Hip-hop and R&B star Drake performed a sold-out gig on Wednesday night at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in Irvine.
Click here for a photo slideshow of Drake’s performance in Irvine.
Read the full review of Drake’s performance on the Soundcheck Blog.
Photo by Kelly A. Swift, for the Orange County Register.
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His winter tour of colleges and universities, a deliberate downsizing of venues when he could otherwise fill arenas, was dubbed the Club Paradise Tour.
So what does it mean that Canadian sensation Drake‘s next Southern California appearance will be his largest yet, May 8 at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater in Irvine? Since his Viejas Arena gig was larger but still tied to a school (San Diego State), should this date be considered somehow tied to … UCI?
No? Too much of a stretch?
Doesn’t really matter what you call it. Bound to be a wild night all the same.
J. Cole, who made a cameo during Drake’s striking performance earlier this month at USC’s Galen Center, will deliver a proper opening set for the O.C. gig, as will Wacka Flocka Flame, Meek Mill, 2 Chainz and French Montana.
Tickets, $43.75-$93.75, go on sale Saturday, March 24, at 10 a.m., with pre-sales underway ’til Friday at 10 p.m.
That’s only one of three Verizon shows announced this week. We already learned about Kiss and Mötley Crüe teaming up for a tour that stops there in August. But also on the way is the return of Danzig Legacy, the three-set show that creative force Glenn Danzig brought to Gibson Amphitheatre last year.
It would have been wrong to have gone into Drake’s near-knockout performance Monday night in Los Angeles anticipating visionary spectacle on the scale of Kanye West’s recent powerhouse productions. Not only is the rapidly advancing Canadian sensation still a few steps behind West in terms of output and variety, but his Club Paradise Tour, by its very name and nature, suggests he isn’t aiming for anything too grand just yet.
“I fought for this tour,” he told MTV recently. “I fought really hard for this tour because, of course, they want me to go get the big bucks, go into the stadiums and cash out.” He’s right, of course. Had Monday’s gig at USC’s dwarf arena the Galen Center been shifted instead to Staples Center, it would have sold out just as fast and probably led to multiple nights.
Click here to see a photo slideshow of Drake’s performance and fans.
Drake will get to that point soon enough – probably by fall, I’d guess, once his pretty staggering second album, October’s Take Care, spins off a few more smash singles. For now, he’s keeping bonds tight with his core demographic by playing smaller (but not too small) venues at colleges and universities coast to coast, including another sold-out show March 11 at San Diego State’s Viejas Arena.
By its very name and nature, the Club Paradise outing tips Drake’s hand that he isn’t aiming for anything grander than a bare-bones experience, maybe with just a hint of gloss: slo-mo images of women knocking ’em back during “Shot for Me,” say, or a parade of honeys wiggling their behinds for “Practice.” And definitely save the special guests for L.A.: Meek Mill turned up for the aggressively horny “I’ma Boss” halfway in, just after Drake bust it bust it bust it on the Waka Flocka Flame track “Round of Applause” – but J. Cole easily bested that by barking through “Can’t Get Enough,” stunning the crowd.
Not that sharing the spotlight took anything away from the smoldering headliner, whose relatively slow-rising career, like so many overnight sensations before him (Kanye especially), now seems positively meteoric. In a highly compelling performance principally focused on Take Care (15 of 18 tracks) and only touched thrice on his debut disc Thank Me Later, the 25-year-old was fully in command of both the room’s heaving energy and the pace of the six-man band egging him on. He gave all, leaping about the stage, painstakingly pointing out fans during an extended “Miss Me” (à la Jay-Z when he goes off on one of his “I see you, I appreciate you” jags) and proving beyond doubt that his verbal skills are as top-tier on the mic as they are in the studio.
Read more about Drake’s performance on the Orange County Register’s Soundcheck Blog.
Photos by Armando Brown, for the Orange County Register.
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He’s got the clout and popularity now to be filling arenas coast to coast. Yet Toronto rapper Drake is resisting the urge to get too big with his first stateside tour behind November’s widely hailed second album Take Care.
So instead he’s embarking on the Club Paradise College Tour, an outing designed to thank original fans by playing relatively intimate venues on or near university campuses.
Granted, the locations aren’t exactly tiny — his San Diego State visit on March 11 brings him to the full-size Viejas Arena. But that’s not as cavernous as Staples Center, which he could likely pack in an instant. Instead, Drake’s L.A. stop will see him perform March 5 at the considerably smaller Galen Center at USC, where capacity is roughly 10,000.
My question is: Why say this tour is “for the same people who supported me from day one,” as he told MTV, when you can’t possibly ensure that that’s who will snatch up tickets? They go on sale Friday, Jan. 27, at 10 a.m. for Galen, price unavailable just yet; and Friday at noon for Viejas, $39.75-$59.75. Opening both shows: two other rapidly rising rappers, Kendrick Lamar and A$AP Rocky.
Matt Nathanson fans in Orange County are getting some options and extra opportunities: You can see the singer-songwriter open for Kelly Clarkson at Nokia Theatre on April 3, or you can see him headline a place a fraction of that size, House of Blues Anaheim on April 6. Tickets for the new local date, $20-$42.50, go on sale Friday at 10 a.m.
Meanwhile, at House of Blues Sunset Strip and on sale at that time: Andy Grammer, March 2, $15 … the Pretty Reckless, March 14, $12.50-$37.50 … and Decibel Magazine Tour featuring Behemoth with Watain, April 25, $22.50.
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