Kendrick Lamar and SZA perform at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey in May.Cassidy Meyers/Supplied
Appearing in his first Toronto concert since his ballyhooed beef with hometown pop-rap superstar Drake, Los Angeles rapper Kendrick Lamar materialized at Rogers Centre on Thursday for the first of a pair of shows in a black, high-performance Buick Regal Grand National that rose from beneath the stage.
Lamar stepped into wacced out murals and stepped out of the classic car. The Buick never moved, but Lamar drove the audience nonetheless.
Much later in an extravaganza that lasted more than 2½ hours, the 37-year-old rap virtuoso performed Not Like Us, the Grammy-winning earworm and chart-topping coup de grâce that finished off his nemesis Drake in their rap war from a year ago.
The thrust of the disdainful song is right in the title: Drake, the son of a white Jewish mother from Canada and a Black father from Memphis, is culturally not like us – us being purveyors of authentic, socially aware, hardcore hip hop.
After he tore through Not Like Us to close the main set at Rogers Centre, Lamar stood alone at centre stage, milking the moment for the amount of time it takes to soft-boil an egg. The jackals in the crowd chanted, “One more time!” but Lamar did not oblige with a reprise.
At this stage of the game, he keeps Drake in his place subtly − a diss track here and there, such as Euphoria and, of course, Not Like Us, to satisfy the haters and blithely assert his dominance. Dunking on Drake is old hat. (Lamar wore his ball cap backward.)
This is a Pulitzer Prize winner, not a WWE brute. He knows the best victory laps are taken while standing still. It is good, if you haven’t figured it out by now, to be Kendrick Lamar in 2025.
Opinion: No one is doing a better job of making Kendrick Lamar’s claims about Drake stick than Drake
The current Grand National Tour of stadiums is co-headlined by R&B singer-songwriter SZA. Toronto is the only Canadian stop on the jaunt in support of Lamar’s 2024 album GNX and SZA’s SOS Deluxe: Lana.
They alternated on stage but often appeared together – as they did for a duet on SZA’s 30 for 30. They seemed to have equal access to the tour’s pyrotechnic budget.
The production was cinematic in scope, innovative in its use of giant video screens and seemingly Broadway-broad when it came to the dancers’ artful choreography. The epic staging of Lamar’s Reincarnated, which used dancers on a towering set of steps, looked like a black-and-white epic straight out of Cecil B. DeMille’s vault.
(The audience was young, the reference to the long-dead director notwithstanding.)
There were no visible backing musicians, except for SZA’s occasional cartoonish use of guitarists. One of them performed solos while on his knees. Was he praying? I know I was.
SZA highlights included Kill Bill, the ballad Nobody Gets Me, a fabulous faux mink coat and the cheeky inclusion of her 2023 collaboration with Drake − Rich Baby Daddy, from his album For All the Dogs − without Drake. “Do you know this song?” she asked. The crowd knew it. They just weren’t sure whether to dance or to hiss.
Both SZA and Lamar were featured in fictional court depositions used for wry video interludes. A lawyer has trouble pronouncing “Sizz-uh” and accuses Lamar of drawing attention to himself by disappearing.
Lamar was in plain sight, even when he wore a camouflaged suit. His performances on Humble, Peekaboo and more were electric and galvanizing. Standing at the top of the stairs at one point, he might as well have been looking down from Mount Olympus.
Being the heavyweight champion of the world is, writer Norman Mailer said, “like being the big toe of God. You have nothing to measure yourself by.”
In coming out way ahead in his feud with Drake, Lamar has forever vanquished a contender. The Torontonian’s standing is much diminished, even in his hometown. What is Lamar’s next challenge and who is his challenger?
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