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Tierra Whack at Rainbow Room

Live Review + Gallery: Tierra Whack at Rainbow Room (05.10.19)

The 2019 edition of Red Bull Music Festival in New York continued with a concert at Rainbow Room in New York, NY on Friday, May 10th. The sold out show was the first headlining performance of Philadelphia rapper Tierra Whack in New York City. I first caught Tierra Whack in March 2018 when she was the opening act on a bill featuring Open Mike Eagle at Rough Trade NYC in Brooklyn. Someone I knew at the show (Brooklyn rapper Miss Eaves) told me that I would love Tierra before the concert began. Tierra came on stage holding a toilet plunger, which she later threw into the audience that someone caught and took home with them. After that moment happened, I knew Eaves was 100% correct.

Since the concert took place at the famous and historic Rainbow Room at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, when I arrived just after doors opened at 8PM, there was a line to enter. Once ticket holders were inside the building, we took an escalator up one flight, to show our tickets and be given wristbands to head upstairs. We were split up in small groups to take the elevators up to the 65th floor to enter the Rainbow Room. DJ Ohso played music starting at 8:30 until Tierra Whack’s DJ, Zach, who also played a few songs for the audience before Tierra came on around 10:30. A silver circular stage was on the middle of the floor that she ran around on continually rapping while talking to Zach and encouraging call and response with the crowd in between her songs.

She blew through songs from her debut, Whack World, with the audience singing along throughout her performance. Her set felt far too brief (it doesn’t help that Whack World is 15 songs that is over in 15 minutes and I experienced a three hour RBMF performance the night before). I definitely could have watched her run around that stage rapping and singing for hours.

About Edwina Hay

Edwina Hay is a New York City–based freelance photographer who has been documenting live music since 1999 and joined Music Existence in 2018.

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