Addison Rae Goes The Onyx Hotel Tour for Coachella

Considering that Addison Rae was already paying homage to an “obscure” Britney Spears “project” like 2007’s The M+Ms Tour when she did a release party performance for Addison at The Box in New York, The Onyx Hotel Tour as a “mood board” was probably never far behind. And it felt like the clear inspiration behind Rae’s debut on the main stage at Coachella this year (as opposed to cameo’ing at someone else’s set, as she did for Arca’s in 2025 to sing “Arcamarine”).

Opening with “Diet Pepsi,” the single that forced the mainstream to embrace her, Rae also revealed a reworked version of the song and her usual entrance thus far on the tour she’s been doing (which has now evolved from The Addison Tour into The Fame and Glory Tour, per a recent announcement on her socials). What immediately gives the performance the feel of Spears’ 2004 tour is the dancers snapping like beat poets before Rae introduces herself by starting off on a circular “apparatus” branded with a capital “A” for Addison in an ultra-flourish-y font style. Rae grips both hands to a piece of it so that her arms are outstretched above her as though they’re “bound.” And, who knows, maybe they are (by the unspoken, presumed Faustian pact that all rich and/or famous people have made).

However, before she appears like that, the dancers continue to snap while wearing black trench coats (the back of some reading “Fame” or “Glory”) as Addison’s breathy vocals chant, “Tell me who I am. Say you love me.” After a bit of the reworked vocal intro plays, Addison finally descends the staircase in front of her while wearing a dress with a tulle skirt, her hair a reddish brown. Indeed, it’s a hair color not too dissimilar from the darker shade that Spears sported for The Onyx Hotel Tour (not to mention the shimmering, glittering eyeshadow that both pop singers are wearing during these performances). And while the set design isn’t necessarily what reminds one of that particular Spears tour, it’s the costuming, “Broadway musical” feel of it and reworked versions of songs that recall what Spears was doing at that time. For instance, during the “Mystic Lounge” portion of the tour, Spears not only wears something that Addison appears to be riffing on for this performance, but also reinvents “…Baby One More Time” and “Oops!…I Did It Again” into sultrier, jazzier numbers.

However, one thing even Spears, for as adept as she was at capitalism, wouldn’t do is what Rae proceeds to with “Money Is Everything,” a song that one wanted to believe is ironic, but you can tell Addison really means it when she devotes an entire segment to telling the crowd to shout out “money is everything” so that they can “manifest it” for their own broke-ass lives (though not so broke ass that they couldn’t come up with the money to get to Coachella). After screaming, “Money loves me! I’m the richest girl in the world!” as the usual conclusion to the song, Rae removes her corset dress (in a manner that suggests she’s faux scandalized by herself) to reveal an ensemble that is more in line with Spears’ attire during the “Security Cameras” segment of The Onyx Hotel Tour, when she performs her “racier” tracks, “Touch of My Hand” and “Breathe on Me.” To be sure, any of Rae’s “racier” moments remind one of Spears’ rendition of “Touch of My Hand” during that tour.

To inaugurate her “outfit reveal,” Rae has the audacity to sing “New York” in one of the most quintessentially West Coast/L.A. crowd environments (hence, when the camera pans out to provide a glimpse of said crowd, they’re not exactly going apeshit). It’s almost on par with Sabrina Carpenter talking shit about L.A. in an interview right before not only also talking about headlining Coachella but also right before actually headlining it. And no, it didn’t even occur to Rae to maybe alter the lyrics to suit the coast she was on, instead going so far as to project a giant glittering silhouetted version of the NYC skyline to the barrage of Angelenos before her. Even so, it is, in its way, in keeping with Spears’ own New York fetish that was particularly prominent circa 2004—which is part of why she wanted her tour concept/stage to be modeled after an NY theater setup.

As for Rae continuing the homage to Spears, “I Got It Bad” is, as usual, mashed up with the sound of “…Baby One More Time.” And yes, her moves are also very reminiscent of Spears’ brand of choreo here. But one thing that stands apart (and is far more Madonna-esque) is the fact that Rae is sure to make two of her male backup dancers kiss before the song is over (you know, for the sake of “inclusivity” a.k.a. wanting to become a gay icon), something Spears never would have (or could have) done during her 00s reign.

From there, Rae opts to sing “Times Like These” with a “simple” chair performance (all the rage these days, as Sabrina Carpenter’s own Coachella performance reminded) that also recalls Spears’ performance of “…Baby One More Time” and “Oops!…I Did It Again” during The Onyx Hotel Tour. But Rae can’t help giving a bit of a Madonna nod during the musical breakdown of the song, throwing in a dash of vogueing where her hand gestures are concerned before she rounds out the song with a twirl on the pole so conveniently provided by her set design. And yes, Spears also has a pole option during the “Security Cameras” segment of her tour, using it to slide down at the beginning of “Breathe on Me” (which Addison imitates, at times, in terms of her intonation for “Headphones On”).

