It’s sort of crazy to think that Vanessa Amorosi is celebrating 25 years as an artist. Her discography has soundtracked so many special moments in Australian pop culture history, and she’s getting the flowers she deserves on this mostly sold out extensive tour. 

Kicking off in Newcastle and Sydney over the weekend, this show was all about celebrating her journey as an artist from all the hits to the fan favourites along the way. With the Factory Theatre at full capacity, the crowd signaled early on that they were ready to dance and singalong with Vanessa. Opening with “Mr Mysterious” and straight into “Have A Look”, she set the tone of the show perfectly before going into fan favourite “U R Mine” from her album The Power, and “City Of Angels” from her 2022 album of the same name. 

The set then took a bit of a dip in the audience’s engagement levels, before pulling them back in with an acoustic set where she performed “Shine” with Meg Mac, and took requests from the crowd that saw her doing a little bit of “Tent By The Sea”. She hilariously stopped the song before the chorus to give the backstory on the song as it came to her while she started singing it. 

“Perfect”, “Hazardous” and a brilliant cover of The Angels’ “Am I Ever Gonna See Your Face Again” bright the energy back up before she brought the show home with “The Power”, a full-band version of “Shine”, “This Is Who I Am” and “Absolutely Everybody”. 

The biggest takeaway from this show was that Vanessa has still got it. Her voice is as powerful and breathtaking as ever, and she shows so much diversity through the 80 minute show. But for a show that is to celebrate 25 years in a career, it felt a little undercooked with so many songs and fan favourites that could’ve been spotlighted, and medleys that could’ve been done to really get the full scope. The show felt quite short for what it was advertised to be, and instead felt like a classic Vanessa Amorosi set when comparing previous tour setlists. There were quite a few songs that could’ve got their moment in the show like “Kiss Your Mama”, “The Simple Things”, “Holiday”, “Aliens & UFOS”, “Amazing”, “Gossip”, “Heavy Lies The Head”, “Lessons Of Love”, and “Just Let It Go”. And maybe the near 7 minute version of Mr Mysterious at the beginning could have been shortened as it felt a little random. But with that being said, this show was a lot of fun, and looking around the sold out crowd it was so nice seeing all the beaming smiles of a crowd who were in total awe by the superstar that is Vanessa Amorosi.