Drake at Co-Op Live: Rapper makes triumphant return to Manchester with career-spanning setlist

Yahoo

5 days ago

It's been six years since he last graced the Manchester stage on his 2019 Assassination Vacation tour but Drake came back with a bang last night (July 25).
Kicking off the first of FOUR shows in the city at Co-op Live as part of his Some Special Shows 4 U European tour, the five-time Grammy-award winning and multi-platinum rapper bursts on stage with "Gimme A Hug".
Wearing a simple blue shirt and brown jeans and greeted by his thousands of adoring fans, he has an important question for them: "Where my Day Ones at?"
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He's referring to his 2009/2010 listeners and tells them: "Manchester, make some f*****g noise!" as he launches into a nostalgia fest of Marvin's Room, Teenage Fever, Passionfruit and Jungle.
"Y'all ready to go? I'm ready to take off!" he shouts, as, on cue, flames shoot up from the stage and he belts out hit track "What Did I Miss?"
Headlines is followed by further pyromania as fire cannons go off and Drizzy bounces around the stage and pounds down the runways with enormous energy, not to mention dexterity, as he dances atop the crowd.
"I'm just getting started! What do you wanna do? I'm here all night!" he says, launching into Nonstop and No Face.
Then, following a raunchy display by female dancers clad in bondage attire, he is joined by fellow Canadian rapper PARTYNEXTDOOR, who he collaborated with on the album $ome $exy $ongs 4 U.
The pair take it down a notch to perform lover's lament CN Tower, Something About You, and Die Trying, finishing up with the plaintive Come and See Me.
Laugh Now, Cry Later is then followed by God's Plan.
"Sing it with me, but sing it like you mean it!" he implores the more than up-for-it crowd, of whom there are some 17,000.
In My Feelings precedes the rallying cry of Nice For What, as he addresses the ladies in the audience: "This is for all you ladies who got kids, who got your own place and don't need no m**********n' man!"
And to delight the ladies in the crowd, even further, he passes right next to a stunned sea of faces as he casually saunters up the steps to the DJ area and serenades the crowd, just inches away from his adoring fans.
"Whatever else is going on in your lives tonight, I want you to forget it", he says, before performing Controlla, Hold On We're Going Home and the smash hit One Dance.
Then, back in the heart of the crowd, he performs Girls Want Girls, Fancy and Rich Baby Daddy, his tattooed biceps flexing, to the swoons of his lady fans.
It's time for a bit of anti-love now though and he gets the crowd on his side:
"I want you to think of the worst exes you have, the worst examples you got on your phone, everything they put you through. I want you to take your m************ finger and put it to the sky."
"F**k all your exes!" he roars, before belting out You Broke My Heart.
The crowd are then treated to a surprise appearance from British rapper Central Cee, who, sporting a green rucksack, could just have come straight from Piccadilly train station.
Back to Drake and the irresistibly catchy Nokia is up next, with cries of "Babygirl" echoing across the arena. In fact, there appears barely a single word to a song that the audience don't know.
Yebba's Heartbreak makes for a chilled finale as Drake proudly brandishes a pink bra that a fan has thrown onto the stage.
"This is a ten out of ten crowd tonight and it's been a while since I got a bra!" he says. "If there's one thing I love in this life, it's some t*****s!"
He then leaves the crowd with a deeper message: "I hope you achieve everything you want", he says.
"And remember, you don't get that by being a piece of s**" but by being a good person."
"I got my mum in the building tonight!" he then reveals, but mum it seems, is staying schtum, as well as invisible, to the disappointment of the fans.
'"I got 17,000 people in Birmingham tonight!" he then shouts, to a somewhat confused crowd, before quickly rescuing his faux-pas with a: "Goodnight Manchester!"
And a good night it most definitely has been. In true Manchester style, it might have been drizzling outside tonight but both him, and the stage, were on fire.