Throughout her nearly 20-year career, Lady Gaga has cast herself as something of a chameleon, alternating between pop star, electro queen, and stripped-down songwriter. For her Mayhem Ball tour, which kicked off last year and landed at the Moody Center on Sunday for the first of two nights, Gaga seamlessly wove those characters into a fairy tale-like narrative, an epic of good versus evil that ultimately culminated in a representation of her rawest, most honest form.
The two-and-a-half-hour performance played out over four distinct acts, all within a production made to look like a gothic opera house. Following a reading of the Mayhem Manifesto, dictated in unison by two competing personas – one clad in crimson and the other in white – she launched into Act I, “Of Velvet and Vice.” Here Gaga emerged from an enormous doorway, positioned atop a two-story, red hoop skirt to perform Born This Way staple “Bloody Mary” beneath showers of sparks and flames.
After two more songs – Mayhem’s lead single, “Abracadabra,” and 2011 classic “Judas”– she inserted a quick shout-out to International Women’s Day: “Where’s all my girls at tonight in Texas?! Tonight, we celebrate!” It was an apt intro to the feminist anthem “Scheiße,” where Gaga moved with inhuman agility among a gang of a dozen backup dancers.
As the Mistress of Mayhem in red, she faced off with the story’s “good” character – adorned in a flowing white dress and matching, spiked crown – during “Poker Face.” The dance battle concluded with her killing the opponent: “Off with her head!” she exclaimed, nodding to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.
Then came the transition to Act II, “And She Fell Into a Gothic Dream,” where Gaga became the white queen, erupting from a literal sand grave to wrestle with her red rival during “Perfect Celebrity.” After banishing her, Gaga strode out on the runway, injured but supported by chrome crutches and armor, to perform a raucous rendition of “Paparazzi,” where the hundred-foot sheer train of her white ensemble eventually glowed with rainbow hues.
It was the first tribute to her legion of queer fans (more on that later), and was punctuated by “LoveGame,” “Alejandro,” and “Beast Inside,” which featured Gaga on an electric guitar to shred through the section’s finale.
She then mused, “A long time ago I got lost in a dream,” a sentiment that became the crux of Act III, “The Beautiful Nightmare That Knows Her Name.” The central figure here was a caricature of the white queen adorned in black, who emerged from a giant skull for “Killah,” flanked by equally sinister backup dancers whose red rose-topped headdresses nodded to Día de los Muertos.
This section of the story adopted a Sleeping Beauty scenario, where brambles snarled the opera house and Gaga played the part of a Malificentesque character who belted out arresting versions of “LoveDrug” and “Just Dance” – which awoke the artist from the nightmare and launched her into Act IV, “Every Chessboard Has Two Queens.”
Gaga’s performance was epic of good versus evil that ultimately culminated in a representation of her rawest, most honest form.
With her evil alter ego expelled, Gaga finally embodied her current self, donning a militarist leotard. Here, she addressed her Little Monsters.
“Where is my queer community?” she asked. “This show is for you, your community, your beauty, your queer Texas art, your strength, the way you lead the world … I’m gonna sing about it.”
She did just that with “Born This Way,” which elicited the most spirited sing-along of the evening. Afterward, Gaga reconciled with the red queen, serenading her with “Million Reasons” and riding a boat along the runway-turned-river while delivering tearjerker hymn “Shallow,” from 2018’s A Star Is Born.
She arrived at the piano, where – with all the house lights turned on – she sang the solemn yet thunderously operatic “Die With a Smile” and “The Edge of Glory.”
This act’s finale, “Vanish Into You,” saw the singer venturing offstage for a run along the barricade, where she signed various records and illustrations. The moment’s emotional impact was driven home by a brief speech reflecting on her long career.
“I intend to write a lot more music. For those of you who have been [here] 20 years and for those of you who are brand-new, would you come back in 20 years?”
A chorus of cheers signaled an affirmative, which was rewarded with send-off “Bad Romance,” where Gaga was resurrected on a hospital table as a monster queen by a group of dancers dressed as pink plague doctors.
Even that skin was shed for an extended encore in which a camera crew followed the singer backstage as she removed her wig and makeup for show-closer “How Bad Do U Want Me.”
She reemerged onstage in humbled, all-too-human form, intimating that – at the end of the day – she’s not a queen or monster, but rather a highly relatable person among the masses. Her message was clear: Mayhem is an internalized story about the struggle against an all-consuming ego, and anyone is capable of defeating it to embrace and celebrate the truest version of themself.
Lady Gaga
Moody Center
March 8
This article appears in March 13 • 2026.