Lorde review: New Zealand icon gives Dublin audience the Royals treatment
A recent image of Lorde, who played the RDS in Dublin on Saturday. Picture: Leon Neal/Getty Images
★★★★☆
At 8.45pm, the RDS Simmonscourt venue is plunged into darkness. A singular blue laser beam appears, and Lorde emerges.
She is met with deafening screams as she launches into the opening track of her latest record. “Some days I’m a woman, some days I’m a man,” she sings, a beat pulsating behind her, “I think I’ve been born again.”
It’s hard to believe tonight is the first time the New Zealander has brought a tour to Ireland, though she had headlined both Forbidden Fruit and All Together Now festivals in 2022 and 2023 respectively. Thirteen years have passed since a song that defined a generation and earned her two Grammys at the tender age of 17. For most artists, giving away gold so early would be reckless; for Lorde, there’s plenty where that came from.
Dressed in blue jeans and a black T-shirt, festival-style diamantés stuck to her forehead, the 90-minute set is a nostalgic deep dive into her discography — a soundtrack to many of the audience’s youth.
On she sings of nights spent “off our faces”; on of the fear of being too much; on the pressure of living up to your parents' expectations.
She says her aim with the Ultrasound tour was “not to leave any part of [her] behind”, and she certainly achieves that goal. The set includes all of 2025’s with almost as much coming from arguably the singer’s magnum opus, and a hefty showing from her debut too.
seen by many as the 29-year-old's weakest record to date, is the only album sidelined on the night (perhaps a sign that Yelich-O'Connor sees it as a blip too). Its two inclusions, and delivered back-to-back, are the only moments in the night when she loses large portions of the crowd.
Even deep cuts, like from a 2013 EP, get enthusiastic receptions and almost universal sing-alongs. (For that one, the singer urges the audience to help, “This is a song I wrote in 2012 that is pretty much physically impossible to sing, but I’m going to try. If you know it, please, for the love of god, help me.”)
and deliver the night’s high, 7,000 people seeming to jump in unison as we scream “I'm waiting for it / that green light / I want it.” For those tempted to dip out, however, there was more to come. Moments later, Lorde appears in the middle of the crowd, whipping out before closing with
Face-to-face, body-to-body, phones cast high in the air, we sing, “I've never felt more alone / feels so scary getting old.” It’s a moment for the devout. And after 90 minutes in her presence, we might just join the converted.
