Over the years something I’ve always said about Lauv is that he knows how to put on an incredible masterclass of a show. From seeing him on his debut run of Australian shows in 2018, to his upgraded production tour in 2019, he showed a lot of signs of growth and levelling up with an innovative element that saw him incorporating mental health initiatives into the show experience with activations like “My Blue Thoughts”. 

It’s 2023 and he’s finally returned to Australia following the unfortunate re-scheduling of his 2020 tour thanks to COVID. This sold out run of seven shows is his biggest run of dates yet, and sees him playing some of the most prestigious theatres in the country. For his two night run in Sydney, he packed out Enmore Theatre for a 90 minute show full of singalongs. The first thing that became apparent about this show was that he no longer had a band. He was performing completely to track, with the addition of picking up guitar and keys sporadically throughout the show and playing them himself. It was quite obvious there was a band missing with the arrangements of the songs lacking the energy you expected from the live versions. A perfect example of this was the fan favourite “Chasing Fire” – which wasn’t as electric as it usually is live. Secondly there was no production on the stage except for a giant ruffled curtain, so he was quite simply running around an empty stage singing to a backing track. It felt like a glorified karaoke show with some occasional strobe lighting, and it was ultimately disappointing. For the fact that this is his biggest Australian tour yet, but he had the smallest production of his three tours yet, it made no sense. The energy of the show also lacked compared to the previous tours, and felt like he didn’t exactly know what he was doing. 

If this was his first tour maybe I could’ve forgiven him for this show, but having seen two previous tours, I know exactly what he’s capable of, and this show was not it. It could’ve potentially worked if he had LED screens with cool visuals to amplify the production, or cool levelled staging that allowed him to run up or climb things while performing. But it was genuinely an empty stage, and every time he sat on the naked stage – if you weren’t towards the front or on the balcony – you couldn’t see him.  He came straight from the Asia run of dates where he had LED screens and more lighting, and from seeing those videos and the added elements, the show makes more sense.

But I will note that Lauv’s vocals are still immaculate live, and when I wasn’t focusing on the fact that nothing was happening on stage and there wasn’t a band, I was drawn to remember that he can truly sing, and he’s an incredible songwriter. The show felt like hit after hit, with big singalong’s constantly erupting, and thousands of phones held up as they captured him singing their favourite song. This was “The Between Albums Tour”, so he filled the setlist with songs from all of his projects, and took the crowd on a discography journey. Opening with current single “Love U Like That”, he then steered into early favourites “Paris In The Rain”, “Paranoid” and “Fuck I’m Lonely” before giving some new favourites “Kids Are Born Stars” and “Molly In Mexico”. One of the shows’ standout moments was an impromptu acoustic performance of “Julia” which impressed with his raw vulnerability and his powerhouse vocals. He closed out the show with “Never Not” and “I Like Me Better” which were big singalong’s as expected.