Image via Greg Noire/pgLang/USAToday
Pranav Trewn finds peace in his vinyl record collection.
On the heels of the most commercially successful year of his career, Kendrick Lamar is the first rapper this decade to embark on an all-stadium world tour. Fresh off of becoming the first solo rap artist to headline the Super Bowl, rapidly landing four number one hits in quick succession, and having eviscerated the reputation of rap’s previously undisputed and seemingly unstoppable chart heavyweight, a Kendrick concert has never felt more vital to the culture.
At Oracle Park in San Francisco last month, the rapper’s vocals were nimble; his disposition felt impenetrable, and as a performer he was generous, offering a reverent crowd memorably orchestrated show beats that would stick with them long after the final notes rang out, from a spaced out two-part “tv off” to spotlights for his earth-shattering guest verses on “family ties” and “Like That.”
Oh, and SZA was fun too!
Stadium tours are planned long in advance, and no one could have predicted the heights Kendrick would ascend over the last 14 months. Prior to GNX, with the divisive Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers as his last full-length statement, SZA was arguably a bigger draw. SOS was a critical and commercial smash, skyrocketing her with an escape velocity only Kendrick had previously achieved at TDE. Pairing a hip-hop act and R&B singer together has proven a tried and true industry tactic to move a high volume of tickets (see: Eminem & Rihanna, Jay-Z and Justin Timberlake), so if Kendrick wanted to make the leap to stadiums, SZA was a natural pick to co-headline. The two colleagues have a shared history and oeuvre, complimentary fanbases, and proven they could fill an equal number of arena seats.
No suit behind the scenes could have been unhappy with Kendrick’s hate-fueled boom in popularity. The Grand National Tour sold out swiftly and resale has maintained its hefty price tags even up to the start of each show. The heightened adoration for Kendrick, has complicated the audience reception to the shared vision for the duo’s performance. Their show is one where each artist trades off on stage every few songs rather than perform two distinct solo shows.
This format has gone from an anomaly to a befuddling trend, with most audiences’ first experience likely being last year’s Troye Sivan and Charli XCX’s SWEAT Tour, in which the two indie pop stars surprised ticket buyers with a rotating selection of their respective hits. As with Kendrick and SZA, Charli and Troye arguably had similar pull in 2024, up until a sudden career breakthrough for the former made Charli not simply a bigger mainstream artist, but one of the most hyped up pop stars in the culture writ-large.
Between the tour announcement and the first show, Charli XCX had become a household name and BRAT summer was in full-swing. Now seeing Troye Sivan’s sultry but perfunctory mid-tempo bops interrupt the it-girl’s string of newly-minted feral club standards was an affront to the show’s momentum.
Kendrick, simply put, means more to the moment right now than SZA. Although both are exceptional songwriters and compelling live vocalists, it was tough to stay immersed through the tonal switches between each artist’s mini-sets. Kendrick’s setlist was that of hard angles and even harder bars, whereas SZA’s was mostly soft edges and aqueous melisma. The dichotomy offered an enjoyable contrast in their best moments, but most often felt incongruous, hampered by the fact that one of them is on a generation-defining run, sitting on top of his genre and raining fire and brimstone down on his enemies on the biggest platforms.
The audience in San Francisco expressed as much in their body language. Kendrick’s appearances would have everyone standing at attention, throwing their bodies into chants against Drake and in appreciation of Mustard. Whenever he left the stage, such as after a breathless six minute run through his delightfully despicable “Euphoria,” an Anita Baker-spliced rendition of “m.A.A.d City,” and the modern protest anthem “Alright,” many would take their seats to pleasantly enjoy SZA romp around with a quirky collection of bugs. She had her dedicated pockets within the stadium, but you could feel the crowd begin to count down the time until the next Kendrick section.
It reminded me of the first time I saw this type of split show: Jay-Z and Beyonce’s On The Run II trek in 2018. Even with the former coming off of his freshest album in a minute, the reflective 4:44, Beyonce was simply operating in a league of her own, having wowed the world with her landmark sixth album Lemonade. She also had just performed one of the most lauded Coachella headlining sets in the festival’s history earlier that year. As much as I was excited to finally hear iconic hits like “U Don’t Know” and “99 Problems” live, even Beyonce’s comparable deep cuts like “Resentment” and “Don’t Hurt Yourself” were more electric during the show. She had the culture under her command, and Jay-Z couldn’t help but feel small in comparison.
For artists, there are still many benefits to organizing co-headlining runs. Twenty to thirty minute spurts of performance are easier to manage than one continuous 90 minute set; maybe those pauses let Kendrick worry less about preserving his stamina, so he could sequence early three of the most breathless songs of his set in a row (“Euphoria,” “Hey Now,” and “Reincarnated”) without burning himself out by the second half. Performers also save money by pooling resources, such as sharing dancers, screens, and other elements of their production. And in cases where it’s unclear which artist is going to land the bigger reaction by the time the tour starts, this format manages egos so no one has to humbly open for the other (or worse, be the “headliner” that most people would leave early to beat traffic).
There are also several drawbacks. Chopping up the runtime into so many mini-sets necessitates a lot of transitions. The Grand Nationals Tour had too many cutscenes meant to ease the switch between SZA and Kendrick’s appearances. While the best of them (the deposition videos, the pair comically stopping at a gas station together) added to the experience, most of them felt unnecessary and vacant, if not actively hard to engage with in a setting like a stadium where the crowd noise made mostly inaudible the muted dialogue.
The two artists were also frequently offering out of step experiences. SZA put together what is essentially the traditional modern pop headliner show, more reliant on a backing track and dance breaks, with trademark moves like turning the mic to the crowd to sing-along and rocking out to unnecessary guitar solos stapled onto her synthetic R&B hits. She was chatty and down to earth, offering inspirational speeches and “fuck my ex” banter that made her relatable and approachable. Compare this to Kendrick, who showed videos of street brawls, stalked the stage like a hunter confidently approaching its prey, and kept the crowd work to a minimum.
When the two were on stage together, rather than amplifying one another to a sum greater than their respective parts, it felt like the show was further compromising itself. In part because their shared catalogue held the weakest songs of the setlist (“Doves in the Wind,” “30 for 30”), but also because it reduced both artists’ star-making eccentricities, boiling SZA’s contributions down to monotonous hooks and necessitating Kendrick pare back his raps to their simplest cadences.
Recognizing that Kendrick had become the primary attraction, the show was at least bookended by his material. That helped begin and end the show on the highest notes, and even with the frequent interruptions, each artist’s sections were long enough to maintain a rewarding flow. But I left in part hoping the next time I see either artist it’s as a standalone event. Like with Troye and Charli, Beyonce and Jay-Z, and I expect whoever inevitably tries this next, the Grand National Tour felt like a B-Tier concert interspersed throughout an A-Tier one, to the detriment of how enjoyable both experiences could have been on their own.
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