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Yahoo
19 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
I Took My Compton A** To Toronto For The Kendrick Lamar Concert. Here's What Happened
Considering Kendrick and Drake's epic 2024 feud, I thought it would be poignant for a fellow Compton native, someone who walked the same streets as Kendrick, to pound the pavement in Toronto as he brings over a decade's worth of hits to the city, one year after obliterating Drake via their rap battle. Does obliterate sound too strong? Maybe it is, considering Drake was still the highest-selling rapper of 2024, despite the narrative surrounding his L in the K. Dot battle. But are we really going to lie and say that King Kunta didn't come out on top? In addition to sharing my perspective as a West side native, I wanted to see how Toronto the city reacts to Kendrick in person. Is there still animosity? Was there ever animosity, or was this 'beef' purely between the artists? Was the battle as big a deal in Toronto as it was perceived to be by the rest of the world? I can tell you one thing, Compton took full pride in Dot's triumph, as demonstrated in the 'Not Like Us' music video that brought the whole city out. However, there is no true document of how that feud was perceived by Drake's fellow countrymen. Yes, some folks in Vancouver pressed Rick Ross for playing 'Not Like Us' during the initial back-and-forth, but then Toronto sold out two massive shows at Rogers Centre to see the man who called their savior a pedophile do so live. This is not to downplay singer SZA's ability to draw a crowd, as the tour's co-headliner also has a massive fan base, many of whom don't give AF about Dot and Drizzy's 2024 tussle either way. Still, it was the talk of the year and continues to stir conversation. I'm not here to give you a peek inside of the concert itself, as VIBE dropped our official review of the GNX show following Lamar's Los Angeles stint. Instead, I'm here to share my own observations regarding the crowd before and after the show, as I was fortunate enough to chop it up with – and eavesdrop on – Toronto natives as they discussed Kendrick, Drake, and why they did – or didn't – choose to pay top dollar to see Mr. Duckworth tear down the stage in Aubrey's hometown. My first observation was that I was far from the only Californian to cross the border in support of Kendrick, with many Los Angeles natives making their presence known IRL and on social media. Two couples who seemingly traveled together – one rocking matching Dodgers jerseys and the other wearing Shaq & Kobe Lakers jerseys – spotted me in my Compton fitted and threw up the W ('Four fingers up, two twisted in the middle' – Mack 10) as they entered the building via Gate 3, with plenty others also making it known that they came a long way to show up for Dot. It was also evident that several New Yorkers, Bostonians, and other American North-easterners made the trek for the show. While this is a sign of Kendrick's immense lock on the culture, it may also be comforting for those taking issue with the idea of Torontonians 'betraying' Drake with their attendance. While residents undoubtedly made up the majority of attendees – as would be the case in any city – it was by no means a night fueled purely by local support. As for the Torontonians that did show up, I observed a distinction that women of the city, quite frankly, couldn't care less about a rap beef, with Camille, a young woman who drove down from Markham, telling me, 'I was playing 'Nokia' on the way here. I love them both. But thinking I'm not going to see Kendrick out of loyalty to someone I've never met is kind of silly to me. Doesn't mean I don't like or respect Drake and what he's done, but Kendrick has, like, a bunch of hits that have nothing to do with that.' This echoes the sentiment of a young woman whose day-of interview went viral on social media, where she stated, 'These are two grown men. Their beef has nothing to do with me. I didn't start it, I didn't have nothing to do with it, it doesn't change my life any which way, I'm still gonna come to this concert.' This isn't to say that only women felt this way, as Jameson, a young man from Toronto, told me, 'Music goes beyond rap beef. I came for a good show from a great artist.' 'The internet and podcasts make that sh*t seem deeper than it is,' added Chris, another attendee and Toronto resident. 'In real life, people are not clocking the beef that closely. It's summertime, people want to be outside, one of the biggest rappers ever comes, you buy a ticket and you go. All this trying to shame people for enjoying themselves is dumb. High school sh*t.' This was the overall vibe of both nights outside of Rogers Centre. Fans, essentially, just wanted to see two of the world's biggest artists hit the stage live, and refused to let a year-old rap battle — and all the drama it spawned — stop them from doing so. As far as they're concerned, the 'they' of 'they not like us' are Hip-Hop 'culture vultures' and OVO specifically, not the whole city. That's not to say that there weren't some straight-up Drake haters in the building, with one concert goer being spotted in his own custom 'Real Canadiens Hate Drake' shirt during both concert nights. There were also plenty of Toronto attention seekers going out of