Katy Perry’s Saturday Night Live Performance May Make You Trip Out

Katy Perry may have just planted roots in Las Vegas, but she’s still making time to slay the Saturday Night Live stage. Perry’s SNL performance on the show’s Jan. 29 episode will make you want to book the next flight to Vegas to check out her new show — and also might make you feel a little funny. Her first number of the night was her new single “When I’m Gone” with EDM producer Alesso, who joined Perry to provide DJ support in the background.

The pop star brought one of the sets from her new Las Vegas residency show, Play, transforming Studio 8H into a magic mushroom wonderland, complete with a bright red latex look, mushroom top hat, and rhinestone-emblazoned mushroom mic. If you thought you were seeing weird things during her performance, you weren’t actually tripping. Many viewers noticed that her dancing mushrooms looked a bit phallic, to say the least. You may not have taken mushrooms, but Perry succeeded in making us trip out anyway.

Perry stripped things down for her second performance of the episode — well, as stripped back as a trippy mushroom set could be. Perched atop a gigantic pile of baby blue ruffles, she sang an orchestral version of her 2019 single “Never Really Over,” with just a keyboardist and an acoustic guitarist accompanying her. The track begins with Perry singing about falling down the rabbit hole, and the majestic arrangement along with the trippy stage made her performance feel like a musical number from a psychedelic remake of Alice in Wonderland.

While this may mark Perry’s first SNL appearance in nearly five years, she’s far from a stranger to Studio 8H. The singer first performed on the show in 2010 during the Teenage Dream era, and then made her hosting debut the following year. She returned as a musical guest in 2013 and 2017, when she appeared alongside rap group Migos, many drag queens, and Backpack Kid (remember him?). Needless to say, when Perry comes to Studio 8H, she never fails to entertain.