October 25, 7:26 pm: from the green room of Brighton Music Hall, MARIS peeked through the window to look at the stage down below. There wasn’t an opening set, at least not in the typical sense, but something on the stage grabbed her attention. “Sorry, I have to watch this whole thing,” she said with a huge smile. Two fans had dressed up as MARIS and Caroline Kingsbury for a karaoke performance of their song “Give Me A Sign” and the crowd raucously sang along at a volume the wall barely dampened. “So obsessed, holy fuck. That was the cutest thing ever!” she pounded the window in applause as the doppelgangers departed the stage. “I saw some people on TikTok a little bit ago kind of being like, ‘if you go on tour and you don’t bring an opener, you’re not passing the torch,’ like kind of shitting on artists who aren’t [bringing openers],” MARIS said as she got ready to pose for portraits. “For me, the karaoke thing, I’ve just seen how much of an impact it makes on these shy kids, that they see somebody else be brave and get up there and do something scary, and then they get up there and do something scary, and all of a sudden it’s like you see everybody kind of come to life,” she made her point as the crowd belted along to Chappell Roan’s “The Subway” in the background. Fans finding safe space, cutting loose, and having a great time was precisely the theme for the MOSH PIT tour, and MARIS was elated to see her plans come to fruition.
There was another reason for MARIS to be excited for the show. Not only was the Brighton Music Hall show the largest show of her first solo headlining tour, it was also the largest headlining show of MARIS’s entire career to date. The show hadn’t fully sold out, but a glance at the crowded room revealed that it had very nearly done so. “I feel so surreal,” MARIS declared before adding, “I’m happy it’s Boston because I fucking love it here.” A Missoula girl now living in Los Angeles, MARIS has nevertheless built a strong fanbase in Boston, particularly since her first major festival appearance at Boston Calling Music Festival 2024, and her subsequent tours with Maude Latour, Melt, and Caroline Kingsbury. Having the time of her life on her first bona fide headline tour, her enthusiasm was undimmed even in the face of her seventh show in eight days with hardly any rest. She unflinchingly considers the lifestyle a price of playing. “Nobody’s entitled to a career in entertainment,” she stated matter-of-factly while preparing for one last photo shoot before her set.
MARIS may be a relative newcomer to headlining, but she has refined her live performances into what she calls “a MARIS experience.” At Brighton Music Hall, she entertained and engaged the audience with her humor, earnestness, and of course her powerful vocals. With just two EPs out including the recent release Mosh Pit, MARIS’s setlist consisted of most of her discography, a cover of The Killers’ “Mr. Brightside,” and an unreleased song “KMS.” She got up close and personal with the crowd throughout the night, singing face-to-face with the front row for her power ballad “Chameleon,” and she waded through the crowd before singing “Goodbye Forever” from atop one of the bars in the back of the room. Even fans who weren’t physically there got some face time with MARIS. “This song is all about having FOMO, so I want you to FaceTime someone who should be here right now, and let’s bring them on stage,” she sang into an autotuned mic to introduce her song “Missing Me.” Wielding several phones with active video calls on screen, she transitioned into the first verse by singing the observation “this bitch is in the shower!”
Consistent with her words in the green room before her set, MARIS encouraged her fans to not be shy and to dance like nobody was watching. During her performance of “Crashland” she urged “I want you to dance like an idiot because everybody loves you! Especially me!” She later crowned two people “King of the pit” after she noted the most fearless members of the audience.
She ended the show with an unplanned encore, having expressed a personal distaste for the charade of a built-in encore. When MARIS informed everyone that she had no specific song in mind, the room erupted into a cacophony of requests. One fan called for a second performance of “Losing People,” but there were no complaints when the decision was made to wrap up the evening with “Julia Roberts.” That electric finale was a fitting conclusion to another career milestone for MARIS in Boston.
Check out the rest of Greg’s photos below.
