Wednesday night I watched a man in a beanie sing jazz-inflected R&B with two backing vocalists and a seven-piece band. This weekend I’m at Vans Warped Tour. I put that up front so you know exactly what kind of ears were in the room.
My history with Jack Harlow is everyone’s history with Jack Harlow. “What’s Poppin,” “Tyler Herro,” the Lil Nas X verse. Then Monica came out in March and I put it on expecting more of that and got soft basslines, brushed drums, trumpets, and not one rapped verse anywhere on it. I sat there confused. That’s why I wanted to review this show.
Here’s what I came out with. The pivot works. The show doesn’t quite (to me, at least), and not for the reason you’d think.
James Savage
James Savage is from Louisville, same as Harlow, and he sings on Monica, which makes him the rare opener who’s actually on the record. Not a slot filled by a booking agent.
He told us he’d been enjoying it here and that he’d put out his debut project, Pine, a few months back, and that he tried to be intentional with it. Small thing to say out loud. It stuck with me anyway. Later he asked if he could sing for us tonight, which he can, and “100 Years” was the one that got the floor to stop holding its beers at chest height. He asked for phones to the sky once and got them, instead of begging for it three times like some openers do.
Jack Harlow
Nine on the dot. Hazy orange, no intro tape, straight into “Trade Places.” Eight people on that stage including two women on backing vocals and a guy on keys who ends up doing more work than anyone will credit him for. Harlow in baggy dark brown and a beanie, which is a long way from the kid in skinny jeans in those old videos.
And I couldn’t hear him sing.
The bass was hot. Not slightly. Enough that through “Trade Places” and “Lonesome” his vocal sat underneath it, which is a bad trade on an album whose entire pitch is that he’s a singer now. Caveat on that one though, I wear earplugs, because I’d like to still have ears at fifty, and earplugs eat the top end long before they touch anything down low. So that might be on me rather than on the room.
Then, third song, the whole thing flipped. “Prague,” him sat on a stool, dark yellow light, and a couple of lines done a cappella. Best-sounding two minutes of the night so far, by a distance, and it happened the moment the band got out of the way.
Three songs in before he said a word by the way. Song ends, next one starts, nothing. Then: welcome to the Monica tour, welcome to my first headlining show in Montreal, ever. Osheaga, sure, but never his own room here. We answered with the olé olé olé, which we then did roughly every twenty minutes until the lights came up, because that is what this city does to visiting artists and there is no stopping it.
He asked who was listening before Monica dropped and went straight back to That’s What They All Say. This is where the show got good for me. “Already Best Friends,” everybody told to put an arm around their best friend, and he ended it a cappella again. Second time the band shut up, second high point. He was making a point about being a rapper first and he made it by singing without any instruments at all, which I’m still turning over.
Savage came back for “Move Along,” the one song they have together, and Harlow used it to tell us to go listen to Pine and to remind us they come from the same place. Then “Route 66,” fully back in rap mode, keys guy on backing vocals.
After “Nail Tech” he told us this is his first tour in four years and that what he actually loves is setting up mics in a hotel room with his brother Nicky and working on the next thing. “Denver” came out of one of those rooms. That’s the guy I like. Acoustic guitar, quick hi-hats, a song that sounds like two brothers and a laptop.
Now the part that bugged me a little bit.
A lot of these songs were ninety seconds and gone. “They Don’t Love It” barely got going. I guess I didn’t love it. The deep cut run through “All of My Friends,” “Living Alone,” “Against the Grain,” “Sundown” and the “Warsaw” / “Ghost” / “Thru the Night” stretch was effectively a medley for the day ones, and then “Tyler Herro” had its second half handed off to the crowd a cappella. Which is the thing. A cappella was the best idea of the night twice, on “Prague” and on “Already Best Friends,” because both times it was a choice. On “Tyler Herro” it read as a shortcut, and that song is a total banger that deserved its full three minutes.
In hardcore, ninety seconds is a feature. Turns out it doesn’t transfer.
And yet. The day one fans in there ate the medley alive, and I’m not going to sit here and pretend the room didn’t love it, because it did. He told us it means the world to have a crowd give every word back, asked for the lights so he could actually look at us, got another olé olé olé for his trouble and called it the perfect vibe. He’s right that it felt cozy. Family and friends more than arena. Then the Drake one, “Churchill Downs.” “Say Hello,” introduced as a song for all of his bad breakups, and at the end of it he stopped everything and named every single person on that stage. Almost nobody does that anymore.
“What’s Poppin” was always going to be the loudest thing in the building and it was. “First Class,” “Lovin on Me,” done.
Artists change and change is good. Nobody needs a guy still doing teenage douche rapper at 28, and the left turn into Monica is the most interesting thing he’s done. The band is what sells it. Those songs have edges on a stage that they flatly do not have on the record.
The problem isn’t the pivot. It’s that this show wanted to be two shows. A jazzy R&B record that needs air, and thirty-two titles of hits and deep cuts that need a clock, and those two things fought each other all night. Every single time he took something away, a stool, a band drop-out, a room full of people with their arms around each other, it was better. Every time he crammed, it wasn’t. Is that ight? Mostly, yeah, and I’d still rather see a guy overreaching in a room this warm than coasting in an arena.
I wouldn’t trade places with anyone who stayed home. Even at a minute and a half a song.
Setlist — Jack Harlow
- Trade Places
- Lonesome
- Prague
- Luv Is Dro
- Like a Blade of Grass
- Already Best Friends
- My Winter
- Move Along (with James Savage)
- Route 66
- Way Out
- Nail Tech
- Denver
- No Enhancers
- They Don’t Love It
- Is That Ight?
- All of My Friends
- Living Alone
- Against the Grain
- Sundown
- Warsaw / Ghost / Thru the Night
- Churchill Downs
- Dua Lipa
- SUVs (Black on Black)
- Movie Star
- I Wanna See Some Ass
- Industry Baby (Lil Nas X cover)
- Say Hello
- Hello Miss Johnson
- Tyler Herro
- What’s Poppin
- First Class
- Lovin on Me
Review – Maxime Le Huidoux
Photos – Eric Brisson
