Caren Badtke | Contributor
Featured Image: YFS’ YorkFest concert welcomes undergraduates with hip-hop extravaganza. | Angelica Babiera
The fall semester is already in full swing—the first serious assignments’ deadlines are fast approaching, and downtime has considerably decreased (probably to the chagrin of several freshmen). However, students had the opportunity to forget about their classes at the YFS’ annual Welcome Back Concert at the Aviva Centre this past Thursday.
This year’s headliner was local songwriter and producer Tory Lanez. Lanez has been “on the come-up” so to speak, as he has two singles on the top 30 Billboard Hot 100—“Say it,” which peaked at number 23; and “Luv,” which peaked at number 19.
He experiments between hip-hop and R&B, and oftentimes fuses both genres together to get rugged boasts and smooth come-ons. His success has captivated people around the world—especially Torontonians, many of whom would relish an opportunity to see him perform for free.
“We’re kind of fans—not huge fans—but he’s from Toronto. We’re just glad to see a Toronto guy up there,” says Justin Ervin, a first-year Social Work major, who came to see the show with his friends Andrew Corbett, a first-year Information Technology student, and Feyyaz Aydin, an international student from Turkey studying his first year of Business and Society at York. Aydin hadn’t heard of Lanez before, but was ecstatic to see what his friends were all talking about. “I saw the posters and my friends said they were going, so I just went along with them.”
The excitement in the Aviva Centre was as palpable as it was contagious. Pumped up on contemporary hip-hop classics provided by opening act 4Korners, the crowd got ready for a wild night. He mixed popular songs such as Cardi B’s “Bodak Yellow,” Kanye West’s “Famous,” 21 Savage’s “Bank Account,” and more. The audience danced and sang along to the mixes as they anticipated Lanez’ appearance. Despite the raucous crowd, YFS ensured necessary safety precautions were met, as security, police, and paramedics were on-hand just in case.
At 8:30 p.m., right when 4Korners ended his set, Lanez took the stage, hyping up the crowd up with, “Y’all ready to party?” before jumping into an energetic hour-long set. It included songs from his 2016 album I Told You, brand-new material from an upcoming album, and even his forthcoming hit “Skrt Skrt,” a day before its release.
When the show ended, many found themselves in a sea of personal belongings scattered around the floor inside and outside the venue. A massive swarm rushed toward Lanez as he was leaving in the hopes of snapping a picture, or even merely just a touch.
Moe Hantash, a third-year Criminology student, lost a shoe and hat during Lanez’s crowd-surfing extravaganza. “Someone stepped on my shoe and it’s easy to take off, so that’s how I lost that, and then someone flipped my hat, which I didn’t even notice. By the time I did, I grabbed my things and went somewhere else.”
By the end of the concert, however, he was back in one piece, after having the night of his life, adding: “I’ve been to a bunch of concerts, but that was absolutely astounding. Plus, I’ve seen Tory Lanez live before—but this time, it was different, because I wasn’t in the crowd—I was in the back. I was able to touch and carry him while he crowd-surfed. It was unreal.”
