Gig Review: Surviving The Circus To The Maximus — I Chaperoned a Travis Scott Fan And Hummed Along To One Or Two “Tunes”

Gig reviews. I want them to return. Even if it’s a gig where I am NOT the target market. I took my son to Travis Scott as a 13th birthday present for him. Dad of the year. Fuck yeah. I’m into that!

Travis Scott

Eden Park, Auckland

Wednesday, October 30

A year ago, I would not have known what a Travis Scott was or is. If pressed, I might have guessed it was the name given to a walk-on where someone plays the brother of the boss in the US version of The Office in an episode I must have somehow missed. I had no idea it was a rapper who had burst onto the scene making early connections with Kanye West and Jay-Z, and being declared some sort of future of the game, all the while making music for predominately 20-25yo dudebros, and having actual blood on his hands from the pits at his concerts which get, well, a little bit loose!

A week ago, I thought I was going to a Travis Scott concert in Auckland on Thursday the 31st of October. But, yeah, promoter’s whim or artist’s demand, or some odd combination, has me chucking down $400 extra in a panic to get flights shifted, because you can only claim your flight-insurance back after you spend the extra, even though you got flight-insurance because you were worried something like this might happen, but they can’t do anything, and you have to have all the receipts and it’s really not their problem, because that’s how the world works so THANKS A LOT OBAMA!

Anyway, I’m so old at the Travis Scott gig that I’m actually looking for a coffee cart. And I’m older than I realise, because the person in the coffee cart, who looked kinda old/ish to me, said “there you go dad, that’ll help you make it through”. But also, lol, it did! And, lol-lol, I held that coffee with both hands like it was a trophy, and I looked as pleased about receiving it as I did about anything that night, until of course I saw my son’s face light up as soon as the actual show started.

We sat in our seats, and waited — and waited. A “DJ” came out and pressed play on songs by Central Cee and HP Boys and this lasted 20 minutes in total and then back to the silence of listening to the hum of sweat and steam lift from the big mosh pit that had gathered for hours in shirtless prayer, waiting.

Most memorable bit of the opening set was when my nearly 13-yo son, Oscar, leaned over and said sincerely, “this is UK Grime dad, do you know what that is?” I did in fact know what that was. So strange that I had heard of a whole genre of music that was invented before Oscar was even born. I slurped the end of my coffee. And checked to make sure there was none left after that.

Four hours after the gates opened, the lights flashed on the big screen, the audience frenzied, and Travis Scott, on his Circus Maximus tour, in support of his Utopia album, hit out with his blunted, smooth-cornered trap beats. He prowled the catwalk/stage and picked a couple of young audience members out to dance and scream in the general direction of lyrics alongside him. He played banger after banger if you are under 30.

He played song snippets of Hyaena and Thank God and Modern Jam, and though many of his song titles are in block-caps to show how much he really MEANS IT MAN, I will be referring to them in my stately review in less hyped fashion. He also debuted a new song for us, which was very exciting just for the announcement.

I know more Travis Scott songs than anyone my age needs to know, but I really do think that 90210 is one of the greatest songs of the last 10 years — so it’s a shame, when it arrives, that it’s only the opening verses, and not the emotional instrumental coda too. But this is an audience that doesn’t care for the actual musicality of it all (and I am autistic for ambient instrumentals). They just want videos to share on Discord, selfies for the ‘Gram and clips for TikTok — who says “clips” by the way? (People that order Oat Milk Flat Whites at concerts is my guess).

Travis is not meant to be my cup of (herbal) tea, but he is great to watch as he plays gems like Nightcrawler, and Mamacita, and I Know? The crowd knows the lines they are meant to add, and when the beat is stripped and Travis holds the mic out for the audience to complete whole sentences they comply. And they are elated. And they not wrong in this moment. Because who is wrong to be young and a fan of the music in front of them and so happy to be there in the power of a crowd?

Travis plays Stargazing and Meltdown and Sicko Mode, and some of these things are great, even if none of them mean anything to most people reading. He plays his ridiculous anthem FE!N five times, but it’s just the first verse repeated — and then a pause, and then the tape-warp of the musical refrain fades back into shot for another round. And every time the crowd surges their arms to the sky and feels like this is just for them and not every audience on every night. And what the fuck is FE!N anyway? I believe it’s ‘short’ for Fiend — as in basically a typo! But fuck, like any of that matters.

My Eyes is good. Goosebumps is actually fucking epic — I’m even thinking of putting my coffee cup down somewhere (responsibly) so I can raise a hand to the roof.

And then 80 minutes after he came to tell us that he was pleased to be in Auckland, and first time in New Zealand, and “Make some noise”, and all sorts of things about fucking three hoes in the same week or night or whatever wholesome churchgoing wisdom is hiding deep down in them there ‘lyrics’, Travis is gone. Telekinesis plays, and it is chill, and he’s riding on the back of a golf cart out of the arena. And the fans are never the same again. Until next year’s flavour of the month is announced and they get ready to go to a concert all over again.

When I was 13, my parents took me to Eric Clapton. No one will ever put Travis Scott and Eric Clapton in the same sentence — and if they do it might be to say something about them being terrible parenting role models, or something like that. But EC was my Travis Scott. It was the gig I wanted to see as I was becoming a teenager. And it was incredible. And I still remember every moment of that show. And I was grateful to my parents for enabling that. Just like my son will remember every moment of Travis Scott. And that’s what it is about.

Was it value for money? Fuck no. The promoter shafted us by dropping the price of the tickets for chancers after changing the date a week out. The signs around the arena boasted “Sold Out” but it wasn’t. There was space in the venue, and spare seats around the place too. And I am financially out of pocket for this night. There was no anticipation for anything that might happen at the gig apart from Travis Scott fronting. That’s blind fan devotion. And that is fine. There didn’t feel like there was any musical curiosity in the air. And that’s always a bit sad. But this is a very different world from the hopeful, decadent, care free time that I saw Eric Clapton in the Supertop at Mt Smart and was blown away enough by Midge Marsden’s opening set, because, hey, MUSIC!

But when Oscar said “Dad I love you so much” and when the people in front told me I was a pretty cool father because they could see my son singing every single world of the mumbo-jumbo that passes for rap these days, well, you can’t put a price on that can you? You can actually. Your credit card receipts will remind you. Your accountant will laugh as you try to pass it off as a research trip.

But you get my point.

And Travis did what he was meant to do. He came, he saw, he played. That he actually turned up and ran through the songs was reason enough to celebrate. The last week has felt like a knife-edge. Will the concert happen or won’t it? Will it be worth it? It was worth every moment to see the nearly 90 minutes of Losing Himself To The Music that Oscar exuded, exemplified, and so totally owned.

Happy Birthday Darling Boy. I love you enough to take you to exactly one Travis Scott-type concert a year.

UK Grime, takeaway coffee, Eric Clapton, and a laboured gag that was basically an airball involving The US version of The Office. Welcome back gig reviews. Finger on the motherfucking pulse eh!