Drake's Club Paradise Tour Kickoff Concert on Valentine's Day in Miami
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| Photo by Marta Xochilt Perez |
Drake's Club Paradise Tour
With ASAP Rocky and Kendrick Lamar
BankUnited Center at University of Miami
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Better Than: Slightly dirty sweet talk that's not set to million-dollar beats.
Have you ever visited Club Paradise?
In the words of your celebrity host, overly emotional though sufficiently tough Young Money Cash Money rapper Drake, it's "the greatest club in the world!"
We, however, would describe the joint as a total teen scene.
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| Photo by Marta Xochilt Perez |
Don't get it twisted, though. This so-called Club Paradise isn't some chain of all-ages discotheques-slash-arcades that Drake's planning to launch in megamalls across America. It's just the imaginary locale for his current 39-show world tour.
And last night, 8000 insanely shrieking Drizzy Drake superfans piled into Paradise (AKA the University of Miami's BankUnited Center) for the Young Money wunderkind's V-Day kickoff concert.
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| Photo by Marta Xochilt Perez |
By 8 p.m., the arena's seats were already packed with manic 15-year-old girls chaperoned by mom; dry-humping GFs and BFs; and an endless expanse of 20-ish chicks in red/black/pink YMCMB tees.
But even though the average age of a Club Paradise attendee could be accurately estimated at approximately 21 years of age, there were still a few older types hanging around the BankUnited, including old-school hustlers and their women, wannabe Scarfaces with slinky coked-out arm candy, even a fat white dude with an actual ho.
Still, it was a predominantly young, horny, and female crowd. And all hopped up on nachos, Diet Coke, and Papa John's personal pan pizzas from the concession stand, they were ready for some fucking romance.
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| Photo by Marta Xochilt Perez |
But after a couple of quickie sets by ASAP Rocky and Kendrick Lamar, this pheromone-soaked mob was forced to wait on Drizzy. So ... Cute lil' couples sucked face near the restrooms. Entire groups of girls closed their eyes and sang along to Lil Wayne's ooey-gooey "How to Love." And ushers wandered the arena, passing out red roses to single, questionably legal ladies.
At precisely 9:37 p.m., though, Drake finally sprinted out of a hole in the center of the stage, inciting a massive squall of absolute insanity as tweens, teens, and 20-somethings literally lost control of themselves.
They shrieked and squealed and stomped and shook, whipped their hair, and humped their seats while he dashed through the darkness, dodging vertical beams of bright white light and rattling off two-minute versions of "Lord Knows" and "Underground Kings" off his newest slab, Take Care -- plus DJ Khaled's summer cut "I'm on One" and his big breakout track, 2010's "Over."
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| Photo by Marta Xochilt Perez |
Then it was time for an intimate moment.
The rapper waved for a break and his band (two guitar guys, twin keyboard players, a live drummer, and DJ) went silent.
But the superfans just wouldn't stop screeching. Well, at least until they were on the edge of passing out from lack of oxygen to the brain.
So when the screamers paused to breathe, Drake spoke. "I'd like to welcome you to Club Paradise," he crooningly croaked, "I go by the name Drizzy Drake." And the screaming resumed.
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Location Info
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BankUnited Center
1245 Dauer Drive, Coral Gables, FL
Category: General
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