Live Review: Cyndi Lauper, The Veronicas @ Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne

The mood of Cyndi Lauper's Girls Just Wanna Have Fun Farewell Tour could so easily be sad. But, returning to Rod Laver Arena, the American hitmaker ensures that the first of her six Australian dates is a party with as much joy as sentimentality.

Lauper told The Times that, "I want to say goodbye big." And she delivers with colourful wigs, couture costumes, striking visuals, tight musicianship, chronicles and, yes, expressive vocals.

Lauper announced her farewell run ahead of an appearance at 2024's Glastonbury Festival that was unfairly maligned due to technical failures – the tour then commencing in Montreal last October. The 71-year-old's presence alone is meaningful – defying gendered ageism with flair. And, though there's a Gold 104.3 activation outside the arena in Naarm/Melbourne, the audience is intergenerational; Lauper's fans are predominantly women and members of the LGBTIQA+ community.

The New Yorker broke out in 1983 with her debut She's So Unusual – now seminal New Wave (she won 'Best New Artist' at the Grammys). Lauper was hailed an instant pop icon with her punk image – complete with dyed hair and thrift shop styling. But the quirky star exuded charm, her songs alternately blithe or poignant.

Initially, Lauper toured Australia behind her sophomore, True Colors, in 1986. However, her later success occurred largely outside the US. She became a frequent visitor in the new millennium, most recently as Sir Rod Stewart's special guest in 2022.

Lauper has fostered Australian talent, commissioning both Yolanda Be Cool and NERVO to remix Girls Just Want To Have Fun and Time After Time, respectively, for the 30th-anniversary edition of She's So Unusual. This go, she has The Veronicas as special guests. In fact, the Brisbane duo have a Lauper connection: they collaborated with Billy Steinberg, co-writer of True Colors, on their 2005 debut album, The Secret Life Of…

The Veronicas released Gothic Summer in March of last year,. Not being in an album cycle, they're free to present a homage to the '80s—the outfit's retro logo is felicitous. In Melbourne, they have a blast.

Fronting a three-piece band, The Veronicas open with a rousing cover of Stevie Nicks' Edge Of Seventeen, segueing into their electro-pop Take Me On The Floor. There are other Countdown throwbacks: Pat Benatar's Love Is A Battlefield and The Best – which, originally recorded by Bonnie Tyler but immortalised by Tina Turner, has the crowd singing along.

But the chatty twins take inspo from Lauper by revisiting their 'greatest hits', amping up the pop-punk. Awesomely, Jessica Origliasso dons a guitar to play the riff from The White Stripes' Seven Nation Army at the start of When It All Falls Apart. Still, the set's highlight is a sublime execution of 2014's chart-topping ballad You Ruin Me, traditionally led by Lisa. The Veronicas wrap with the anthemic Untouched – their biggest song on Spotify. For a warm-up slot, everything is unusually considered.

These days, many a brand strategist throws around the word 'storytelling', but Lauper inuits its cultural significance in an era of social atomisation and fractured social media narratives. In concert, she shares stories about her life, family and songs. And the witty Lauper might moonlight in stand-up comedy. When, amid a monologue, a punter impudently demands she sings, Lauper sweetly explains that it's "not just a bang-bang show." But the real revelation is the 71-year-old's voice – deeper, more resonant and occasionally operatic.

It's rare that artists are compared to Lauper as she's so singular, but musically, attitudinally, and aesthetically, she's surely influenced female rappers (Lil' Kim, Nicki Minaj, and Missy Elliott), the Spice Girls, Lady Gaga, and Björk.

Like Madonna, Lauper promoted sex positivity in the '80s. She bounds on stage with the cheeky (and transgressive) She Bop off She's So Unusual, even playing the recorder.

Lauper favours her '80s classics, as showcased in the 2023 documentary LET THE CANARY SING. After "bopping", she travels back through time to her soundtrack premiere, The Goonies 'R' Good Enough – novel then, now nostalgic.

Lauper has long been an adept song stylist – She's So Unusual encompassing five covers. She stretches those distinctive vocals on what is arguably the definitive version of Prince's petulant When You Were Mine, her synth-pop ballad rivalling Sinéad O'Connor's Nothing Compares 2 U with its radically-altered arrangement – and fragility.

More stunning again is I Drove All Night, Lauper flexing her four-octave range on the lead single from 1989's A Night To Remember. Roy Orbison first cut the track, but Lauper's aired first – and she observes how, sung from a woman's perspective, it's a "power song".

Lauper does perform some of her '90s material, such as the R&B ballad Who Let In The Rain, an allegory for professional and personal change on the underrated Hat Full Of Stars – her soulful topline enhanced by backing vocalists' harmonies.

During an extended 'remix' of the traditional Iko Iko – which Lauper recorded for True Colors, following The Belle Stars – the singer introduces her band, including NY drummer Sterling Campbell (who, having toured with her in the '80s, briefly replaced Roger Taylor in Duran Duran before working extensively alongside David Bowie), all while playing a washboard.

In the 2000s, Lauper turned up on Tricky's Blowback (he raved about her) and made a buzz dance music album in Bring Ya To The Brink with the likes of Basement Jaxx and Axwell. The expansive artist last ventured out in 2016 with a country LP, Detour – and she performs its swaggering remake of Wanda Jackson's '60s Funnel Of Love.

Sally's Pigeons is Lauper's rawest number as she recounts the tragic tale of a childhood friend's back alley abortion. Live, it’s stark yet poetic; the vocalist partly singing a cappella.

Lauper also revives a day one fave in I'm Gonna Be Strong – the Frankie Laine/Gene Pitney standard she reinterpreted with her late '70s band Blue Angel. At Rod Laver, Lauper's spectacular rendition evokes Édith Piaf.

Lauper has herself contributed to the American songbook – Miles Davis covering her signature Time After Time as an instrumental. This evening, she transforms her masterpiece into a duet with surprise guest Tones And I – and it's the showstopper, virtually the entire audience standing.

Lauper sings three songs for the encore, gliding through the crowd to a smaller platform. The night climaxes emotionally with True Colours, a queer anthem – Lauper waving rainbow-coloured chiffon.

Lauper's setlist has omissions – the most obvious All Through The Night off She's So Unusual but also Into The Nightlife and Rocking Chair from Bring Ya To The Brink, both of which she reprised at Glasto (and the former an Aussie hit). But there are no frowns as Lauper closes with her break-out Girls Just Want To Have Fun – forever the quintessential girl power bop or brat banger – generously inviting The Veronicas to join in.

As Lauper's swansong, or canarysong, the Girls Just Want To Have Fun Farewell Tour captures a superstar resigning from the rigours of international gigging on her own terms while celebrating the power of imagination, empathy and collective memory – reoccurring themes in her music. Goodbye big.