Lorde | Ultrasound World Tour ★★★★★
RAC Arena, Wednesday, February 25
Lorde’s debut album Pure Heroine was released in 2013 when she was just 16 years old.
Also 16 at the time, I remember listening to that album on the bus home from school and developing a particular adoration of hits Ribs and Team.
So naturally, hearing those songs live for the first time 13 years later, along with songs from all three of her following albums, Melodrama, Solar Power and Virgin, felt a little surreal.
Lorde performed the Ultrasound World Tour in Perth to a sold-out crowd on Wednesday night, opening with Hammer, an anthemic song from her latest album, appearing from beneath the stage into a laser beam of blue light.
The high-energy song flowed straight into Royals – arguably her most well-known piece – before jumping back to her new work with Broken Glass.
“Welcome to Ultrasound, I am so grateful to be spending the last night of this tour with you Perth,” she calls out.
Lorde keeps that engagement with the audience high throughout the night, often stopping to discuss the heat – “I f—ing love it … it’s kind of sexy don’t you think?” – and calling security over to help a member of the crowd struggling.
She mentions visiting Rottnest Island for the first time, and sits down on the stage to discuss the drive behind her latest album, thanking the crowd for accepting “all the parts of me”.
There is a slight lull in energy as Lorde performs several songs from her album Solar Power, but crowd engagement doesn’t die with fans instead lighting up their phone torches to sway along.
It is a song from her original album that brings the energy back, even for the youngest in the crowd, proving that her first album is the one that has been cemented in history as one of the greats, followed by Green Light from 2017 album Melodrama.
After walking through the crowd singing David, Lorde brings it home with A World Alone and finally a euphoric rendition of Ribs, singing from a platform on the mixing desk at the back of the mosh pit.
Unfortunately, the Perth show marked the end of the Australia and New Zealand leg of the Ultrasound World Tour.
But if you missed out this time fear not – Lorde has toured Australia multiple times and unlike other superstars (Taylor Swift and Harry Styles, we’re looking at you) she doesn’t skip WA.
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Holly Thompson is a journalist with WAtoday, specialising in education and the environment.Connect via X or email.