Alanis Morissette smiled through much of her Saturday night concert at Calgary's Saddledome, delivering a polished performance that balanced her iconic anger with a mature, joyful stage presence. The 52-year-old mother of three opened with a hymn-like rendition of Hand In My Pocket from offstage, followed by the defiant Right Through You, one of eight songs from her 1995 breakthrough album Jagged Little Pill.
A Night of Hits and Deeper Cuts
Morissette played snippets of deeper tracks before launching into full versions of her biggest hits. She offered a taste of Sympathetic Character from her 1998 album Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie, singing, “I have as much rage as you have, I have as much pain as you do,” before segueing into the scorching You Oughta Know. The set also included crowd favorites like Ironic, Mary Jane, and Head Over Feet, with thousands singing along.
Activism and Solidarity
The concert featured a pre-show video highlighting Morissette's activism, including a quote from Rolling Stone where she described anger as “lovely” and capable of pulling people out of complacency. During Right Through You, the Jumbotron displayed statistics on harassment, sexual violence, and gender inequality, while a later moment showed alternate pronouns—a subtle but powerful gesture of solidarity amid political debates over transgender rights.
Morissette kept between-song chatter minimal, letting the music and visuals speak. The show closed with an appropriate encore of You Oughta Know, the song that introduced the world to her raw, female-driven rage and altered the mainstream musical landscape.
