The first night of Drake’s It’s All A Blur Tour with 21 Savage turned out to be every bit as eventful as we’ve all come to expect from the pop culture lightning rod. In addition to stoking a (possibly tongue-in-cheek) feud with Childish Gambino over “This Is America,” Drake also joined the growing list of artists to have stuff thrown at him while performing, and rapped alongside what appeared to be a hologram of his younger self.
Meanwhile, his set dressing also got plenty of attention, from a statue of the late Virgil Abloh to a giant, flying sperm cell overhead. Yes, you read that right: Drake’s tour includes an extended sequence involving a flying swimmer (and a bunch more projected on the stage around him), which I can only presume gives him an excuse to talk at length about all the draconian abortion laws going into place around the nation — although it does work to set up some admittedly good “Drake’s tour design is nuts” jokes, too.
All this talk about black women’s respectability policies and Drake in here with a damn floating sperm pic.twitter.com/ygi9kXChUb
— Hippolyta (@A_GirlNamedBRI) July 6, 2023
Drake’s tour set up is nuts! pic.twitter.com/oObl0uBBgF
— HYPEBEAST (@HYPEBEAST) July 6, 2023
While there’s certain to be an out-there explanation for this, at its core, it’s doing one thing extremely well — just like all of Drake’s off-the-wall stunts, it’s got people talking, which is just doing free promo for the rest of the tour. You can see the remaining tour dates here and the massive, career-spanning setlist here.