Glow in the Dark.

[weasel_seeker]

Just got back from the Glow in the Dark Tour (Kanye/Rihanna/NERD/Lupe) at the Bell Centre. Want to write up something about Kanye's evolution from rap star to pop icon and how the stage show abandoned key tropes of hip-hop culture and performance in order to make that jump. Explore/compare/contrast. But first, sleep and basic thoughts.

Comments

[koganbot]

Astonishing fact about Rihanna: she will not be able to buy drinks legally for another nine months.

She must be persuaded sing an impassioned and desperate Kelly Clarkson song, such as "Hear Me."

Did she sing "Haunted"?

[weasel_seeker]

I don't believe so. The openers sets were 30-45 minutes, which I suppose is how I missed Lupe.

Rihanna started with Breakin' Dishes and then did (no specific order) Don't Stop the Music, Pon de Replay, S.O.S., Hate That I Love You, Take a Bow, Unfaithful, Shut Up and Drive, Umbrella. I don't think she did Push Up on Me, but I could be wrong.

[weasel_seeker]

Plus, she can legally drink here.

[koganbot]

Maybe that's why she scheduled the concert.

[weasel_seeker]

I continue to be somewhat baffled as to her presence. Not to say that Rihanna is Kanye-level popular, but Lupe and NERD are clearly opening acts at stadium level, while I think Rihanna could/should be headlining herself. There's a story here somewhere.

[koganbot]

Maybe the assumption is that you need two top-bill caliber acts to fill a stadium.

[weasel_seeker]

I suppose, but this is Kanye West.

Can I redirect you to the part of the concert where ALIENS FROM ANOTHER PLANET PROCLAIMED HIM TO BE THE BIGGEST STAR IN THE UNIVERSE.

Haha. You're probably right, but I prefer to think of Kanye as an insufferable egoist who only accepts purple M&Ms and European bottled water and insists on his primacy in all musical endeavours. At least, this is the case post-Graduation, which was a marvel of ego in all its guestless indulgence and stadium-synth production

[alexmacpherson]

You should! Kanye's got so many conflicts going on, even apart from the conscious/bling binary he sometimes flirts with lyrically - right now it's like he can't decide whether he wants to be a rock star, pop star, hip-hop star or hipster (well, he's obviously decided he wants to be everything, it's about how far he can go and still pull it off).

He is the first proper big hip-hop act (who's come up via the trad hip-hop route, unlike eg MIA) to treat other genres in an indie kind of way though - ie whereas hip-hop traditionally subsumes other genres into itself and makes them wholly hip-hop, as opposed to rock or bhangra or whatever, Kanye's all about trying to dress up in their clothes, trying to be them except not too much.