Katy Perry is in a strange position in the world of pop culture, where relevancy is often fleeting.
At age 40, Perry is more than a decade removed from her prime chart-topping form but way too young to tap into that nostalgic sweet spot like Madonna and Usher are mining.
So her largely sold-out “Lifetimes” tour stop Wednesday at State Farm Arena was a disjointed but endearing mess of a show that attempted but failed to breathe much life into the cuts from her most recent album, the tepidly reviewed “143.”
Credit: RODNEY HO?
Credit: RODNEY HO?
The 130-minute, 26-song set did cover almost all her big hits, sometimes in frustratingly brief medley form. (There was a perfunctory snippet of “Last Friday Night” and a way-too-short version of “California Gurls.”).
She did bring back her breakout hit “I Kissed a Girl’ with cheeky ebullience and pranced around with authoritative verve during “Dark Horse.”
Perry gave herself plenty of opportunity to get close to her fans, courtesy of an infinity sign stage that took up the entire lower portion of the arena.
There was a head-scratching storyline throughout the show in which Perry played a half-human, half-robot attempting to save the world from the evil “Mainframe” and ultimately freed the … butterflies?
Credit: RODNEY HO?AJC
Credit: RODNEY HO?AJC
This theme enabled her 10 backup dancers to play robots, bad guys or simply athletic eye candy while she performed stunts inside a big, metallic ball elevated 30 feet into the air. And toward the end, she flew around the arena on what looked like an ugly moth but was supposedly a butterfly.
Over her career, Perry has tended to evoke more of a PG-13 than dangerous vixen vibe. So despite donning a range of revealing cyberpunk outfits, her concert felt more like Halloween play acting. For instance, she spent part of the time in a gray latex mini dress with peppermint-shaped hip embellishments and cotton candy platform boots.
Credit: RODNEY HO
Credit: RODNEY HO
Nobody has ever mistaken Perry’s dance skills for that of, say, Jennifer Lopez. And while she put in the effort, her backup dancers provided the killer dance moves. At one point, she joked: “People tell me I can’t dance, but I can … shuffle!”
Over the past year, Perry has faced a bizarrely intense level of social media hatred. She was panned for working again with producer Dr. Luke on “143″ because he previously faced sexual assault allegations. She was mocked for taking part in the Blue Origin suborbital spaceflight earlier this year. (Even the Wendy’s X feed wrote, “Can we send her back?” after she landed.)
But none of that deterred her fans from filling State Farm Arena and giving her oodles of compensatory adulation. She even alluded to the over-the-top online outrage before performing 2012’s “Part of Me.”
“They can say what they want to say,” Perry declared. “I know who I am. This is the part of me they can never take away.”
At one point during “Part of Me,” she ran full tilt around the stage as if she were trying to escape the critics.
Credit: RODNEY HO
Credit: RODNEY HO
Perry didn’t delve into her personal life in any great detail but referenced her public breakups before giving her most emotional performance of the night with “Not Like the Movies.” And noting that she had no regrets joining “the cult” of motherhood, she dedicated “All the Love” to her 4-year-old daughter.
Dropping the sci-fi theme for a bit, she brought up several fans on stage to join her for “The One That Got Away,” revealing her innate charm. She hugged two 9-year-old girls who practically cried in her close presence.
Credit: RODNEY HO
Credit: RODNEY HO
A man bounded on stage dressed as Left Shark, referencing the man whose creative choreography during Perry’s 2015 Super Bowl appearance became a meme. She mock berated his attention-getting ways.
Then she celebrated a sassy 20-year-old she highlighted on stage named Chase who told Perry he was “Chase ― like the bank I got money.”
Perry found this turn of phrase so amusing she began chanting it with dorky intensity, and the entire audience joined in.
And before she disappeared down the stage at the end of her iconic inspirational song “Firework,” she told the crowd, “Thank you for reminding me what is real. No matter what the internet says, this is real.”
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