Event Review: Inside Wizkid's Historic Night at Madison Square Garden (Nov. 16, 2022)
With certified legend status in the realms of domestic and international Afrobeats, his unforgettable storm of London’s O2 Arena, and the recent release of his fifth studio album More Love, Less Ego, Wizkid’s occupation of Madison Square Garden was one that carried with it universal anticipation. It was to be his crowning achievement, a signifier that his Starboy status truly was global, and indisputable to boot. For an Afrobeats act, dominating a Western stage is something like acquiring an Infinity Stone: after the O2 comes Madison Square Garden; and after Madison Square Garden, the world.
On a Wednesday evening in the heart of Midtown Manhattan, fans far and wide congregated under the roof of Madison Square Garden to see Wizkid. “Sold out” truly did mean sold out - the venue filled to the brim, phone lights flashing throughout the arena like a concentrated collection of stars. DJ Tunez, Wizkid’s longtime DJ and a master producer in his own right, gingered the crowd with a slew of contemporary Afrobeats hits - from “Last Last” to “Organize” to his own career-defining track “Iskaba.” Timely as ever, the engineer also used his opening set to offer a heartwarming tribute to Davido in the wake of his son’s passing, blasting his timeless classics such as “Dami Duro,” “If,” and “FIA.”
Once the commotion subsided and the smoke cleared, Wizkid emerged. Along with the band, he performed a relatively low-energy rendition of his classic “Ojuelegba.” While it set the stage for the night - outlining Wizkid’s origins and the place that made him - it did so without the fanfare one would expect from so crucial a moment and space. The beginning of the concert continued on in the same laid-back, sultry fashion that has come to define Wizkid - he sang “Fever,” the collaborative “Love You Everyday,” and his newer release “Frames.”
To the excitement of Wizkid’s long-time listeners, he transitioned from his slower tunes to his career-defining party anthems, the very songs that propelled him to fame within the Nigerian landscape. “Pakurumo” became “Don’t Dull” became “No Lele,” in that precise order. While he performed these tracks with greater energy, they were truncated, the transitions fast, as though in attempts to rapidly complete a checklist. The classics felt something like a necessary inconvenience: songs that were included solely because they were technically essential to any Wizkid show.
Expertly, Wizkid used “Soco” - a slower track that was still a slightly older classic - as a bridge back to the new Wizkid. With tracks like More Love Less Ego’s “Everyday” and Made in Lagos’ “Essence,” Wizkid calmed the arena down, transporting us from a thumping party in a Lagos club to something like a tranquil seaside. He rounded off, strangely yet fittingly enough, with another performance of “Ojuelegba,” and then the night was over.
Thematically, the concert was clean, taking audience members on a smooth journey from the new to the old and back again, sculpted expertly for an American audience while honoring the integrity of Wizkid’s past legacy. Sonically, it was pristine, the slower pace allowing for Wizkid’s smooth vocals, as well as the band’s polished performance, to shine. Wizkid’s night at MSG accomplished a complex balancing act - successfully riding the sharp and unforgiving line between palatability, authenticity, and quality.
On the other hand, the concert came in the wake of Wizkid’s aforementioned residency at London’s O2 arena, where the brightest stars from Nigeria, Britain, and the Black diaspora took to the stage and made history. During his 3-day tenure at the historic venue, he converted the space into something like a home, a site of cultural connectivity for Nigerians, Africans, and Black British folk alike. Since Madison Square Garden is an equivalent venue in an American context, there was a natural expectation of similar treatment, of Wizkid converting MSG into a Nigerian and larger Pan-African “home.”
Notably, however, no extra acts were brought out at MSG. It was quite possibly a product of pure logistics: the difficulty of travel to America in comparison to the UK, potential restrictions from MSG as a venue, the particularity of post-Made in Lagos fervor, or Wizkid’s possible desire to turn the Garden upside down all on his own.
Whatever the reason might have been, it unfortunately felt disheartening as an audience member, and seemed like a further reflection of the American Afrobeats landscape. The positioning of Nigerians and Afrobeats in the UK seemed to create an environment where Wizkid could conquer a stadium with his countrymen in tow - while the American reality failed to support such an occurrence. (However, the real issue might also be that Afrobeats concert-goers, like myself, have come to rely too heavily on extra acts in order to have a good time - but that is another story).
Even the delivery of his party hits felt lackluster, iconic tracks like “Final” and “Azonto” falling flat on stage. While it would be simple to blame Wizkid entirely, the reality is that these are songs that carry emotional weight, songs that define the house parties and childhoods and university days of a generation. Performing them in a space without that same level of cultural context (that is to say, America), for lack of more appropriate phrasing, was never going to hit the same. As a performer, you can only go so far as to sing your songs to a crowd - there is no guarantee that the crowd will sing them back to you.
Essentially, part of the complication of Wizkid’s MSG storm was America’s fraught relationship with Afrobeats, and the difficulty of imparting cultural significance and feeling in a space (largely) devoid of it.
Generally, however, the turnout of the concert was ultimately the consequence of a shift within Wizkid himself. Our Starboy has shifted gears, marching steadily towards global stardom as well as the muted, sultry sound that accompanies it. The slowness of it all was a reflection of the new Wizkid, one who aims to soothe and seduce as opposed to excite. In a way, he did exactly as one would expect him to at MSG: used the stage to define himself, to plainly outline to the whole world his new trajectory. Ultimately, it is up to us, his consumers, to accept him.