their way to rub Dot's victory in Drizzy's face, busting out the most trash crip walks I've ever seen. The majority, however, attended out of sincere interest and fandom, not to spite the $ome $exy $ongs 4 U artist. Drake did, however, have more than a few loyalists show up on his behalf, with one group, The 6 Takeover, attempting to organize a party outside the venue, bumping Drake classics while handing out free pizza and hoodies. As you may have heard, things didn't quite work out, as venue security immediately broke up anything resembling a mob forming both nights. Still, the few who showed up before the rebellion was shut down proudly rocked their OVO and Drake merch while lambasting their fellow Toronto natives for 'crossing' the man who put the city on. These loyalists have a sports team mentality when it comes to Drake. You root for the home team, period. I don't care how sh*tty the season was, you don't switch up the first year they don't bring home a chip. And you damn sure don't pay to see their biggest rival host an All-Star game in your city. And to this I say, fair! However, I think the disconnect happens when you expect an entire culture (or city) to abide by this expectation, especially one year removed from the peak of their rivalry. This isn't a LeBron James situation where Drake has every right to feel betrayed due to their personal relationship. And yes, while hearing Rogers Centre go off to 'Not Like Us' might feel personal, it was also an undeniable hit, meaning it will get the hit-treatment when performed live. Now, as for the fans in the crowd begging for an encore? Tough break, kid. At no point did I feel uncomfortable or out of sorts in my Compton garb. In fact, hospitality was on ten my entire trip. Even those who spoke in passionate defense of Mr. Graham did so with an undercurrent of respect. One question I can't answer, however, is how exactly Drake will be received when he finally makes his way out west again. Los Angeles is a far more unpredictable environment, so it's trickier to assess. It's also important to distinguish Compton from Los Angeles (proper), two different cities that will likely react to Drake's presence differently. As for Toronto, however, the beef simply isn't as serious to the average resident as it seems on the 'net, and that might just be the biggest takeaway from Dot's time in the city. More from Clipse, Pharrell Preview Kendrick Lamar's Highly Anticipated "Chains & Whips" Verse Drake Accompanying Morgan Wallen At Houston Show Yields Big Internet Reaction Lil Wayne's Son Claims Rapper Ghostwrote "Most" Of Drake's Music: "On God" Best of 10 Rap Albums Snubbed Of The Grammys' Album Of The Year Award 21 Black Entertainers Who Are Almost EGOT Winners 11 Black-Owned Games To Play At The Next Function Or Kick Back
News.com.au
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- News.com.au
Battle rapper T-Rex suffers seizure mid-battle during live showdown onstage
A veteran US freestyle rapper has suffered a medical emergency while in the middle of a rap battle. T-Rex – real name Randy Sullivan – was freestyling against his opponent Geechi Gotti at the Ultimate Rap Battle's NOME 15 event at the Gramercy Theatre in New York when he collapsed and appeared to have a seizure live on stage. In a clip going viral on social media, the Harlem battle rap legend – who was headlining the event on Sunday – was midway through the first round when he abruptly fell to the floor and began to convulse. His collapse caused panic among his crew, who tried to pull the rapper back up before urging each other to 'turn him on his side'. Paramedics soon arrived to transport him to a nearby hospital, with rap media outlet Let's Talk Battle Rap providing an update from the event. 'Rex was conscious before the Paramedics left to the hospital,' they tweeted. According to TMZ, New York is currently experiencing a heatwave and many suspect T-Rex could have suffered from heat stroke after he was reportedly seen begging for a bottle of water before his battle began. His opponent Geechi Gotti – real name Marcus Fantroy – spoke out about the incident at the venue, expressing concerns for the popular star. 'I'm about to head to the hospital to check on my boy,' Gotti said. 'I came in here with his folks and family. So we gon' go up there and check on Rex right now... Prayers to bro because that s**t is way more important than any battle.' In the wake of the shocking incident, T-Rex took to social media to confirm he's doing better after friend and battle rap nurse Juiceboxxx, who was by his side, tweeted, 'Right place. Right time. I'm glad you're okay.' 'Thank god for JuJu I appreciate you so much,' T-Rex replied. 'Also my cuzin D-Boy love you n***a.' Relieved fans have also showed the battle legend some love on social media. 'Rest up rex and i am so happy [Juiceboxxx] was there to help. Praying for you,' one tweeted, while another wrote, 'Glad to hear your Ok, brother, thanks to all who help in that situation.' 'You scared the sh*t out of us. Glad you good!' another commented, with one tweeting, 'Prayers to you Rex you bouta come back the best version of you.' T-Rex has been a prolific battle rapper since the late 90s. In his career, he has faced off with MCs including his cousin Murda Mook, Loaded Lux, Math Hoffa, Charlie Clips, and Hitman Holla.
