Katy Perry reached an agreement with the Australian Football League to perform at the AFL Grand Final on Saturday at Melbourne Cricket Ground in East Melbourne, Australia. However, the two sides have clashed with football officials in recent weeks over her setlist.
The AFL doesn’t want Katy Perry to play any songs off of her new album, 143, which the pop star is actively trying to promote after its release on Friday.
Perry was officially announced as the main performer for the Grand Final in July. It was a huge get for the AFL, which has previously landed acts like Ed Sheeran, Tom Jones, The Killers and KISS for its Super Bowl equivalent.
We have a world-class event on Grand Final day and we want world-class artists who are going to entertain our 100,000 fans throughout the game but our millions of fans will be watching both in Australia and worldwide. She is a global superstar who is going to rock the house on September 28.
— Kylie Rogers, AFL Executive General Manager of Customer and Commercial
Although the dotted line was signed more than two months ago, there has been an ongoing disagreement between the two parties about the performance. They reached an agreement on Sunday.
Katy Perry and the AFL met in the middle.
Perry’s deal requires her to play five different songs prior to the Grand Final’s opening bounce. She really wanted to play two songs off of 143.
On the flip side of the negotiation, AFL officials did/do not want Perry to play any songs off of 143. Not only is the new album widely labeled as a massive flop, it will be less than 10 days old on Saturday so nobody knows any of the music. They wanted/want her to play five of her best bangers.
Some of Perry’s biggest hits include Dark Horse, Firework, Hot N Cold, California Gurls, Roar and I Kissed A Girl. The AFL would much prefer that she picks five songs from that list instead of performing even one song off of 143. She doesn’t want to play any less than two songs off of 143.
A stalemate took place between the two sides over the last month or so. There was growing concern that the performance could be called off all together.
That will not happen!
Katy Perry and the AFL reached a compromise. She will be allowed to play one song off of 143. The other four songs will have to be off of One Of The Boys, Prism, Teenage Dream, Prisim or even Witness.
Thee crisis is adverted. Perry will play the hits before the AFL Grand Final between the Sydney Swans and Brisbane Lions on Saturday!