 |
| All photos and video taken by Lanette Espy |
Opening acts
Singers and Grown-ish stars Chloe X Halle, who are signed with Beyonce's Parkwood Entertainment, started off the night, delivering outstanding vocals and neo-soul vibes.Afterwards, DJ Khaled took the stage with a DJ set of some classic rap hits, including some of his own songs. Khaled brought out a stream of hip hop stars, including ASAP Ferg, Jim Jones, Freeway and Fabolous, who performed two of his classics, “Breathe” and “You Be Killin’ Em.”
His wife Nicole Tuck and their son Asahd also made an appearance onstage.
Storm hits, MetLife evacuation
Dark clouds hovered over the stadium all night as North Jersey had a rainy day with thunderstorms in the evening. It also rained on and off before the concert even started.I'm glad I had braids and my poncho on!
The severe weather storm caused all of us in MetLife to evacuate our seats and take cover right before Beyonce and Jay-Z were about to come out on stage. Luckily the evacuation didn't happen in the middle of their performance.
Everyone in the stadium was told over a loudspeaker to leave so we could stand under somewhere safe. The crowd stood around and waited for the storm to pass, which seemed like forever, plus it was humid and I was getting really hot standing so close to a large crowd of people.
 |
| A storm hit North Jersey on Aug. 2 right before Beyonce and Jay-Z were about to perform |
Of course we would wait for you, Bey! I ain't pay 400 something dollars for nothing! Lol.
Beyonce and Jay-Z
While kicking off their first night in Jersey, the power couple finally made an elevator entrance shortly after 11 p.m. Fans went wild as Bey and Jay came down onstage from above in the elevator and they performed their first song "Holy Grail."What rain?
Throughout the night, the duo took turns performing their solo hits while flirting onstage during song transitions and performing together on hits like "Crazy In Love," "Upgrade U," "Bonnie & Clyde" and "Young Forever."
After the cheating scandal and "Becky with the good hair" hoopla, Bey and Jay continue to remind fans that their love is real and they are human just like everyone else. Intimate home video clips, showed twins Rumi and Sir Carter, their oldest daughter, Blue Ivy, the couple on vacation, chilling in the bed together and kissing.
Bey and Jay held hands while performing a couple of songs and at one point, they even kissed onstage.
Sometimes, Beyonce just danced and rapped to Jay's songs as he did his thing on the mic right next to her. And, of course she knows every single lyric! Beyonce is his biggest fan! She's like Jay's personal hype man and it was awesome to watch, especially when they both jammed out real quick to "Down For My Niggaz."
The Jersey crowd rocked out hard to Jay's "99 Problems" in which the rap star used different celebrity mugshots as his backdrop on stage.
Beyonce got the crowd hyped when she incorporated "Swag Surfin'" at the end of "Drunk In Love" which had us rocking side to side, and also when she did her now-famous Coachella dance break to O.T. Genasis' "Everybody Mad."
Queen Bey thanked the audience at the end for not "letting the rain stop the night."
"Thank y'all for riding. It's like 1 something in the morning," she said. "God bless you. We appreciate you. We love you."
On The Run 2014 tour vs. On The Run II 2018
This was my second time seeing the iconic duo at MetLife!Someone asked which tour did I like better: the first On The Run Tour in 2014 or the second one ... Hmmm ...
I can't even decide! I really like both for different reasons: it seems like Beyonce danced more on the first OTR tour. Now don't get me wrong, muva puts in werk all of the time! But, she definitely danced wayyy more during the 2014 tour. Also, Bey didn't perform my favs "Partition" and "Love On Top." Plus, I enjoyed seeing the Les Twins dance at the first OTR tour.
However, Thursday's OTR II concert was way more organized than it was back in 2014. During the first concert, people on the floor acted like zoo animals when Bey and Jay first came out. There was no kind of control whatsoever. Everyone on the floor ran to the front and stood on chairs, it was chaos.
This time around, the floor crowd had just a little more class and there were signs behind the chairs which read: DO NOT STAND ON CHAIRS.
This stage set up was much better than 2014's stage, and Bey and Jay seem to have catered a little more to the audience.
In addition to the typical main stage and three huge screens in the front, there were two separate runways (the 2014 OTR tour had one runway which led to a smaller stage in the middle) that the couple performed on a lot. Jay-Z performed "Song Cry" in full at the end of the runway towards the side where I was sitting and Beyonce sang "Resentment" across on the other side of the runway. Those two performances seemed more intimate with the floor crowd.
During Bey's "Drunk In Love" performance, she walked down the ramp on my side and grabbed on a railing as part of the ramp transformed into stairs. As Jay came out to rap his part on the song, Bey walked down the stairs and joined him.
Bey and Jay also had a smaller, moving stage which floated over the crowd! This was super dope!
When The Carters performed one of their newer hits "Family Feud" and Beyonce sang "HIGHER!," they literally went higher and floated over screaming fans.
Yasssss for the incredible stage setup!
There were a group of young chicks next to my brother and I ... these girls lacked any type of class as they smoked their weed and seemed like they didn't know the unspoken rules when it came personal space: stand and dance infront of your own damn chair!
One chick kept bumping into my brother and he was highly annoyed. She even screamed in his face at one point while I was busy recording. I happened to look over and saw my brother talking back to her and was like what the hell is going on. I was about to handle her right quick but my brother told me to chill, it's not worth it. The chick winded up swapping seats with one of her other friends.
Some zoo animals just don't know how to act when you finally let them out.
But, despite our ghetto seat neighbors at the concert and the storm evacuation, my brother and I still had such an awesome time!
I can't wait for the next concert!
Check out more photos from the On The Run II tour at MetLife stadium below:
 |
| I had a ball! |
______
Sign up for my free newsletter: LA LA's Insider.
Comments
Post a Comment
Add your comments and thoughts below and click 'subscribe by email' button to receive follow up responses and other comments on this post.