Yahoo
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Granderson: Where's the music that meets this moment? Black artists are stepping up
It's been one year since Kendrick Lamar took the Kia Forum stage in Inglewood for 'The Pop Out: Ken and Friends,' the first in a series of highly publicized victory laps that have come at the expense of his deflated rival, Drake. Their rap battle began more than a decade ago, and the two heavyweights exchanged subtle lyrical jabs until the gloves came off in the winter of 2023. By the following spring, they were exchanging a flurry of scathing diss tracks, each diving deeper into the other's personal life. The fight was competitive until K-Dot landed the haymaker. It wasn't the chart performance of 'Not Like Us' that declared Lamar the winner. No recording artist has more Billboard Hot 100 entries than Drake. In fact, he has more appearances on the chart than Michael Jackson, Elvis and the Beatles combined. When it comes to talent and commercial success, Drake is unquestionably among the greats. The reason Lamar was able to knock him out was because Drake's authenticity couldn't take a punch. That's not just my score card. That's what the culture was feeling. Lamar performed 'Not Like Us' five times during that Juneteenth show last year and dropped the accompanying music video on the Fourth of July. By the time Vice President Kamala Harris was playing it at her first rally as the presumptive Democratic nominee in Atlanta, every sporting event in America was playing that song. Yes, the 'A-minor' double entendre was catchy, and it is always good to have Mustard on the beat. But what elevates 'Us' is the same thing that grounds the artist who wrote it — an unapologetic defense of the culture and the people from which the art originates. As the saying goes: 'Everybody wants to sing our blues. Nobody wants to live our blues.' For Lamar, the decadelong rap battle stems from his lifelong disdain for gangster cosplay and the vacuous monetizing of Black culture. As the diss tracks between the two progressed, it was clear Drake was still trying to win a rap battle — while Lamar was inspiring a conversation beyond their beef, rap music and even the entertainment industry. At the heart of Lamar's surgical evisceration of Drake's brand of artistry is a question all creatives must ask of themselves at some point: What am I doing this for? * * * Few inflection moments in American history have shaped our society quite like the convergence of war, technological advancement, old-fashioned prejudice and artistic expression during the summer of 1969. From the Apollo moon landing and Woodstock to the Stonewall riots and the Harlem Cultural Festival, there wasn't a disciple or demographic that was not directly affected over that stretch. It was during the summer of 1969 when the great Nina Simone gave a concert on the campus of Morehouse College in Atlanta after the school's most famous alumnus — the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. — had been assassinated the year before. Simone joined other artists there to offer the students encouragement. That summer she also debuted the song 'To Be Young, Gifted and Black' and performed it during the Harlem Cultural Festival. Her contemporaries Donny Hathaway and Aretha Franklin soon recorded their own versions of the song — not because of its chart success, but because of its purpose. 'An artist's duty, as far as I'm concerned, is to reflect the times,' Simone said after her Morehouse performance. 'How can you be an artist and not reflect the times? That to me is the definition of an artist.' Indeed, after Bob Dylan asked 'how many years can some people exist before they're allowed to be free?' in his 1962 protest song, 'Blowin' in the Wind,' Sam Cooke was inspired to declare 'it's been a long time coming, but I know change is gonna come' in 1963. The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham pushed Simone to write her first protest song in 1964: 'Mississippi Goddam.' By the summer of 1969, she was known as much for her work in the civil rights movement as for her music. Simone still wrote songs about love, heartache, those sorts of things. However, the reason her legacy still looms large today (the Irish singer Hozier named his third EP after her in 2018) is that Simone was also willing to use her art to reflect the times. Not sure if you've looked around the country recently, but the times we live in are a-changing. And just as was the case in the summer of 1969, the summer of 2025 finds the U.S. at a convergence of war (Ukraine-Russia/Israel-Gaza-Iran) and technological advancement (especially artificial intelligence) and old-fashioned prejudice (indiscriminate ICE raids). However, in this updated version of America, the White House has taken over the Kennedy Center, has cut off National Endowment for the Arts grants, has threatened the broadcast licenses of news networks and is holding a guillotine over Big Bird's head. Because of President Trump's unprecedented hostility toward long-standing cultural and academic institutions, there is a question of how far tech and media executives will allow today's artists to reflect the times we're living in. 'I think it's hard today to get a feel for the totality of what people are feeling because there's so much out there to consume,' documentarian and author Nelson George told me. 