By Neil Durham

WORTH A LOOK?: ****

WHEN? Saturday 8 March, tour runs through 16 August 2025

SETLIST: Jupiter Drive; Gravity; Forever; Warning Signs; Hate The Way I Love You; Statements; I’m In It With You; Dreams; Coming Close; Euphoria; Is it Love?; Tattoo

It’s International Women’s Day and while Sweden is choosing its Eurovision entry for 2025 the only woman to have won the competition twice is performing in Barcelona as part of an extensive European tour that reaches the UK and Ireland for 8 dates later this month.

• Read on for reasons including how this up-for-it crowd responded magnificently to an artist clearly revelling in their enthusiasm for her

We make our way to the front of this beautiful, theatre-like venue and in the standing area on the venue’s floor there are lots of Loreen fans with ‘VIP’ designations which we assume entitled them to see the queen at her soundcheck.

There’s an almost Stargate-like ring above the stage and Loreen emerges from it moving slowly amid the smoke from the dry ice and lighting that makes it difficult to see her face and connect with her emotionally as the extended nails on her fingers make her look like a cross between a Nightmare On Elm Street villain and an alien terminator warrior surveying the destruction of the battlefield in the wake of war.

The sci-fi mood is sustained through a couple of early songs and it’s only really when the enthusiastic crowd sing back the chorus at the top of their voices very loudly to Forever that we think we see a flash of a grin across Loreen’s face as she must anticipate this Saturday night Spanish audience is up for it.

In Stockholm right now 2015 Eurovision winner Måns Zelmerlöw is experiencing the pain of not winning Eurovision selection show Melodifestivalen and it’s a feeling Loreen went through with the jarring Statements she plays tonight. He, like Loreen, will grow through the experience and in Barcelona she’s interpolating it with Pink Floyd’s The Wall to accentuate the prog rock lapses of this performance.

There’s not a lot of audience banter but we do at 1 point think she says: ‘It’s like a gym workout’ ahead of debut Eurovision winner Euphoria which receives special treatment with a slowed-down beginning and mass audience singalong which is a joy to behold but must be especially satisfying when you’re in a country that’s not your own.

2nd Eurovision winner and equally joyous dancefloor banger Tattoo leans into an eastern sound that has influenced later single releases and we would love to see form part of an album but, for the moment at least, Loreen appears to be happy pursuing rather niche side projects like the current team-up with SAGES and Olafur Arnalds.

For us she’s at her most entertaining with the laser-like focus that Melodifestivalen has brought to her song output rather than the Kate Bush, 70s prog rock of some of the new songs she plays tonight which do advance her credibility and artistry.

Does she want worldwide hits and mainstream success or to be ploughing her own very arty 70s prog rock furrow?

It’s perhaps not even a question she needs to answer in the moment right now. What is important is that this up-for-it crowd responded magnificently to an artist clearly revelling in their enthusiasm for her.

And, if Loreen was looking for an escape route from that Eurovision pigeonhole, perhaps this tour sees her finding it without quite having to jettison her links to the contest that brought her to our attention completely.

• Main pictures via Facebook courtesy Loreen Tickets
• Have you seen a Loreen show before and what did you think of this 1? Let us know what you thought in the comments below
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