The Big Day: Vegas’ biggest ever hip-hop fest Day N Vegas returns
The hip-hop cowboy encapsulated the weekend he was bringing to a close.
“I see we got a party going on,” observed Kendrick Lamar, dressed head to toe in black, looking like an Old West villain, a rapid-fire tongue serving as his six-shooter, rhymes blasted in place of bullets.
It was the final set of the final night of the 2019 debut of Day N Vegas, the biggest hip-hop event ever to hit the city, drawing 60,000 fans over three days to the Las Vegas Festival Grounds.
It was also the last time Lamar took the stage.
Two years later, he’s back — and so is Day N Vegas.
Lamar’s one-and-only performance of 2021 on Friday, and his first since the pandemic scuttled a number of planned festival headlining slots in 2020, highlights a crazy-loaded weekend of hip-hop, R&B and, uh, feline-lovin’ prog jazz (more on that later) with over 120 acts performing nearly 12 hours of music a day on three stages.
There’s Lil big names (Lil Baby, Lil Uzi Vert), alt-R&B chanteuses (SZA, Ari Lennox, Jazmine Sullivan), of-the-moment voices (Roddy Ricch, Denzel Curry, Don Toliver), scads of up-and-comers and more.
(Note: Hip-hop superstar Travis Scott was scheduled to headline Saturday night’s show but canceled his performance after the tragedy at his Astroworld festival last weekend in Houston, where eight people were killed and hundreds injured by a surge in the crowd during his set. Post Malone will fill Scott’s headlining slot.)
What to expect?
Here’s but a taste.
Makin’ mooo-ves
When we first encountered Doja Cat, who performs Saturday, she was rapping with french fries jammed into her nostrils against a backdrop of pixelated, eight-bit hamburgers and wigged cattle with flowing blond locks.
Flashback to 2018 and her viral video for “Mooo!,” an earworm-y blend of “Old McDonald’s Farm,” Kelis’ “Milkshake” and Afroman-level stoner rap that was destined to end up on a Dr. Demento compilation album, where all other novelty singles go to die.
But then a funny thing happened on the way to the fleeting fame of a one-hit-wonder: Doja Cat blossomed into a pop star. On her latest album, the artfully all-over-the-place “Planet Her,” released in June, Doja Cat raps as feverishly as Nicki Minaj, sings with SZA, and manages to rhyme “empty” with “Robyn Fenty” (aka Rihanna).
Talk about having her cow and eating it, too.
Some super-helpful travel tips
Seeing as how there is no parking lot at the Las Vegas Festival Grounds, getting to the venue can be an … adventure. Here are five helpful suggestions for beating the traffic:
1. Parachute in, Fan Man style.
2. Order an Uber. Now. Like seriously, right now.
3. Try to convince Wynn parking garage attendants that you’re really there for the Russian Osetra caviar service at SW Steakhouse.
4. Get a room at nearby Circus Circus and hoof it. One clown show deserves another …
5. Secure a part-time gig as Tyler, The Creator’s wig handler. Speaking of which …
Best in fest again?
It was like watching a hip-hop Andy Kaufman.
Sporting a blond bob wig and a Harry Dunne-worthy powder-blue suit, Tyler, The Creator brought his songs to wild-eyed, manic life during his best-in-show performance at Day N Vegas 2019, his set somewhere between a concert and a performance art spectacle.
“I don’t know where I’m going,” he acknowledged at the outset of it all, careening between convulsive hip-hop and contemplative soul.
Now, he’s back in a headlining role, closing Day N Vegas on Sunday while touring in support of his latest album, “Call Me If You Get Lost,” one of the year’s best, cocksure and vulnerable, breathless and reflective all at once.
“Find another (rapper) like me, ’cause I ain’t seen one,” he boasts on “Corso.”
Seeing is believing in this case, but even then, Tyler, The Creator will probably leave you rubbing your eyes in bafflement.
It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad world
One of hip-hop’s most accomplished producers of the 2000s, Madlib possesses a deep, diverse discography. Here are five of his albums you need to hear before his Day N Vegas appearance Friday:
“Madvillainy”: This collaboration with the late masked rapper MF Doom is like a comic book come to life. A classic.
