Rolling Loud: A Recap of NYC’s Biggest Music Festival

Since the slew of COVID-related cancellations last year, music festivals and concerts have been front and center on the minds of those anxious to see their favorite artists live. After being postponed for more than a year, Rolling Loud finally announced its dates in late October, sending thousands of New Yorkers into a frenzy to buy tickets to one of the country’s most revered music festivals. Impulsively, my friend and I scored tickets two weeks in advance. Since I’d only ever attended concerts, I didn’t know what to expect from a festival this large, but I was excited to see some of my favorite artists nonetheless.

The festival was arranged with three stages: Deleon, Audiomack, and Punx. Each stage had a unique lineup of artists across the three days, some well-known and others just making their debut.

On the festival’s first day, October 28, I decided to go early to secure spots for the performance of the artist who convinced me to buy the tickets in the first place: Rico Nasty. With a unique blend of punk and hip-hop and infectious energy, her performance was nothing short of amazing, inciting pits in the crowd while fans screamed the lyrics to “IPHONE,” “OHFR,” and “Tia Tamera.” By the time she walked off the stage, it was already 6:10 p.m., meaning bigger artists were starting to perform at the Deleon stage.

Jack Harlow was the next artist we saw, singing hits like “WHAT'S POPPIN” and “Rendezvous.” The first half of Harlow’s set faced a drowsy audience, but that changed when rapper Lil Nas X surprised the crowd, showing up for a rendition of the duo’s hit song “Industry Baby.” After Harlow’s set ended, Lil Uzi Vert took the stage, running through hits like “Do What I Want,” “Money Longer,” and “XO Tour Llif3.” Besides his music, Uzi’s amazing stage presence and technical theatrics made him one of the best performers at the festival, energizing and controlling the crowd in ways no other artist had done that night.

At the end of the night, people flocked to the Deleon stage to see 50 Cent close. While he reminded the crowd of some classics like “P.I.M.P” and “In Da Club,” what truly shocked fans were the surprise guests: A Boogie Wit da Hoodie, A$AP Rocky, and DaBaby. The crowd reached its peak during Rocky’s “Lord Pretty Flacko Jodye 2,” with mosh pits opening up left and right. Following DaBaby’s performance, 50 Cent’s return to the stage provided an exciting conclusion to Thursday night.

Friday’s biggest attractions were undoubtedly Trippie Redd, Playboi Carti, and J. Cole. Unfortunately, as the night went on, the crowd got progressively more violent. This especially took shape during Lil Yachty’s performance, when his calls for moshing and a barricade-less pit led to several injuries. After escaping the suffocating crowd, my friend and I took a breath while we waited for City Girls. The duo was fun and lighthearted, providing a breath of fresh air compared to the heaviness of the previous performances.

Immediately afterward though, the festival was divided between the Audiomack stage, where Carti and Trippie Redd would perform, and the Deleon stage, where J. Cole would provide the closing act. Staying for the former, I watched Trippie Redd’s performance give the crowd a wild burst of energy as he sang songs like “Dark Knight Dummo” and “Miss the Rage.”

Over at Deleon, J. Cole began his performance and had fans singing new fan favorites like “a m a r i” alongside time-tested classics like “Power Trip.” “No Role Modelz” was the highlight of his set and could be heard all the way over at Carti’s show. However, when Playboi Carti stepped on stage, the ground quite literally began to shake. No performance thus far had elicited so much energy and passion from the crowd as the music combined with heavy rain sent fans into a rage, screaming like never before.

Finally, on Saturday, many decided to arrive early to get spots to what seemed to be the only appealing performance of the night: Travis Scott. While the Deleon stage was almost empty when I got there, with each ensuing artist, hundreds of people abandoned the other stages in hopes of catching Scott’s performance. Though I enjoyed the preceding act, Roddy Ricch, who performed hits like “The Box” and “Lemonade,” alongside other tracks, the hour-long wait for Travis combined with the near suffocating crowd made the experience more unpleasant than fun.

Known for violent, chaotic concerts, Scott evoked so much rage from the crowd that the moshing that resulted from “Escape Plan” and “90210” led to intervention by security, who pulled people out from the pits and into safety. This pattern of violent behavior at Scott’s shows was seen again just days later on a much greater scale when ten people tragically died at Astroworld Festival in Houston.

Scott closed out the three-day festival with “SICKO MODE” and “Goosebumps,” sending fans into their final rager of the night as fireworks and flames shot up from the stage.

As one of the first large festivals to take place since COVID, Rolling Loud definitely reminded everyone of what they’d been missing out on since the shutdown. The festival provided the perfect place for a cathartic release for hundreds of kids who left with phones filled with memories that will be held onto until next year’s concert.