Kendrick Lamar & SZA Close SoFi Stadium Trilogy in 50-Plus Song Blaze (Concert Review)
The first two SoFi nights had already raised expectations sky-high; the finale met them by simply trusting the set list and letting two generational talents share the load without ego or spectacle.
The mood outside SoFi felt like a tailgate crossed with a block party reunion. GNX bomber jackets are everywhere, the Mustard costumes, and the line toward NOT Beauty (SZA’s lipstick brand) was long as hell as fans waited for pictures with SZA. Ticket portals that had previously shown resale seats were now quoting double the price, a late surge stoked by word of a 50-plus song marathon the prior two nights and whispers of an unannounced guest still to come, following Night 1’s Lizzo and Night 2’s Justin Bieber. When LA’s dusk finally bled out through the open roof, the house lights snapped off around 8 p.m. Pacific Standard Time after Mustard’s warmup set, a low roar ran around the 50-thousand-plus bowl—SoFi’s full football capacity pressed into service for rap and R&B’s current center-of-gravity.
Act 1 began exactly as the run-down had promised. The sharp synth-bass stab of “Wacced Out Murals,” straight into the pummel of “Squabble Up,” “King Kunta,” and an adrenalized “ELEMENT.” As Lamar gets the crowd going with the instrumental of Anita Baker’s “Angel,” he raps with aggression and side-by-side prowls down the central runway, easing into the introductory half of “TV Off,” the first of two installments that bookend the show. Their first genuinely quiet moment where Lamar and SZA shared the stage from the start, “30 for 30,” slipped into place six songs deep, Lamar retreating to harmonize beneath SZA’s lead; the hush lasted barely thirty seconds before “Love Galore,” “Broken Clocks,” and “The Weekend” reignited the bowl into a vast karaoke pit, each chorus fed by tens of thousands of camera-flash stars.
Act 2 ceded the floor to Lamar alone. The woozy bass glide of “Euphoria” signaled the switch (he rapped for nearly six minutes effortlessly), and the Compton MC unspooled a ten-song sprint that never loosened its grip: “Hey Now,” “Reincarnated,” “HUMBLE.,” “Backseat Freestyle,” “Family Ties,” “Swimming Pools,” “m.A.A.d city (which he rapped over Anita Baker’s ‘Sweet Love’),” “Alright,” and the deep-cut “Man at the Garden” closed the sequence, each song bleeding into the next with jult of energy and unbelievable breath control. With no reliance on surprise props, just strobe hits timed to every down-beat, the segment felt like Lamar’s bid to prove pure rap craft can still hold a football stadium without gimmickry, and the crowd’s roar after “Alright” seemed to ratify the point.
Digital Ivy then flooded every screen, and Act 3 ushered SZA to the fore. She opened on the sultry shuffle of “Scorsese Baby Daddy,” sauntered into the pop-punk snap of “F2F,” and glided through “Garden (Say It Like Dat)” before the night’s first major stage piece rolled out: Anthony, the two-story animatronic ant the tour’s production designer has made infamous on TikTok as Anthony’s eyes blinked crimson, SZA climbed its thorax for “Kitchen,” let the insect circle her band riser during “Blind,” and punched the snarling “Consideration” and bass-quake “Low” without missing a breath, the pit echoing every hook.
The subsequent acts arrived back-to-back, underlining the tour’s elastic chemistry. “Doves In the Wind” reunited the co-leaders in a playful call-and-response; “All the Stars” elevated them on twin scissor lifts, their silhouettes framing the video board in a blizzard of pyrotechnics. A mass sing-along of “LOVE.” followed, then an abrupt left turn. After the Mustard interlude for GNX Radio kicked off, Lamar barked “Dodger Blue,” a SoCal-only treat the audience recognized instantly. After the funny interrogation, the instrumental shredded into the alarm siren that flags “Peekaboo,” and the rumored cameo arrived—AzChike burst through a trap door in a very cool fit, sprinting the runway beside Lamar as the cameras and a thousand phones snapped proof in real time. The energy spike never dipped; “Like That,” “DNA.,” “Good Credit,” “Count Me Out,” “Bitch, Don’t Kill My Vibe,” “Money Trees,” and a falsetto-rich “Poetic Justice” slammed by in rapid succession, Lamar letting SoFi finish whole verses while he paced grin-wide along the edge of the stage.
SZA reclaimed the spotlight for the next act with “Diamond Boy (DTM)” performed from a crescent-moon rig that floated over the floor seating, her vocal cutting through cavernous reverb as clearly as a studio track. She stacked fan favorites—“I Hate U,” “Shirt,” “Kill Bill,” “Snooze,” “Crybaby,” “Nobody Gets Me,” and “Good Days”—then pivoted into the house-party bounce “Rich Baby Daddy,” the entire lower bowl doing Sexyy Red’s hook while Anthony’s antennae pulsed teal. “BMF” and a joyous “Kiss Me More” closed her run, SZA pulling a row of beaming teens up from the rail to dance onstage in a move that cued security earpieces but thrilled every section from club to nosebleed.
The house dropped to blackout, and the seven-note heartbeat that cues the unreleased “Bodies” filled the dark before transitioning to “N95.” Kendrick docked at center for the second performance of “TV Off” with Mustard and a group of dancers, a moment that welded the night into a perfect palindrome—the show began and would end on the same refrain. When “Not Like Us” detonated next, six flame cannons chased every snap, and the upper deck visibly shook; it was the only true pyro overload of the evening and felt designed to prove a point about local pride. “Luther” slid in as a gospel-soaked palate cleanser, SZA’s melismas coiling around Lamar’s half-sung cadences, and the pair closed the three-hour odyssey with “Gloria.”
Clips of AzChike’s cameo, Kendrick/SZA’s stage presence, and the entire crowd screaming “Not Like Us” were on Instagram and Twitter within minutes, and ticket platforms registered a lightning 40 percent bump for the tour’s next stop in Glendale. The first two SoFi nights had already raised expectations sky-high; the finale met them by simply trusting the set list’s airtight chronology and letting two generational talents share the load without ego or extraneous spectacle. By the time the concourses cleared, the feeling in the air wasn’t just satisfaction—it was collective exhale, the relief of seeing a show that knew exactly what order to place its every punch and lull, and hit them all without flinching.