Gig Of The Year - Kendrick Lamar

DAMN.

Exactly our reaction to the album and exactly our reaction to the tour. After topping the 2017 charts commercially and critically with fourth album DAMN., 2018 was the year that Kung-Fu Kenny chopped and kicked his way to the top of the live arena – and we here in Ireland were lucky to bear witness twice.

After an initial 2017 leg for home audiences in America, the DAMN. tour kicked off the year here in Dublin. Our man Paul Nolan was there in February to witness the Compton icon perform “with a demonic level of intensity:”

“I don’t think I’ve ever quite experienced the sense of anticipation in this venue that surges through the crowd before Kendrick Lamar appears... With one giant video screen behind Lamar and another tilted above, the performance has the feel of an arena show combined with an art installation.

“The visuals are inspired, ranging from scenes of LA street life, to ambient flowing water, to a satanic barking dog with glowing eyes. The band, meanwhile, are working overtime... they don’t miss a beat as they move seamlessly through crunching hip-hop, funk jams, icy industrial, avant jazz and ambient electro.

“Lamar appears on a mini-stage in the centre of the arena, before being elevated atop a cube covered in fairy-lights. They and thousands of mobile phones are the sole source of illumination, as Lamar raps and the crowd below strains to reach him like he’s a religious icon – honestly, it’s like we’re all having the same collective dream.
“We may have lost some legendary performers over the past few years in the likes of Cohen, Bowie and Prince, but with this extraordinary show, Kendrick Lamar has again shown that he possesses their rare level of creative genius. Truly phenomenal stuff.”

You could imagine our excitement then, when the head honchos over at Electric Picnic announced that they’d captured Kendrick as a headliner. After Longitude’s hip-hop dominated lineup, K-Dot’s Stradbally appearance was the official coronation of the genre’s takeover of the Irish festival scene.

The Hot Press team was there on the Friday night to witness a more relaxed affair than the feral arena show, more of a celebration of the hits that Kendrick doled out with supreme confidence. The set exploded to life with opener ‘D.N.A.’ and only an artist on top of the world could afford to have a funk jam like ‘King Kunta’ third in the set.

Later the festival vibes were in full swing during chillwave grooves of ‘Bitch Don’t Kill My Vibe’, while one of the biggest singalongs of the weekend took place to Black Lives Matter anthem ‘Alright’. This time we were also treated to an encore of ‘All The Stars’ – his collaboration with the incredible SZA for the Black Panther soundtrack.

As his visuals say: Kung-Fu Kenny fuckin’ everyone up.