Music

Kylie Minogue at 3Arena: 30 years of pop hits dressed up in charm and skin-tight leather

Review: Kylie wrapped up 30 years of pop music – an early Christmas present for Irish fans

Kylie Minogue. Photograph: Christie Goodwin/Redferns

Louise Bruton
Tue Dec 4 2018 - 00:12

On the second last night of the European leg of Kylie Minogue's Golden Tour in Dublin, the Aussie pop star takes us on 30-year retrospective of her career, and in a relentless delivery of pop hits, disco floor fillers and just a touch of country, she proves that her career is more than Golden; it's platinum.

Opening with Golden, the title track from her 2018 album, her strut-worthy 2010 single Get Outta My Way and her 1990 top 10 hit Better the Devil You Know, this show is a story of how a pop star can adapt and master the charts without changing her mission; to provide a damn good time.

A natural charmer, she easily slinks between playing the pop vixen whose confidence knows no bounds and the humble superstar.

Her cowboy (and girl) dancers twirl and jump around her, and with golden Ks sewn on to their denim jeans, they act out bar brawls, hedonistic disco infernos and cowboy hoedowns as she commands the stage, rolling from covers of Blue Velvet and mashing up Can't Get You Out of My Head with Fleetwood Mac's The Chain.

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A smaller production than her 2011 Aphrodite: Les Folies Tour, which was big, feathery and fierce, the Golden Tour is an intimate interaction with the star who usually plays the ultimate showgirl.

Sitting with her legs crossed on a pool table, she raises a drink to “health, happiness and love” before explaining how she was “on the floor in tears” when she had to cancel the original October date for this show.

Not one to dwell on the sad times, she picks herself up and launches into an unstoppable celebration of life. By weaving her new country sound into her hefty back catalogue, songs like Wow lose out on the synths and unfortunately lack momentum but her taunting 1994 single Confide In Me evolves into a brooding rock song.

She oozes charm as she chats with the crowd and recognises fans from previous tours but then camps it up for Slow, slinking around in head-to-toe skintight leather, grinding against her soon-to-be-topless male dancers.

The One, taken from her 2008 album X, begins as a soft ballad but soon picks up the pace and grows into a song of pulsating and blind infatuation. Although it's a dizzying pop song, Minogue plays her vulnerability as a strength in songs like The One, something she has perfected for each decade of her career.

She's committed to providing a good time, and her respect for her fanbase beams through every beat of the fevered Spinning Around and every swelling verse of All the Lovers. As laser beams bounce off a giant disco ball, a flurry of rainbow confetti and gold glitter descends on the crowd for a ramped-up performance of Love At First Sight, a song she says was written in Dublin, and On A Night Like This.

No energy is spared on these songs, and just as we have a Kylie for every mood and era, we also have Kylie for every season. Noting that it's the start of December, she throws in a last-minute performance of Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!, her first Christmas song of the season, bringing on a white confetti snowstorm.

Concluding with Dancing, the lead single from her new album, she wraps up 30 years of pop music at its best. In 30 years, Minogue's message has never changed. She takes the sadness and hardship she's experienced and turns it into something positive.

In her music, she asks us to love hard, dance harder and share the fun around. Instead of looking for the silver lining, Minogue finds the Golden lining.

Kylie Minogue