Lil Uzi Vert, Auckland NZ, 2018

Lil Uzi Vert 

20th February 2018
Logan Campbell Centre, Auckland, New Zealand.

Review by Kate Taylor.  Photography by Taylor Conboy.

Born and raised in Philly like The Fresh Prince before him, Lil Uzi Vert, youth hip hop phenomenon in the styles of both trap and emo; crossed the waves to bring us his special brand of avant garde rapid fire flows to Auckland’s Logan Campbell Centre last night before he trips over the Tasman.

Our support DJ for the night was excellent, ramping up the crowd with slamming tunes as small circles in the crowd opened up to joyous groups of friends dancing and spitting the rhymes of their favourite tracks under the Snapchat light of a cellphone; Big Shaq, Chance the Rapper, anything by Travis Scott and Post Malone’s Congratulations rated very highly with the crowd and our DJ loved our energy and looked genuinely surprised by how much everyone was going off. He did such a good job in fact, that I totally missed him saying who he was, as the crowd roared their appreciation of his set over him speaking his own name.

As Lil Uzi Vert’s DJ took the stage and spent around six minutes whipping us into a frenzy, this anticipation gave way to a rumbling, positively primal chant of “Uzi, Uzi, Uzi…” It was in that moment that it struck me personally that this is where some of the energy I loved and lived for in the hardcore scene in Auckland in the early 2000s has gone too…it’s here now. The enthusiasm, that vital energy building and straining to be released. As Lil Uzi’s DJ instructed the crew to “cut the lights” and for the fans to raise their cellphone torches high; it was among this dimly lit, excited space that Lil Uzi slinked his way onstage. Unfettered by the expectations of his hip hop predecessors, Lil Uzi is free to wear and be just as he chooses in this exciting new landscape of the genre. Presenting as if in some Damon Albarn cosplay circa 1994 and topping his dome with what can only be described as a grungey snowboarder’s beanie; a face filled with piercings plus a diamond encrusted belt and a huge, icy, icy cross that Lil Uzi removed from his neck and whipped around his head or dangled tantalizingly at the crowd.

Lil Uzi pulls funny facial expressions and pokes out his tongue, he careens around the stage in a mixture of dancing and hurtling from spot to spot. He’s off it, wearing spiked gauntlets and throwing up the goats as inverted crosses and his name in a blaze of pink neon fire burns on the video screen behind him; and with Lil Uzi citing Marilyn Manson as one of his main influences, this all makes perfect sense. “Hello everybody. Are you ready to rage?” Lil Uzi inquires before we’re treated to a set list that houses: Ps & Qs, Of Course We Ghetto Flowers, his Carnage feature from Wdyw, Top, Super Saiyan, his feature from the huge Migos track Bad and Boujee, Hi Roller, Sideline Watching (Hold Up), The Way Life Goes, 7am, his DJ ESCO feature on Too Much Sauce; and his Playboi Carti feature on Wokeuplikethis*.

As Lil Uzi removes his beanie and his green dreads spill down his cheek and sweat pools on his extremely cut yet diminutive frame he pauses and peers into the throng of bodies before him; “I see my buddies in the middle got the mosh pit going, where the fuck is the mosh pit on this side?! Where is it, open it up! This is my first time here and I just wanna party out here.” Looking to the gaping maw of a pit that was opening up to the right of stage Lil Uzi exclaimed “…aw shit that’s a big one, that’s a fucking big one! “Oh you came to rage huh?” Lil Uzi turns to his DJ and says “Put on some more rage music. Yo thanks everybody for hitting it we’re going to open back up the mosh pit. Open it up!” Which is something so natural to hear at a hardcore gig, taking on a quizzical novelty at an international hip hop show. “Open up over here, ya’ll know I don’t wanna have to tell you five times over here. Open it up”. There was a moment when a zealous fan intent on having her moment with Lil Uzi rushed the stage; and although she didn’t quite make her intended destination she was rewarded with Lil Uzi coming to the far edge of the left side of stage to repeat her declarations of love back to her, repeating “I love you too, I really do.” until the rumble broke apart. Back to it, Lil Uzi tongue out, all windmilling dancing arms while staggering across stage, he scoops down to pick up some red sharkie wraparound sunnies that have been thrown for him, which he places on his head and keeps there for most of the rest of the set.

I’d call Xo Tour Llife3 the last song of the night as this is where Lil Uzi gave us every scrap of energy he still had belting out his major hit that’s crossing audiences and ending up on more pop based stations as well as die hard hip hop outlets. Leaning back and nailing the chorus hook, Lil Uzi then throws the mic with reckless abandon into the crowd so they can take over. As the extended ‘crowd edition’ of Xo Tour Llife3 wound down; and with Lil Uzi wanting the DJ to keep it raging, he played something to which Lil Uzi cut off and said “No, that’s not my mood…come on give us something so we can move”; from there he delivered half of a song then basically, in a style that Manson would be proud of; went “Naah. I’m done”, put the mic down next to the DJ and just walked calmly off to the side of the stage. As his DJ scrambled to select a track that would bring Lil Uzi Vert back to the stage he mixed in snippets of Dark Queen, Neon Guts, 20min and Loaded as we waited to see what was next. Then a stage manager dude appeared side of stage and gave it the “cut it” gesture and shook his head no, that was indeed, all we would see of Lil Uzi tonight. He was done.

Thus concluded Lil Uzi Vert’s 48 minute set. Some people may have got a little bit angry with this, although the crowd was resigned to their hop hop genius deigning that this was all he was going to give. However, the crowd weren’t visibly angry about it in the moment; there was certainly no overflow of animosity at the short set from the punters as they jostled and cascaded out of the Logan Campbell entrance into the fresh night air. The vibe was more like – “Aww, was that all?” I on the other hand think this is pretty funny, it’s very swag, it’s full of braggadocio, it’s exactly who he is. Lil Uzi Vert has the luxury of being the hip hop artist he wants to be, for the kids listening and navigating the world now. Genre pioneers like N.W.A. Or Wu Tang would perhaps call Lil Uzi’s stage antics and general persona corny in comparison to the way they presented themselves as hard boiled, zero room for frivolous fun characters. Was it that Lil Uzi felt like he’d given the best of his performance to that moment and wanted to call it a night; did he feel that his DJ and himself were not connecting on the same mood and this ticked him off? It’s unclear but I did feel it was kind of funny and befitting of the genre transcending type of artist that Lil Uzi is – this was a straight up rockstar move.

Were you there at the Logan Campbell Centre for this hip hop gig? Or have you seen Lil Uzi Vert perform live somewhere else before? Tell us about it in the comments below!

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