Live Report: Griff brings bedroom pop to the 3Olympia stage

In the years since she won the 2021 BRIT Awards' Rising Star poll, Griff’s celebrity has risen considerably, graduating from Dua Lipa’s 2022 support act to the headliner at Dublin’s 3Olympia Theatre. After a glowing endorsement from Taylor Swift for her 2023 single ‘Vertigo,’ prompting Swift’s then 271 million followers to click onto the track, the English pop singer continues to make a name for herself on the international stage.

Trading out her whimsical bubble ponytail for a sleek double braid, Griff, a.k.a. Sarah Griffiths, appeared on the 3Olympia stage armed with a mic and a can of grey spray paint. As the opening drum beats shuddered through the theatre, the 23 year-old singer scrawled “Dublin 26/03” at the bottom of a floor-to-ceiling tapestry of cities and dates, accompanied by the roaring excitement of a near sold-out crowd.

Griff at 3Olympia Theatre. 26-03-24. Copyright Peter O'Hanlon.

Griff’s iconic image is not one that you forget quickly, donning a drop-waist balloon skirt and cherry red bra that peeked through a silver-trim tank. The picture of modern pop elegance, Griff has quickly become the poster child for electro-pop, as confirmed by her epic collection of magazine cover shoots and feature spreads.

Griff started the night off strong with the uptempo heartbreak anthem ‘Black Hole,’ which shockingly failed to achieve hit song status after falling off the charts a week after its 2021 debut. However, the lack of gusto was hard to picture as Griff strutted across the stage, her scathing chorus echoed by a room full of devoted fans.

Griff at 3Olympia Theatre. 26-03-24. Copyright Peter O'Hanlon.

“For the first time, I’m actually able to properly tour Europe,” Griff said as a stage technician switched out her malfunctioning mic pack. “We’ve just come here to Dublin, and I’m so excited to be back! Tonight's gonna be a good night...We're just gonna dance, we're gonna sing, we're gonna let it all go.”

“If any of you saw me opening for Dua," Griff added, referencing her Dublin debut as an opener on Dua Lipa's 2022 world tour, "I just want to say thank you. It means a lot that you gave a crap about the tiny little support girl just spinning around on the floor.”

Holding firm on her promise to deliver a night filled with unbridled song and dance, Griff jumped into a series of ear-worm belters, starting off with ‘Head On Fire,’ a collaborative track made alongside fellow pop singer Sigrid. Griff was bursting with energy on stage, bouncing on the toes of her black ballet flats as she turned the iconic duet into a gut-wrenching solo.

Griff at 3Olympia Theatre. 26-03-24. Copyright Peter O'Hanlon.

A jack-of-all-trades, Griff made a smooth transition from her typical electro-dance jams to a string of stripped-back acoustic ballads. “I wanna get as close and personal as possible to you guys, if that’s ok,” the singer said as she sat on the edge of the stage, a pearly white guitar in her lap.

After a heartwarming cover of Taylor Swift’s ‘Blank Space,’ yet another tribute to the pair’s artistic friendship, Griff explained, “I usually write my songs on guitar or keyboard, but I end up producing them up quite a lot of the time, so sometimes it’s nice to just strip them right back.”

The short acoustic set, beginning with 2021’s ‘Earl Grey Tea,’ peaked with an intimate rendition of the unreleased track ‘So Fast,’ a folk-tinged ballad that landed just short of her album One Foot In Front Of The Other. Trading out her guitar for a keyboard, Griff hit a high note with ‘Good Stuff,’ initially a salute to failed romance that transformed into an ode to her childhood foster siblings. Without the cacophony of synths, vocal modulators and electronic effects, Griff's raw talent was made abundantly clear, a gift often hidden beneath her usual dance-pop production.

Griff at 3Olympia Theatre. 26-03-24. Copyright Peter O'Hanlon.

With a new EP dropping on 5th April, the second installation in her ongoing project that began with 2023’s vert1go vol. 1, Griff explained, “I wanted to release this project in parts, so I started with volume one, which, to me, they were the most heavy songs and the most introverted songs… Volume two, surprise surprise, is still desperately heartbroken, but the productions to me have a new energy, almost like a new euphoria, and hopefully you hear that in the next few songs I’m about to play.”

The ensuing trio of ‘My Pocket,’ ‘Pillow In My Arms’ and ‘Sounds,’ each more impressive than the last, left the audience itching for Griff’s upcoming release, clearly destined to be the soundtrack of spring heartache.

Griff at 3Olympia Theatre. 26-03-24. Copyright Peter O'Hanlon.

Following a blaring rendition of ‘Miss Me Too,’ a powerhouse belter that brought balcony dwellers to their feet, it was time for the much anticipated ‘Vertigo,’ which received Taylor Swift’s stamp of approval last year when she posted the song to her Instagram story with the simple caption: “damn griff i love this one.” Steeped in electronic beats, the wholly emotive track brought the room’s energy to an all-time high as Griff slid into her final song of the night, ‘Astronaut.’ While the heart-on-sleeve ballad wouldn’t normally lend itself well to a concert closer, the song filled 3Olympia with a melancholic nostalgia as sparkling confetti rained down on from the rafters, leaving the crowd with moment of vulnerability that bonds strangers and forms communities.