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Live Review: Maisie Peters at Forum Melbourne
4 March 2026
Maisie Peters’ return to Australia, marks her first performances here since 2024. The two-night sell-out run forms part of her global ‘Before The Bloom’ theatre tour, a series of intimate shows designed to reflect the closeness and vulnerability of her upcoming third studio album, ‘Florescence’, due in May. And Peters delivers a performance that perfectly captures the emotional depth fans have come to adore.
Maisie Peters takes to the stage and positions herself next to a vase of flowers. Dressed simply yet elegantly and exudes a quiet confidence that draws the audience in. From the opening chords of ‘Love Him I Don’t’, the connection with the crowd is immediate. The song’s witty lyricism and sharp pop sensibility sets the tone for an evening that oscillated between playful storytelling and heartfelt introspection.
‘Lost the Breakup’ follows and the Forum is instantly awash in sing-alongs. Peters’ voice, delicate yet precise, conveyed both the humour and the sting of heartbreak, capturing a room full of fans who knew every word. The pacing of the set feels deliberate, a reflection of the personal nature of her Florescence material, with each song building upon the last to create a cohesive emotional journey.
Peters tells us that the show is going to be a little bit different from any show she’s ever done before in that she arranged it very specifically to really take us on a journey. “I wanted it to represent where I started and where I came from, all the way up to where I am now, which is maybe 9 years.”
“Every song we picked was very much deliberate and intentionally put into the set list in order to show you another chapter of where I’ve gotten so far, and also really show you what led up to and what was part of the process, and the blueprint for making my new album which is called ‘Fluorescence,’ she continues.
Peters’ takes us all the way back to the beginning with the very first song she ever released when she was 16 and it’s about desperately wanting to leave her hometown and see the world and be part of something bigger.
“I think if you told me back then that I’d be playing here in Melbourne, I would be really astounded and I wouldn’t be able to believe that,” she exclaims before sharing ‘Place We Were Made’.
She shares a new song called ‘Audrey Hepburn’ that she reveals was a song she wrote after taking time off about a year and a half ago. “When I did that, I feel like I really, for the first time in many years, started living a very peaceful and simple life. And in doing that, I discovered like a very specific, very small and beautiful type of happiness, that I’ve not really written about before,” she shares.
“That period of rest and recuperation being away from the spotlight in the stage really became a foundation of ‘Fluorescence’ and meant I was able to make the album that I ended up making,” Peters reveals.
She invites her friend – local Melbourne singer Gretta Ray to the stage to join her on stage for a duet of ‘Say My Name In Your Sleep’ mixed with a cover of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Silver Springs’.
This show is a special treat for fans because she plays songs that otherwise, probably wouldn’t be played anymore. Songs that weren’t singles or necessarily huge moments. One of these is a song from her first album, called ‘Volcano’. “I think the song really set the stage for a lot of what was the to come for me musically and sonically. The song feels like a blueprint to me and I really hear it in a lot of ‘Fluorescence’, Peters’ reveals.
‘You You You’ is another new song to bring things down for a moment for us to crash out to as she sings about looking back on heartbreak. “Fluorescence, on the whole is a much more hopeful record. It definitely has moments of bittersweetness and there is some rage within it,” she says.
‘John Hugh’s Movie’ is a song that encapsulates realising later that a moment was the beginning of everything as she reflects back to her 19-year-old self in East London—excited, clueless, creating the first proper single of her career.
For an extra special surprise, Peters brings out her mentor and friend Ed Sheeran to the stage for a beautiful duet of ‘Castle On The Hill’ with Sheeran on guitar and sharing tender vocals with restraint.
We arrive at the penultimate song ‘There It Goes’ from ‘The Good Witch’ that she says was really the first page of the new record.
When Peters returns for the encore with ‘My Regards’, the crowd’s energy is a testament to the connection she had nurtured throughout the evening. She invites Gretta Ray and the girls from Blusher to the stage to form a full dance troupe to deliver a dance routine complete with bubbles. For a moment that feels both celebratory and intimate, a perfect encapsulation of her artistry and the night’s experience.
Words by Michael Prebeg