Rae keeps the Addison songs coming with “In the Rain,” which features a dancer in a French-style striped shirt with an umbrella that has a, let’s say, Beetlejuice-reminiscent pattern. And, speaking of Tim Burton references, it also bears noting that there is a certain element of the auteur in the set and costuming, which speaks to The Onyx Hotel Tour in that tour director Kevin Tancharoen noted of the aesthetic “vibe,” “I wanted to make it seem like a film. A little Joel Schumacher meets Tim Burton.” So it is that Spears, too, also has dancers with umbrellas in her tour—though hers descend from the sky at the beginning. Besides that, Rae’s “umbrella man” twirls around the stage more like the dancer from Madonna’s The Girlie Show, when “Rain” comes to an end.

Picking up the pace again with the next track, Rae goes for the “von dutch” remix, which she’s made all her own. Thus, it’s no surprise that Rae performs it even without a Charli XCX appearance. And her “costume change,” in this instance, is donning a coordinating red glove and a red hat very much in the style of 00s-era Britney. At a certain point, she takes pause during this song to mention all “the blood, sweat and tears” she’s put into the show thus far, subsequently adding, “I think it’s your turn to do something for me.” As if the audience shelling out the cash and shlepping to the desert wasn’t enough in and of itself. And no, Spears would probably never say something like that.

In any case, the request, of course, is for the audience to “scream for me as loud as they can,” with Rae then going out into the huddled masses to home in on a “lone” screamer for the portion of the song that made her (more) famous. The person she initially pretends to let take on the task is a guy holding up a sign that reads “Von Dutch Screamer?” She then puts the mic up to him, only for the entire crowd to drown out his already pitiful-sounding scream.

Afterward, an outro, which has an even more remix-y sound, is played while her dancers offer up plenty of acrobatics onstage for a bit before Rae returns, not so that she can offer a different costume, but so that she might allow time for Maddie Ziegler to join her onstage for “Aquamarine.” But it isn’t until the end of the song that Ziegler really gets to take a crack at her ethereal dance solo, with Addison, too, busting some serious Madonna at the 1998 VMAs-type moves (specifically, when Madonna’s backup dancers get behind her during “Shanti/Ashtangi” and put all their arms out to make it look as if they’re her own for a Hindu deity effect). This in addition to throwing in some more “Vogue”-inspired hand gestures as well.

But Madonna’s “deity” move is one that Spears also emulated for The Onyx Hotel Tour. One that occurs right after her performance of “Shadow,” as her dancers throw some ethereal moves that now evoke what Addison’s dancers do during “Aquamarine.” A song that, after wrapping up, prompts Rae to remark to the crowd, “Oh my goodness! Coachella! Hi! You know, I was here last year, but it was nothing like this.” Because, yes, taking the main stage all for yourself is a different animal than “guest starring.” And so, after thanking the audience for coming out to watch and support her as she lives out her “wildest dreams,” Rae then puts on a purple zip-up hoodie, the first indication that she’s about to go into “Headphones On” (for that particular sartorial piece is prominent in the accompanying video).

Rae then keeps the hits coming with “High Fashion,” with the extent of her “costume change” here being to add a diamond necklace and diamond bracelets to her barely-there ensemble while her male backup dancers go for a full-on change in suits meant to resemble the look of the men in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes during Marilyn Monroe’s illustrious “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend” number—after all, Rae does sing, “Diamonds are my best friend, like I’m Norma Jeane” on “Money Is Everything.” And, even though this kind of homage would have worked better for, you guessed it, “Money Is Everything,” it’s still effective enough here.

Just as it is when the lead-in to “Fame Is a Gun” has a touch of horror-esque music to it as Addison, in “terror,” encounters various “doppelgangers” of herself onstage (demarcated by the wearing of pink wigs—another nod to the “Headphones On” video, but also, undoubtedly to Spears’ own pink wig era after shaving her head). The male backup dancers in the Gentlemen Prefer Blondes suits, meanwhile, have donned pink leather hats in a beret-esque style, while the female backup dancers opt for trench coats. As does Rae herself, wearing a pink vinyl one to tie in with the song’s video. And it’s here as well that The Onyx Hotel Tour comes to mind, for Spears and her backup dancers also opt for trench coats during “Outrageous” toward the end of the show.

For Rae’s big finish, sparks rain down from the stage (more of a “Circus” video reminder than a The Onyx Hotel Tour one) as the word “Addison” shows up in big, bold lettering behind her, with Rae shouting, “The glamorous life!” before thanking the fans who have supported her “from day one” (though it’s unclear if she means via TikTok or “Obsessed”). Rae is then also sure to add, “And to my haters, suck my dick!” Something Spears should have also said, but was way too polite at the height of her own fame to do so. Besides that (and contrary to once being called an “inbred swamp thing”), her Southern sense of “politesse” is clearly more ingrained in her than Rae’s.

Nonetheless, Spears has so clearly infected Rae in other ways, particularly for this performance, with a lot of her choreo during The Onyx Hotel Tour’s renditions of “The Hook Up” and “I’m a Slave 4 U” also being in the spirit of Rae’s more dance-heavy numbers (which includes just about every song, but especially during portions of “In the Rain,” “Aquamarine,” “High Fashion” and “Fame Is a Gun”). So it is that Rae continues to appear determined to carve out her role as the “next generation” Spears. Which is probably as surprising to Britney as it is to anyone else who only ever knew Addison as a “mere” TikTok star.