After exploding in popularity in the music industry with his 2018-19 hits, Juice WRLD started his own tour around the U.S. on April 26. He calls his tour “Death Race for Love” and brings along another sensational rapper by the name of Ski Mask. The tour stopped in Los Angeles May 2 at the Greek Theatre. I luckily had the change to get a ticket for this one–night, sold out show.
From the moment Juice touched the stage, which was made to look like a post-apocalyptic wilderness, he had a magnetic energy. On stage with him he had Evil Twins and an LED-covered “Juice Bot” that took the stage alongside him at points to hype up the crowd. The most striking aspect was how much larger than life Juice WRLD seemed, even when he was the smallest person on stage.
The Greek theatre is outside and smaller than the usual venues major rappers perform at. Knowing how small the space was, I thought it would be cramped going into it, but I was surprised by how much excess room the concert offered. At one point, Ski Mask told the audience to break the rules like joining the mosh pit, otherwise known as general admission, which was the extremely close to the stage. When he said this, many audience members made their way through the security and over the bar into the pit. I was astonished at how invested Ski Mask was in involving his audience.
The only critique I would make about Juice WRLD’s performance was the 30 minutes he dedicated to XXXTentacion, another rapper who had passed away a year ago, as well as Ski Mask including X songs in his set. I wasn’t the biggest fan of this because I was there to watch Juice and Ski Mask perform their albums.
Also, from an audience member‘s point of view, it seemed like audience members were more hyped and excited for Ski Mask, even though it was Juice’s tour. Ski Mask was determined to get the crowd involved by any means necessary. At one point, Ski Mask went to the top of the auditorium and took videos of audience members sitting with him.
