Seeing Kylie Minogue live has been a long-held dream for this reviewer, having grown up rewatching the pop icon’s music videos on VHS, along with Live in Sydney, the 2001 concert film that captured the early-aughties magic of her On a Night Like This tour.

24 years later, the reality is different — and it’s not just the lack of videotape grain. The dancers, costume changes and dramatic entrances are all there, but the elaborate sets of two decades ago have been replaced by modern stage blocks and electronic visuals.

Minogue enters the stage on a large swing, before starting the set in a mock diamond cage created by blue laser lighting. Opening with the lead single of her latest album and tour namesake, 2024’s Tension II, it sets us up for a night of the EDM-inspired sounds she has embraced with her latest releases.

Eight dancers accompany Minogue with rigid and robotic movements, while metallic costuming and styling create a futuristic atmosphere. The past is never far from mind, however, as she dips into her older repertoire with brief versions  In Your Eyes and Get Outta My Way.

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The dancers take centre stage when Minogue exits the stage to swap a silver sequined dress for a red utility vest and baggy pants — the first of five costume changes. This ensemble also change colour and shape throughout the night, from sheer long sleeve tops and baggy pants with boater hats to colourful inflatable shapes that look like they could be characters in a children’s television show.

Throughout the set, Minogue strikes a careful balance between the new material and fans that have given her career a second — or perhaps fourth or fifth — wind, and the older hits that are baked into pop culture and childhood memories.

It’s clear that Minogue still holds a genuine love for these songs too — although it’s hard to hold a candle to the passion of her fans. At one point, Minogue brings an overwhelmed fan on stage with her to have a hug and a private moment.

Minogue makes her way to a small stage towards the back of the arena for some stripped back moments, offering fans roses and indulging requests from the audience with acapella snippets of I Should Be So Lucky and Please Stay. These moments give fans a moment to appreciate her voice free of the arena-filling electronic sounds that dominate the rest of the set.

The volume returns when Minogue heads back to the mainstage for her the heavy bass drops and strobe lights of her club era, topped off with her Grammy-winning comeback hit Padam Padam which is rightfully given its moment in the spotlight.

Padam Padam might have introduced her to new audiences, a simple “La la la” is all fans need to be thrown back to 2001’s chart-topping Can’t Get You Out of My Head.

While the elaborate sets of past tours are gone — what artist could pull of a Showgirl tour in the streaming age? — Tension lets Minogue’s decades of experience and craft shine through. She is still the hardest working person on the stage for the duration of the two-hour set.

For this fan, the years of waiting were worth it — even if, unlike VHS, you can’t rewind and rewatch the real thing.

Kylie Minogue performed at Adelaide Entertainment Centre on 18 February 2025.