Buckingham Palace. The Black Dog saw 1,429% more searches that day than either of these two iconic UK attractions.
Narrower searches, such as for “The Black Dog bar” compared to Big Ben, the London Eye, Tower Bridge and Buckingham Palace, still indicate that the pub in Taylor Swift’s lyrics was more popular than any of the four UK landmarks on the day her new album was released. This confirms the impact that Swift had on the pub’s sudden rise in popularity worldwide.
This interest is particularly high from the Philippines, Argentina, the United States, Singapore, Indonesia, Chile, Thailand, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. This is where total searches over the past month for The Black Dog were higher than any of the four aforementioned London landmarks.
Pub’s real location and Swift’s ex who visited it
Knowing Swift takes inspiration from her love life, fans were quick to identify which bar she most likely mentions. While it is a common name for pubs across the UK, the one located on the south bank of the Thames, in Vauxhall, London, is the most popular of all, according to TripAdvisor reviews. This prompted swifties to pinpoint this particular bar when trying to decipher the meaning behind the song’s lyrics. However, they are yet to establish which partner she might be referring to.
In the namesake song, Swift accuses her love interest of visiting a bar called “The Black Dog”. She discovers this through her partner’s location function. The ballad sets the scene from the start, where Swift sings: “Your location / You forgot to turn it off / And so I watch as you walk / Into some bar called The Black Dog”.
Located at 112 Vauxhall Walk, The Black Dog is a traditional British pub with quaint charm during the day and a lively atmosphere at night. Since the release of Taylor Swift’s new album, the pub’s Instagram bio reads “home to tortured poets @taylorswift”. Another recent post pokes fun at the unexpected attention the pub had garnered overnight. It shows the bar’s administration embarking on a mission to identify which partner Swift might have been referring to by frantically checking their security camera footage, prompting fans to share their theories.
A spokesperson for Affordable Seating comments on the findings: “We are seeing the full-fledged power of Taylor Swift’s music pouring into real life again. The queues outside the Black Dog in Vauxhall are massive now. She single-handedly threw this local gem into global stardom, essentially pivoting its future. From today on, true Swifties visiting London cannot really leave without checking in at The Black Dog in Vauxhall.”
The analysis was carried out by Affordable Seating, a leading restaurant furniture manufacturer from Chicago.
