Melanie Martinez Welcomes Us To HADES On Her HADES: The Sacrifice Tour
I had to keep pinching myself as it didn’t feel real seeing the approval to have the opportunity to photograph Melanie Martinez. If you know me, you’ll know I’m a huge Cry Baby (the name for Melanie's fanbase). I have a large portion of her different vinyl variants, and have had the opportunity to see her on each of her tours, dating all the way back to 2016 when I first saw her live on the Cry Baby tour at the Danforth Muisc Hall in Toronto. A bit of a trek, but I was excited to have made my way all the way to Hamilton, Ontario to witness her Hades: The Sacrifice tour.
Arriving on stage at 8pm sharp was Haute & Freddy. A unique duo that knows how to get a crowd warmed up and jumping. With their circus themed display, costume and energy, they managed to put on a spectacular half hour set including songs such as ‘Freaks’, ‘Anti-Superstar’ and ‘Shy Girl’.
Credits: @MacPhotoMedia
Melanie’s performance started right at 9:10pm. A large bed was positioned on the stage, covered in plush blankets, soft pillows, and a suitcase positioned in the middle. As the arena lights went dark, a deep voice hummed out of the speakers introducing us to Melanie’s newest character, Circle. Circle is a recovered individual who was discovered in an isolated cult, she has no concept of government, technology, or modern society. She only refers to the outside world as ‘Hades’. The show is Circles observations on humanity. Melanie in her true classic form starts the show off with the first songs off HADES. Emerging from the suitcase on the bed she kicks off the show with ‘GARBAGE’, ‘IS THIS A CULT?’ and ‘POSSESSION’. I could hear the live band during the first few songs, but they were nowhere to be seen until I noticed during ‘POSSESSION’ the backdrop turned into a shelf full of trinkets, that the band was behind the screen and the backdrops were created in a way to make it look like the band members themselves were items on the shelf. Another example of this was during her song ‘DISNEY PRINCESS’, the backdrop turns into a castle, and each member was positioned behind a different door or window on the castle backdrop.
Credits: @MacPhotoMedia
After Circle observes the outside world and starts to learn new forms of rebellion, Melanie moves to the B stage which was situated in the middle of the arena. Here Melanie performs ‘GRUDGES’, ‘MONOPOLY MAN’, ‘AVOIDANT’, ‘MONOLITH’, and ‘WEIGHT WATCHERS’. The speech before ‘MONOPOLY MAN’ I admired as Melanie subtly calls out the elites and what they do/ have been doing. Before ‘AVOIDANT’ Melanie takes a moment to ask the crowd how they are doing, having a quick moment to connect with those in attendance. Melanie ended up picking a fan from the audience to bring up on stage with her and she sang ‘AVOIDANT’ to them. During ‘MONOLITH’ the room filled with phone flashlights, although a fan project was clearly in the works and most of those with their lights up used something red to fill the room with a warm glow.
After ‘WEIGHT WATCHERS’ Melanie returns to the main stage where she continues Circles journey with speeches between each song. My favourite songs off the album were back to back ‘BATSHIT INTELLIGENCE’ and ‘GUTTER’. During ‘GUTTER’ one of Melanie’s band members pulled out an accordion to play along with the main melody. The mix of the live accordion, drums and guitar really pulled the song together, and live it sounded amazing. The one performance I was most intrigued to see was ‘THE VATICAN’ as I know within the Cry Baby community that is one of the biggest songs off the album. Melanie came out dressed in a nun’s outfit, and included a rework of the instrumental so that she and her dancers could have a dance break.
Melanie rounds off the show with ‘CHATROOM’ giving her team, dancers and band members a shout out and thank you before transitioning back to the B stage to close the night out with ‘THE LAST TWO PEOPLE ON EARTH’. Melanie put together a well thought out show, a solid storyline, and stunning visuals. Unfortunately she doesn’t sing any songs from her previous albums Cry Baby, K-12, or Portals, but in this instance, and for the sake of her art and story telling, it’s understandable and makes sense. HADES; The Sacrifice Tour runs until September 26th 2026, so while you can, take a night and go see the show. You can also steam HADES by Melanie Martinez below on Spotify and Apple Music.