“Bandana”: Madlib’s second record with Freddie Gibbs is gangsta rap at its most gripping.
“Shades of Blue”: Ocean-deep grooves fill these remixes of various cuts from the archives of jazz label Blue Note Records.
“The Unseen”: Madlib’s 2000 solo debut, under the name Quasimoto, set the tone for indie hip-hop in the decade that followed.
“Champion Sound”: Madlib teams up with another late great, fellow producer J Dilla, on an album that lived up to its name.
Far-out funk
“You know I’m out my mind, girl,” R&B/pop changeling Yves Tumor announces on “Gospel for a New Century,” the opening cut of “Heaven to a Tortured Mind,” one of 2020’s more critically acclaimed albums. It’s a warning that doubles as an invitation on this wild pastiche of fuzzed-out rock ’n’ roll, concussive noise-funk and shimmering R&B dreamscapes.
His Saturday set is not to be missed.
Just as formidably far-out is bass wunderkind Thundercat, who plays Friday. During his last Las Vegas appearance at the Intersect Music Festival in December 2019, he veered from prog-jazz endurance tests to free-range funk jams frequently featuring lyrical references to felines. You’ll risk carpal tunnel syndrome testing your air bass chops by attempting to play along with this cat.
As Nasty as she wants to be
Because every festival needs at least one female MC who expounds upon the practical applications of feline urine.
Enter reefer-abetted rapper Rico Nasty, who returns to Day N Vegas on Friday after a smokin’ — literally — set in 2019.
“I’m nasty, and I don’t give a (expletive), like, what is classy?” she wonders on the aptly titled “I’m Nasty.” “Smokin’ on cat pee and my voice is raspy.”
Can’t imagine why.
Collabs we’d like to see
There are a ton of performers at this year’s fest who’ve collaborated with one another.
Now, not all of these acts are playing on the same day, making guest spots tricky in some instances. Nevertheless, we can hope. Here are five pairings we want to see reunite on stage this weekend:
1. Madlib and Freddie Gibbs, “Thuggin’ ”
2. Earl Sweatshirt with Tyler, The Creator, “Sasquatch”
3. Kendrick Lamar with Thundercat, “These Walls”
4. Kenny Beats and Denzel Curry, “Take_It_Back_v2”
5. Doja Cat with SZA, “Kiss Me”
Trap metal comes to Day N Vegas
“If Self-Destruction Was An Olympic Event, I’d Be Tonya Harding” New Orleans trap-metal duo $uicideBoy$ declare on their latest record, “Long Term Effects of Suffering.”
What’s trap metal?
Well, as grandma can attest, it’s slow-and-low, Southern-style hip-hop with the violent, end-of-days imagery of the bleakest strains of underground metal.
$uicideBoy$ will bring the sound to Day N Vegas on Saturday, when they’ll invert smiles and crosses in unison.
R&B bliss
In her head, it’s always raining — so contends songstress Mariah the Scientist on her latest album, “Ry Ry World.”
Her voice, though, is decidedly cloud-free, a ray of sunshine poking through so many overcast emotions on her sophomore effort, where her weary-hearted narratives come to life over burbling beats and warped strings.
“Who’s your favorite girl? I wish I could be her,” she pines on “Impalas & Air Force 1s.”
After her performance Friday, she just might be.
If “Ry Ry World” is one of the better R&B albums of 2021, so is “Temporary Highs in the Violet Skies,” the third record from Los Angeles-based Swedish singer Snoh Aalegra, who takes the stage Sunday.
Like Mariah the Scientist, Aalegra favors understatement over vocal histrionics, a minimalist delivery of maximalist emotions. She frequently gets compared to Sade, with a voice warm enough to melt a polar ice cap.
It gets nippy at night in November, but Aalegra’s songbook promises to counter the chill like a favorite sweater.
Contact Jason Bracelin at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0476. Follow @jbracelin76 on Instagram.
