Lady Gaga's Mayhem Ball Tour Review: Quite Simply The Best Thing She's Ever Done

Lady Gaga performing at The O2 on the first night of her Mayhem Ball tour's UK legFor an artist who has done everything from suspending herself from the ceiling covered in blood at the VMAs, emerging from an egg at the Grammys and getting the whole world to collectively hold its breath at the Oscars, Lady Gaga is still somehow managing to outdo herself when it comes to her live performances.On Monday night, the award-winning singer-songwriter finally brought her Mayhem Ball tour to the UK for the first of four sold-out shows at London’s O2 Arena (after which she’ll also take it to Manchester’s new Co-Op Live for two more shows).The concert effectively serves as a victory lap after a triumphant year that’s seen Gaga back dominating the charts, landing some of the best reviews of her career, headlining one of the world’s biggest festivals, setting new records with her live performances and even making a cameo in one of the world’s most talked-about shows.It also manages to cram everything that has made her one of the most enigmatic and revered performers of the last 20 years into one fast-paced and action-packed two-and-a-half-hour set. Some fans may recognise most of the show from Gaga’s much-celebrated Coachella set from earlier this year, but it’s also been made bigger and better for arenas, weaving in new songs and set pieces into the mix to help bring the Mayhem album to life, alongside countless hits and some deeper cuts from earlier in her career that feel as familiar as anything else in the set.Lady Gaga embraces her past, present and, indeed, future in her Mayhem Ball tourAnyone who’s followed Gaga’s career will know she’s always blended elements of theatre and pop in her live shows with mixed results, but she’s never done it as seamlessly or with as much finesse as in the Mayhem Ball tour. Divided into five “acts”, the show has a loose storyline that runs throughout, allowing Gaga to dive even deeper into the themes of duality and conquering darkness first explored on her Mayhem album.It also blends different theatrical elements from throughout history, with the opening double-punch of Bloody Mary and Abracadabra throwing it back to the early years of the medium, while Million Reasons (reimagined as a love song to the darker parts of herself in a move few could pull off as well as Gaga) and a reimagined version of Shallow tipped its hat to The Phantom Of The Opera.Other theatrical parts of the show – which saw Gaga briefly playing more to the camera projecting her image onto the enormous screen behind her – felt more in line with Jamie Lloyd’s revivals of Sunset Blvd and Evita (which felt like an even more deliberate homage when her rendition of closing number How Bad Do U Want Me began backstage with her dancers, before returning to the stage).In fact, almost every song on the setlist was given its own set-piece that felt like a music video playing out in front of you – Poker Face became a living chess game, Disease saw her buried alive and grappling with her evil doppelganger, Abracadabra turned the star into a Tudor monarch (with elements of a menacing Queen of Hearts from Alice In Wonderland) and the celebratory Bad Romance saw her bursting back to life in a Victorian hospital setting.Lady Gaga leans into her theatrical sensibilities with huge success on her latest arena tourWhile Gaga has honed this mix of theatre and the traditional pop show like never before on the Mayhem Ball, it also feels like she’s really cracked how to incorporate the different facets of her artistry into one show.The Grammy winner has made no secret of the fact she doesn’t always find it easy to be the Lady Gaga the world, including her own fanbase, expects her to be (listen to Mayhem cut Perfect Celebrity or Chromatica’s Plastic Doll to see what we mean). This has led her to pursue different creative avenues outside of the pop world, like her Jazz & Piano live shows, acting in projects like A Star Is Born and Joker: Folie À Deux (not to mention the very different sounds explored on their soundtracks) and pursuing a more country-inspired sound on 2016’s Joanne.In past live shows, her attempts to incorporate these elements into her performances have felt jarring or, at times, self-indulgent, while renditions of hits like Bad Romance or Just Dance have felt more like begrudging obligations than celebrations of the hits that first made the world fall in love with her.Fittingly for a show that centres around themes of duality and embracing all of the more complicated sides of herself, the Mayhem Ball flows effortlessly as Gaga shines a light on the different sides of her artistry that has made her one of the biggest stars on the planet, mixing grittier rock- and dance-inspired moments with her pop hits and an extended sing-a-long sequence on the piano.An extended sing-a-long around the piano made for one of the most touching sections of Lady Gaga's Mayhem Ball tourThe Mayhem Ball is not a perfect show – certain hits are cut short in their prime to make room for lesser-known Mayhem tracks; some of Gaga’s transitional interludes felt a bit compared to her peers; and it’s a shame that all of her albums are represented except 2020’s Chromatica, which gave the singer her most recent number one and was followed by a massive stadium tour.Meanwhile one brief section was shooting for “gothic” but wound up veering towards surprisingly cheesy for an artist who was once a muse for Alexander McQueen and hung out with the likes of Marina Abramovich and Jeff Koons.What made this part of the show permissible, though, was seeing just the fun that Gaga was having on stage. For all of the impressive staging, incredible musicianship on stage and the undeniable brilliance of the setlist, it was the extra ingredient of seeing how much Lady Gaga is finally enjoying being Lady Gaga again that made the Mayhem Ball the best thing she’s ever put her name on.Lady Gaga paid homage to The Phantom Of The Opera during one memorable section of the tourHuffPost UK attended Lady Gaga’s Mayhem Ball tour as a guest of Nordic Spirit. Nordic Spirit nicotine pouches are a smoke-free alternative for existing nicotine users aged 18 and over. These convenient nicotine pouches are one hundred percent tobacco-free, with no smoke or vapour. Existing adult nicotine users aged 18 can find out more info here.READ MORE:This Is The Hidden Meaning Behind The Lyrics Of Lady Gaga's Hit AbracadabraWith These New Changes To ABBA Voyage, The Show Has Somehow Improved On PerfectionThank You To Sabrina Carpenter For Reminding Everyone That Pop Is Supposed To Be Provocative

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