Just 24 hours after Metallica tore through the Principality Stadium, Cardiff shifted gears completely as Katy Perry transformed Cardiff Castle into a technicolour pop theatre of chaos, comedy and hit after hit.
After a weekend spent photographing Alter Bridge, Skindred and the wider Blackbird Festival orbit, the contrast could not have been sharper. Where one night was built on riffs, volume and stadium-scale heaviness, this was pure pop maximalism, delivered with a knowing wink and a healthy dose of self-aware absurdity.
The evening’s support came from Bea, who set an early tone with a confident solo set, followed by Mimi Webb, whose polished pop energy and big singalong moments landed strongly with the growing crowd.
From the opening Out of Office video, it was clear this was less a conventional concert and more a piece of performance theatre. Perry launched straight into California Gurls, Teenage Dream and Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.), immediately locking in a full-venue singalong.
What followed rarely settled into anything resembling traditional flow. Instead, the show moved through a series of highly stylised set pieces, each driven by visuals, costume changes and increasingly surreal props.
One of the evening’s more surreal moments came during Hot N Cold, when Perry appeared inside a giant inflatable water bottle, moving through the crowd in a moment that felt closer to Flaming Lips-style performance art than mainstream pop staging. It was playful, ridiculous, and entirely in keeping with a show that leaned fully into spectacle.
Elsewhere, the production delivered constant sensory overload. Foam cannons drenched the audience mid-set, while transitions were driven as much by video interludes and thematic shifts as by the music itself. Despite the chaos, the strength of the catalogue ensured momentum never dipped for long.
One of the night’s standout sequences centred around an oversized laptop and an AI skit that quickly spiralled into chaos. When the on-screen AI unexpectedly dropped a C-bomb, there were audible gasps from some parents in the crowd, with a few instinctively covering younger eyes. Perry immediately grabbed a baseball bat and smashed the prop, triggering a shower of sparks from hidden pyrotechnics.
Without pause, she launched straight into Bandaids, joking that the “laptop” would need more than a bandaid to fix it. Later in the set, flames shot from the top of the oversized laptop during Watch It Burn, another clever visual cue that kept the theatrical production flowing.
Musically, the set rarely paused for breath. Dark Horse, E.T., Part of Me and Chained to the Rhythm sat comfortably alongside newer material like I’m His, He’s Mine and Bon Appétit. The response rarely dipped, with every chorus met by mass singalongs across the castle grounds.
There were also moments of restraint that cut through the spectacle. A stripped-back Thinking of You brought a noticeable shift in pace, with Perry reflecting briefly on the song’s origins. Later, Roar was also reworked acoustically, offering one of the strongest vocal moments of the night and a brief reset from the visual overload.
The show thrived on contrast, moving between maximalist staging and stripped-back performance with ease. Hot N Cold and I Kissed a Girl drove the main set towards its close, before Wide Awake, Lifetimes and a closing rendition of Firework brought the evening to an uplifting finish.
In a city that has recently hosted everything from stadium metal to orchestral tours, Perry’s Cardiff Castle show stood out not just for its scale, but for its refusal to play anything straight. Beneath the inflatables, foam cannons, flames and AI gags was a simple reminder of why Katy Perry remains one of pop’s most entertaining live performers. However bizarre the staging became, the songs never stopped doing the heavy lifting.
