Mostly it was just Jay on stage alone - a live band accompanied him, but from the recesses of an orchestra pit - performing in the round, running through a career-spanning setlist that jumped back and forth through his catalog, with bits of 4:44 sprinkled in.Īs an artist with a career that spans two decades, Jay is actively facing his own past on sage each night. During a brief run that included The Blueprint 3 track “On to the Next One,” he performed inside a sort of cage of laser-like light beams.įlashy moments like these were ultimately few and far between. The set began with sliding, suspended projection screens showing clips of Jay-Z alternately engulfed in plumes of smoke or being burned from the eyes and mouth (while the imagery worked as a perfect scene-setter for his opening song, “Kill Jay-Z,” much of the footage was repurposed from the Anthony Mandler-directed music video for the 2013 collaboration with Justin Timberlake, “Holy Grail”). There were some on-stage theatrics, of course. New York City will always loom large in the music and identity of Jay-Z, but these days he and his family have settled down in Los Angeles, and his 4:44 Tour culminated Thursday night in a loose, warm finale at The Forum.
0 kommentar(er)
