Arlo Parks Heats Up The Opera House In Rocking Sydney Show
"I certainly did not expect to end an Arlo Parks show headbanging along to a triple rock-riff."
The concert hall of the Sydney Opera House is the last place you would expect to be out of your seat dancing, vibing, and crying.
But that’s exactly the type of atmosphere Arlo Parks conjured up during her debut show at the newly reopened Concert Hall.
The hot pink top of Arlo’s hair blends with the purple spotlights as she strides on stage in sneakers, statement pleated skirt, black knee highs, and baggy shirt. Despite her first headline tour being cut short due to COVID in 2020, her confident and comfortable stage presence could fool any audience into believing she’s been doing this for 100 years.
Like on her recent album My Soft Machine itself, Arlo opens with ‘Bruiseless,’ a wistful observational track about the omnipresence of pain and abuse. Dancing on the line between a poem and a poppy interlude, this opener allows Arlo to set the mood for her show. It’s not unlike what what you’d get if a spoken-word open-mic night was accompanied by a live electro-pop band. But in this case, audiences show appreciation by doing their darndest to dance, rather than snapping their fingers.
It only takes one and a half songs before people are on their feet, dancing with unbridled joy along with her. Asking people to dance along to ‘Weightless’, even folks crammed side by side in the middle stalls where we sat eagerly oblige the British singer. Throughout the show, Arlo matches fans’ energy seamlessly, keeping eye contact with the red-faced devotees dancing their hearts out. When she throws an “I see you” to a pair of enthusiastic fans in the dress circle, Arlo jumps along with them for a moment to screams of joy.
But Arlo’s first breathless words to the audience inform us how momentous playing the Opera House is for her. The 22-year-old explains that her mum has kept an old Australia calendar featuring the harbor and Opera House up on the fridge since she was little. “Mum, I am going to play there,” she tells the audience, adorably re-enacting the conversation.
The candid comfort with which Arlo wears her heart on her sleeve in a live setting warms the winter evening. When she shares her own struggles with depression before singing ‘Black Dog,’ she does so with an earnesty and unfiltered empathy of someone for whom sharing with an audience is still a novelty and a blessing. Later, when she bids the audience good night, she thanks them for making her debut at the revered space “a lot less nerve-racking.”
However humbled she may have been to play the Sydney Opera House, Arlo is an audacious presence. The chemistry between Arlo and her band, especially her bassist, is amplified by her live arrangements. Her and her band imbue her easy-listening ballads with an ’90s rock edge by deepening the basslines and ramping up the guitar solos. It couldn’t be more obvious Arlo wants you to dance – because she does too.
More than once, Arlo duets and dances to the riff laid down by her bassist, Sam, to the rip-roaring delight of the audience. The indomitable pair are mesmerising, the beating heart of the show. This combination peaks when Arlo dons her own jet black guitar, thrashing out a riff along with her bassist and guitarist for a punkish closer with ‘Devotion.’ She does so once more for an encore of ‘Softly.’ I found myself wishing Arlo would release an album that leans into her love of rock music. But this, I realised, is what makes her live shows so special.
For a show that began with the murmurings of ‘Bruiseless,’ I certainly did not expect to end the show headbanging along to a triple rock-riff. It’s not the concert you would expect from a discography so often described as “lo-fi.” But live, Arlo throws the music behind her hyper-real lyrics into high definition. Her enhanced live arrangements of these sweet soft tracks are a true treat, spinning a tale that begins in quiet contemplation and ends dancing in a room full of beaming strangers.
Merryana Salem is a proud Wonnarua and Lebanese–Australian writer, critic, teacher and podcaster. Follow them on Twitter.