Kendrick Lamar and SZA, pops hottest pair, double up at MetLife Stadium on co-headlining tour: concert review

It’s hard to come in on more of a roll than Kendrick Lamar and SZA did when they brought their Grand National Tour to MetLIfe Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey on Thursday night.After all, their slow-jam joint “Luther” has spent 11 weeks and counting at No.1, becoming the longest-running chart-topper for both artists.Both are also touring behind hot albums — his “GNX” and her “Lana” reissue of “SOS” — that were released late last year.And of course, Lamar —fresh off of winning the Record and Song of the Year Grammys for his epic Drake diss track “Not Like Us” — headlined the Super Bowl, with SZA appearing as his special guest.You might have expected that Lamar would headline again on this tour, with the “Kill Bill” singer essentially serving as a opening act for the Pulitzer Prize-winning rapper.

But this was a true co-headlining show in which the two performers alternated in separate acts, while also teaming up for some of their most notable collaborations, in a seamless flow of power-flexing.But as much as neither of them hardly needs to sit down and be humble, there were no egos.Just two stars sharing the spotlight, shining bright in the night.Lamar hit the stage first to the “GNX” opener “Wacced Out Murals” and quickly turned things up with “Squabble Up” and the “To Pimp a Butterfly” banger “King Kunta,” which was G-funkier than ever.It was good to hear K-Dot dig into his earlier catalog with tracks that feel like classics now, which were missed during his Super Bowl set.In fact, some of Lamar’s best moments came from his 2012 breakthrough “Good Kid, M.A.A.D City.” “Backseat Freestyle” got the stadium rocking old-school style, and “M.A.A.D City” was smoothed out with the quiet-storm soul of Anita Baker’s “Sweet Love.” And the sequence of “Bitch, Don’t Kill My Vibe,” “Money Trees” and “Poetic Justice” — minus Drake’s verse, of course—was a gangsta throwback for th...