It’s a surreal experience to see Sky Ferreira live in 2024.
She peaked back in 2013 when her debut album Night Time, My Time was hailed as instant cult classic. Critics ranked it among the year’s best, falling over themselves to describe how it refashioned sparkling 1980s synths and pop hooks with daker impulses for a new generation of Tumblr-addicted youth. (‘Madonna fronting Suicide’ became a recurring favourite.)
Despite being hyped as the bleached blonde, doe-eyed face of a bright alt-pop future, Ferreira instead became embroiled in a long-standing, increasingly public feud with Capitol Records. She accused her label of sabotaging her career and blocking attempts to release a fabled second album, Masochism, with only two single materialising since it was first teased in 2015.
“I should’ve had multiple albums out by now, to be honest,” Ferreira told Abby & Tyrone on triple j Drive recently.
The music ecosystem she came up and flourished in – hyped by taste-making bloggers, publications and MySpace – has all but vanished. So, has the world moved on from Sky Ferreira?
Judging by the roars of approval from a packed audience at Melbourne’s Forum theatre, the answer is a resounding no.
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Tonight’s sold-out RISING performance comprises older fans who grew up with Ferreira’s music but also a healthy demographic of younger people who must’ve been children during her peak. They’re all here for a rare evening with the US alt-pop star.
She’s back in the country for the first time since 2014 and, given her slight discography, crafting a setlist should be easy. Then again, nothing with Sky Ferreira is easy.
Depending on who you believe, the 31-year-old Californian is either fighting to reclaim her status from a major label system that’s smothered her potential for more than a decade, or simply an overrated singer who loves messy drama.
Reports from her Sydney performance as part of Vivid LIVE appeared to reinforce the latter. She made headlines after arriving 80 minutes late, puzzling fans by performing in poor lighting and giving little acknowledgement to the crowd.
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It fuelled concerns that her Melbourne show could prove equally chaotic. Instead, it seemed Ferreira had taken notes.
Following a warm-up set from DJ Danny Issues, Ferreira and her four-piece band arrive 30 minutes after the scheduled start (an improvement) and kick off with Night Time, My Time opener ‘Boys’.
She cuts a chic figure against a bank of blue and red lights, giving big Debbie Harry energy in her sunglasses and jacket.
More importantly, her voice is strong and clear, sounding as good as the studio recordings.
Phones are rocketed aloft to capture ‘You’re Not The One’, ‘I Blame Myself’ and ’24 Hours’, songs that boast unabashedly catchy choruses but bear more gritty, noisy touches than your average radio ready chart hits.
Her music still sounds fresh today, presaging our current landscape of diverse alt-pop heroines.
Lorde, Grimes, Charli XCX, Caroline Polachek; even Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish and Lana Del Rey all arguably owe something to Ferreira for developing a healthy appetite for music that benefits from the pop industrial complex – obsessive fandoms, charts and all – but operate at its periphery.
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Her vengeful 2022 single ‘Don’t Forget’ lands with a pleasurable thump, while 2019’s moodier, string-laden ‘Downhill Lullaby’ becomes a stark, enjoyable slither on stage.
It would sound beautifully at home in fictional venue the Bang Bang Club on Twin Peaks: The Return – the 2017 extension of David Lynch’s surreal TV series in which Ferreira featured.
Despite a very strong start – good enough to make you question Ferreira’s track record for patchy performances – the concert’s second half struggles to recapture the earlier highs.
Ferreira is a charismatic performer but not a confident one. She says little between songs, and when she does, it’s hard to make out between mumbles, chuckles and apologies.
The flaws become more pronounced as the set wears on, the longer silences between songs sapping any sense of momentum. In a display of her self-professed performance anxiety and perfectionism, she restarts several of her songs over.
It’s as if Ferreira has something to prove, cramming in more material as the hour slides closer to midnight, but she seems to simply lack the stamina and the songs begin to suffer.
Glimpses of Courtney Love rock stardom vanish beneath under-rehearsed, unconvincing renditions of ‘Omanko’, ‘Innocent Kind’ and perfunctory covers of Suzanne Vega’s ‘Luka’ and ‘Til Tuesday’s ‘Voices Carry’.
Title track ‘My Night, My Time’ is a dirge that actively thins the crowd as restless members of the audience take it as their sign to exit.
By the time she inevitably closes with her biggest and best hit, ‘Everything Is Embarrassing’ the appreciation is deafening.
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A shorter, sharper set that left people wanting more might’ve been the better move.
It’s a shame, because this show should’ve been a sterling reminder of what we’ve been missing for a decade. And for parts of it, it very much was.
But the lasting impression was unfulfilled potential; a situation that mirrors Ferreira’s career arc, moments of undisputed brilliance marred by long stretches of frustrating absence and inactivity.
The Ferreira faithful will say the messiness is all part of the experience. Signs of authenticity from someone who refuses to play the role of a prim, perfect pop star. Think history-making BRIT award winner RAYE, but for the indie sleaze era.
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So, what’s next? Following her Australian tour, Ferreira is headed home to – same as it ever was – continue work on the mythical second album Masochism.
“I have a few months off touring but I’m recording” she told triple j, before adding self-reflexively: “I know people are like ‘sure she is!’ But I actually am recording!”
“It’s the first time I’ve been able to record where I’m not on a label,” says Ferreira, who first inked a record deal at just 15 years old but quietly parted ways with Capitol late last year and is now independent.
“I feel like I’m at the point where I feel a little more comfortable talking about because for a long time I couldn’t talk about it. I actually wasn’t allowed to talk about it. I’m still sort of not allowed to, but I don’t really care. What else can they do? They already took 10 years away.”
The abusive relationship with the industry typifies Sky Ferreira’s existence, somebody who’s overcome sexual assault and besieged by chronic health issues, including scoliosis and Lyme disease.
Nobody’s more keenly aware of the dissatisfaction and struggles that define Sky Ferreira’s career than the artist herself.
As she confesses in one of the evening’s many unimpeachable choruses:
‘I just want you to realise I blame myself for my reputation.’
My Night, My Time is out nowSky Ferreira headlines an Open Season show on Wednesday 5 June at The Princess Theatre in Brisbane.