We spent today at the Travis Scott concert. I actually bought the tickets by coincidence — I had randomly opened Ticketmaster, and it just so happened that the tickets had just gone on sale. I managed to grab them without any issues. I’m not someone who listens to him a lot, maybe just 3–4 of his big hits from time to time. I was generally expecting something heavily reliant on auto-tune, without much actual live performance. I had read a lot about how most modern pop and hip-hop artists rely on playback during their shows. So I went into this one with that context — and a bit of prejudice.
From the moment the concert started, the energy was intense. It didn’t take me long to realize that people weren’t there for his vocals. Nobody was expecting him to deliver a vocalist-level performance — the crowd was there for the show, plain and simple. And in that regard, he definitely delivers.
When trying to understand this kind of music, I think it’s important to understand why the audience listens to it. As a rock listener, I’ve only become more open-minded about this over the past 4–5 years. Everyone has their own sense of quality, of course, but in the end, it’s not anyone’s place to criticize the “quality” of music that clearly has an audience. If the listener is happy, that’s the end of the discussion.
The crowd was mostly Gen Z. The “boyz,” if you will. =D I used to think they were mostly posers, but honestly, they seemed genuinely connected to the music. At the AC/DC concert, there were moments when we could sit down and rest. At Travis Scott, people didn’t sit for even 10 seconds — they were on their feet, jumping, singing along for the entire set. It was a great experience.
