Gilded static, the kind that prickles at the nape, seeps into the air as the crowd thickens, bodies shimmering under a canopy of synthetic gold. Amaarae hasn’t even stepped onstage yet, but her presence is already curling around the room like vapor—opulent, intangible, a phantom of her own making. The Outernet’s cavernous glow swells, pulses. Then, a ripple of synth, a breathy echo—something soft and humid, like warm neon pressed against the skin. “All My Love” ghosts in, not quite a song yet, just a premonition, an inhale before the plunge.
Then she’s there. Not emerging, not walking—arriving, like a glitch in the timeline, a fashion-forward deity stepping out of a dream. A red latex dress gleaming under the stage lights, mid-thigh boots slicing through the haze, every inch of her sculpted for impact. The voice, delicate but laced with something unbothered, purrs into “Angels in Tibet” and bodies slip into her rhythm, surrendering. She moves like she sings—effortless, fluid, slightly unreal. Like she’s been projected onto the stage by a machine built to conjure glamour.
Basslines don’t drop in Amaarae’s world, they slink. A slow, syrupy descent, thick with menace. “Princess Going Digital” slithers in, high-gloss and hyperactive, a late-night Tokyo club dreamt up in 2003 and exported straight to London in 2024. The tempo yanks everyone up—hands, hips, heart rates. Her voice, featherlight, cuts through the density of the beat like a knife slicing through fruit. The whole thing is addictive, a sugar rush on a loop. Time bends, stretches, doubles back on itself.
She doesn’t command the stage so much as she flickers across it—one moment rooted, the next, dissolving into motion, a specter of herself. The crowd is sweating, swaying, fully possessed. And then she hits them with “Sociopathic Dance Queen,” grinning like she knows exactly what she’s doing. The prom-night-meets-strip-club synthline kicks in and suddenly everyone is moving with reckless devotion, eyes half-closed, bodies melting into one another. Amaarae barely sings so much as she coos, her voice an exhale, a teasing whisper that hangs in the air just out of reach.
Nothing about her performance is linear. One second she’s a high-fashion pop star dipped in liquid gold, the next, she’s tossing off bars like a rogue AI that learned seduction from old VHS tapes. “Counterfeit” hits like a glitch in the matrix—she raps steady, clipped, the crowd catching only half the words but moving like they understand the language of the bass instead. The sound system thrums, an undercurrent of something dangerous and delicious. It’s impossible to tell where the set is headed next. A lull? A crash? A heartbeat pause before impact?
Instead, it’s “Reckless & Sweet.” The pivot is whip-fast, the entire venue thrown into slow motion, the song rolling in soft and cinematic. She doesn’t just perform it—she breathes through it, stretching every note like she’s pulling silk through her fingers. The crowd, still drunk on the high-gloss chaos of the last hour, is suddenly reverent, swaying like a field of something delicate. If the show had ended here, it would have felt like a perfect, aching dissolve into the night. But Amaarae isn’t interested in clean endings.
No, she needs one last act of indulgence. “Sad Girlz Luv Money” detonates like a champagne bottle popping—sharp, fizzing, golden. The crowd erupts, spilling into the song like it belongs to them. Maybe it does. Amaarae feeds off their energy, amplifies it, throws it back. The beat thickens, her voice skates over it, high and teasing, a flirtation with no intention of ever calling back. Bodies grind, voices rise, the entire venue is vibrating. And just when it feels like the night might loop into infinity, she’s gone.
No encore. No explanation. Just a lingering bassline, an afterimage of red latex and pearls, mid-thigh boots disappearing into the shadows, the taste of synthetic honey on the tongue. The lights come up too fast. The spell breaks. Outside, the air feels thin, like we’ve been breathing something richer for the past hour and now we’re just left with oxygen. Amaarae doesn’t just perform—she warps reality. And once you’ve been inside her world, the real one feels counterfeit.
Words & photos – Richard Isaac
“We Love Live Music” is a new platform dedicated to celebrating the energy, passion and joy in live music – thank you for visiting our site! You, the gig goers & festival goers, are a big part of the “We..”. So we’d love to hear from you, share your views or gig stories in the comments below the reviews, or tag us in your socials in your posts from the shows. Look us up on TikTok/IG/Facebook/YouTube where we’ll be posting regular content