'The Chuck D who's 25, right now, I don't hear him. The Tracy Chapman of this era. Do we really not have voices that are saying something or are we not getting access to those people? All those songs from other moments in history, I'm surprised there hasn't been an anthem for this time yet.' Comedian Roy Wood Jr. said he feels that in his line of work, 'resistance humor or educating humor' works best in television because 'TV is a reflection of who we are, where I feel like movies are what we wish we could be or were.' The host of CNN's 'Have I Got News for You' also said because of the political climate we're in, instead of challenging us to learn or grow as a culture, TV executives are 'canceling a lot of the shows that really focused on serious societal issues because there's a pushback against those types of topics.' Big Sean, whose 2013 project with Lamar is pegged as the starting point of the Drake beef, said there was significance to Lamar's 'pop out' appearing on Juneteenth, the federal holiday marking the end of slavery in the U.S. 'I feel like being Black is awesome.… We worked as a people to get there, to feel like that,' he told me. 'That's why I'm so thankful for the people that said I'm Black and I'm proud.' And that James Brown vibe is the type of art Big Sean said he is currently working on, the kind that uplifts and gives listeners hope. Lamar's Juneteenth show was livestreamed on Prime and became Amazon Music's most-watched production. For Ben Watkins, creator of the Prime TV series 'Cross,' the success of Lamar's performance — along with his Super Bowl show and current tour with SZA — is proof there is a hunger for authentic Black artistic expression in this current political environment. As he was putting together the TV show, Watkins said, he told everyone involved: 'I'm going to do a Black man with swagger, I'm going to show D.C. to its fullest and I'm going to honestly talk about some of the controversies and contradictions of a Black cop.' The reaction? 'That sounds great to us.' 'Cross' premiered the week after the 2024 election and for 100 days it was among Prime Video's top 10 most-watched series. Grammy winner Ledisi said she wasn't planning on writing a political anthem when she began composing 'BLKWMN' for her latest album. However, her tribute to the resolve of Black women was embraced as an anthem after its release in February. 'I wasn't thinking of any of that, just creating,' she told me. 'When you're truly creating … you just have an intention of releasing whatever that feeling is. I'm glad it resonated with the times.' Even before the song took off, Ledisi unexpectedly found herself in the middle of social media attacks for daring to sing the National Black Anthem at this year's Super Bowl. That's why when she sang a couple of lines from one of Lamar's anthems during a recent tour stop in Chicago, I couldn't help but feel it was more a word of encouragement for herself and the predominantly Black audience than it was a nod to a commercially successful track. That week Trump announced plans to resurrect names from the Confederacy on public land. Just hours before Ledisi took the stage, 'No Kings' protesters came marching by, followed closely by local police. Their chants echoed loudly throughout the North Loop, their passion forcing those shopping and dining near the river to take notice. The concrete walls and thick glass designed to rebuke Chicago's winter could not keep out the cries of the people. Later that night Ledisi, whose Nina Simone tribute album was nominated for a Grammy in 2021, looked up in the balcony, smiled — and visibly exhaled. 'We gon' be all right,' she sang to a full Chicago Theatre house. 'We gon' be all right.' * * * Few inflection moments in American history have shaped our society quite like the convergence of war, technological advancement and old-fashioned prejudice during the summer of 1865. The second round of the Industrial Revolution was on the horizon, the Confederacy was on its last legs, and the first Juneteenth celebration was born. However, while the Civil War was all over, racism managed to emerge from the wreckage unscathed. In fact, a Confederate journalist by the name of Edward A. Pollard began working on a revisionist history book that painted the South as noble and slavery as unimportant to their way of life. Pollard's piece of fake news, 'The Lost Cause: A New Southern History of the War of the Confederates,' was completed before President Andrew Johnson had even declared the war officially over. And to this day there are elected officials from former Confederate states who repeat untruths about the war that originated from Pollard, an enslaver. Today there are state holidays in honor of men who fought against this country because for some white people it still feels better to believe Pollard's lies about the Confederacy than to accept the truth about America. Historically this is where creatives have come in, using artistic expression to fill in the gaps in our understanding of one another. Sometimes the art is profitable. A few times it hits No. 1 on the New York Times Bestseller list or Billboard chart. More often than not, it is underappreciated. However, art that reflects an authentic lived experience is always necessary. It is both the spark that can ignite a fire and the coolant that prevents us all from overheating. Over the last century, each time it seems the world was falling apart — be it war, famine or disease — it was always the artists who kept us laughing, hoping and believing. A year ago, on Juneteenth, Kendrick Lamar took the Forum stage for what was initially viewed as a victory celebration. And it was … though he didn't do it for himself. KDot did it for 'Us.' @LZGranderson If it's in the news right now, the L.A. Times' Opinion section covers it. Sign up for our weekly opinion newsletter. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
