Megan Thee Stallion's Hot Girl Summer tour in Austin was the ultimate hip-hop bounce back
As a wise woman once said, “The booty don’t lie,” and thousands of derrières spilling from the scantest of booty shorts, clapped truth to power as Megan Thee Stallion’s Hot Girl Summer tour scorched the Moody Center on Thursday.
The H-Town Hottie’s first Austin appearance since a 2021 Austin City Limits Music Festival set was a sexually charged twerkathon, an ecstatic journey into a temple of self-love and also, one of the realest rap shows of the year. Oh yeah, and Paul Wall showed up.
Megan’s Hotties (as she calls her fans) skewed young, brown, female and gay male, and scantily clad. They let their freak flags fly as the reigning queen of rap polished her crown.
Here are things five that happened at the show.
Like a phoenix, she burst from the flames
Megan is in her snake era, but even as she emerged through the floor of the Moody Center in a curve-hugging, serpentine bodysuit with big “Eat the apple, Eve” energy, other metaphors were at play.
To herald her entrance, red lights danced on three massive screens behind the stage. They morphed from floating embers to a flow of molten lava down the center. Plumes of fire shot from both sides of the stage, which was constructed as two circles, a large inner section ringed by an arching catwalk. The most hardcore (and deepest pocketed) Hotties, were in a pit between the two.
Megan came to slay. She took the stage solo, spraying verbal bullets at her haters on “Hiss” while flames shot skyward around her. She emerged as a phoenix from the flames, which is fitting, considering the journey she’s been on over the past few years.
A brief recap: Megan was shot in the foot by rapper Tory Lanez as the two former friends were leaving a party in 2020. In the wake of the shooting, she endured public mockery and rejection from a male-dominated rap community, a drum beat that grew louder as the case went to trial in 2022. Her brilliant 2022 album “Traumazine” grapples with her depression following her mother’s death in 2019 as well as the incident. In addition, Megan spent the last few years fighting to get out of a record deal with 1501 Certified Entertainment that she described in court documents as “unconscionable.”
At the Moody Center, she seemed jubilant. This woman came through on the other side. She took her abuser to court and won. (Lanez was sentenced to 10 years in prison last August.) Her album “Megan,” the first released on her brand new indie label, Hot Girl Productions, drops in two weeks. What a bounce back.
When her Hot Girl dance crew stormed the stage to put the “fake-ass, snake-ass, backstabbin', hatin'-ass,” opps on notice on “Ungrateful,” the sense of victory was palpable.
She flexed her rappity rap cred
The afore-mentioned booty is a central feature of a Megan Thee Stallion concert, and it was an evening of astonishing gluteal gymnastics. There were multiple dance breaks and sections where Megan pranced and posed and worked her angles. Her dance team was phenomenal.
But don’t get it twisted: Megan is a brutal rhyme slinger. One of the best in the game. She brings stories to life with her words. She’s hilarious and she’s hard. When she wasn’t breaking down steamy moves, she was in a battle rap stance.
She skewered haters on tracks such as “Megan’s Piano” and “What’s New,” and her raw anger on “NDA” cut through the arena. She threw a fist in the air for a prolonged pause as she shouted “my body my choice” on “Gift and a Curse.”
Trapped in a coil of red lights, she took us deep into her battle with depression on “Cobra,” the emotion bringing her to her knees while somewhere a guitar quietly wept. It's been an emotional time, she said, as an intro to a song from her new album. “You are loved and somebody does give a damn,” she said.
She celebrated her Texas roots with the People’s Champ
“I’m happy to be home in Texas,” she told the crowd. She shouted out her OG hotties and reminisced about her first Austin performances at the South by Southwest Music Festival in 2018.
And then she brought out H-Town rap legend Paul Wall. Much of the crowd went wild as the 43-year-old baller spit the Dirty South classics “Still Tippin’” and “Grillz.” Some people around me took the opportunity to sit down.
She reveled in radical power of female sexuality
Like Little Kim before her, Megan Thee Stallion is a sexy rapper who loves to rap about sex. Graphic sex. Obscene sex. When she bent over in a wide straddle and made a suggestive gesture on “WAP” the crowd squealed.
Rocking a blue Josephine Baker-style beaded fringe with blue butterfly wings at her back, she rapped about popping morning-after pills lest she get stuck with a fool on “Plan B.”
“Ladies, love yourself 'cause this (expletive) could get ugly,” she rapped. And I thought about how far we’ve come from the early ‘00s when mainstream hip-hop reduced women to unnamed bitches and ho’s. What a time it is to be alive.
The love was in the room
Megan is clearly having a blast on this tour and the camaraderie she feels with her dance team was on full display on bangers like “Girls in the Hood” and “Don’t Stop.”
Megan also loves her Hotties and they love her too. She took multiple breaks (arguably too many, a whole song or two) to sign autographs for the VIP fans in the front section. She turned the house lights on to look at the crowd and spotlighted a few particularly impressive twerkers. She pulled a couple dozen fans on the stage to shake what their mamas gave them. Megan has created a space where women (and gay men) can safely revel in raucous sexuality and it was a wonder to behold.
One of the women she pulled on stage, an academic type with chunky glasses and braids to her waist, wore a T-shirt that succinctly summed up the vibe.
“I support women’s rights AND women's wrongs,” it said.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Megan Thee Stallion brought Houston heavy Paul Wall to Austin concert
