When Doja Cat got here to TD Garden Saturday night time, she introduced together with her an ordinary assortment of pop-star equipment: backup dancers, flame jets, a cheek-revealing singlet enhanced with pretend abs, trapdoors and hydraulic risers, a big turntable constructed into the stage, a large mechanical spider dangling over her, and a big eye costume connected by optic nerve to the rafters. (Those final two are perhaps barely much less customary.) None of it mattered. In a concurrently tight and expansive 95-minute set, she proved that the one stage business that Doja Cat wanted was Doja Cat.
Not that each one that manufacturing worth acquired in her manner. With the live performance cut up into 5 discrete acts and a recurring character rising from among the many dancers — a feral lady coated in blood and staring down Doja Cat with menace in her physique language till a rapprochement was reached by the top — there was most likely the bones of some narrative or different taking part in out. But it by no means overpowered the efficiency. Time and once more the stage would reset; dancers got here and went, finally leaving the deal with Doja Cat and Doja Cat alone.
Much of that needed to do with how she projected not simply confidence however power. She spat out a torrent of syllables whereas hunched over and evident throughout “Get Into It (Yuh),” delivered straight defiant dismissal in “[Expletive] the Girls (FTG)” and rapped “Can’t Wait” mendacity on her facet as if oblivious to dancers dressed just like the Wild Boys crawling alongside the size of her physique.
It additionally got here by means of in moments of obvious tenderness that she was capable of create even when the lyrics didn’t fairly bear it out (as with the affecting “Bennie and the Jets”-style clomp of “Ain’t [Expletive]” and the sluggish jam of “Agora Hills,” the place “Baby, lemme lick on your tattoos” was one of many extra printable lyrics) or the visuals appeared to battle (see: a video display stuffed with flames, a hacking scythe, and skulls accompanying the love-drunk disco of “Kiss Me More”). And she remained related sufficient to the viewers at hand them the majestic “uch”s of “Paint the Town Red” and beam at their response on the finish of the liquid neo-soul of “Often.”
Mostly, Doja Cat understood find out how to calibrate her efficiency to not solely overwhelm however pull again as mandatory. It was a dynamic that performed out in miniature in “Balut,” which was heavy, sluggish, and spare sufficient that taking issues up or down a notch made clear impacts on the track. Doja Cat was in management the entire time.
Coming out to a bumping, booming clatter in a “DON’T HATE ME IT TURNS ME ON” T-shirt, fellow rapper Ice Spice’s opening set was all about asserting dominance, however her simple confidence was a lazy one, daring sufficient to carry the stage however with out the creativeness to know what to do with it outdoors of an arsenal that appeared restricted to bouncing, twerking, bending over, and feeling herself up.
DOJA CAT
With Ice Spice. At TD Garden, Dec. 2
Marc Hirsh might be reached at [email protected] or on Bluesky @spacecitymarc.bsky.social.
