Blue Ivy’s ‘Deja Vu,’ Rumi, more

BEY-HAW!

That buzzing you may have heard over the weekend was the Beyhive journeying to Los Angeles from places as far as Australia to see the Queen B herself, Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter, kick off the start of the Cowboy Carter and the Rodeo Chitlin’ Circuit Tour.

While Beyoncé performed a select few tunes from the Cowboy Carter album at the Christmas Day Beyoncé Bowl Netflix show in Houston, Monday night was the first time she performed nearly every track, along with selections from Act i, Renaissance with a peppering of older hits like “Formation,” “Deja Vu,” “Why Don’t You Love Me,” “Diva” and more.

At last, fans can see how the disco-house infused Renaissance and the country-Americana sounds of Cowboy Carter connect. The result? A genre that is simply just Beyoncé… a megastar who consistently pays homage to her Texas roots and musical pioneers like Linda Martell, Tina Turner, and others who paved the way while creating a musical style that is unique, original, and unmistakably hers.

Clocking in at just over two hours and 40 mins, from the opening note to Beyoncé’s “good night,” here are five highlights from opening night that were worth getting blisters for (seriously, how does anyone wear cowboy boots for hours?)

A 45-song set list

According to Today, Miss Tina Knowles’ eldest daughter performed 45 songs! Look- I am two years older than Beyoncé and my knees wanted to cut themselves off, wither and die after dancing for the first two minutes. Bey? Mother of three. Business woman, entrepreneur, artist of our lifetime… nearly three hours. IN HEELS. Bow down bitches, indeed. The set also included a classical interlude where two ballerinas took the stage as a solo violinist played a classic song. While the majority of the set is from Act ii: Cowboy Carter (you won’t get a “Single Ladies” or “Halo” here!), the vision for all three acts begins to take shape with the effortless blending of sounds from Act i and Act ii. And trust me when I tell you, you ain’t never heard country like this. Yippee-ki-BEY!

VISUALS

At this point I have long given up on the prospect of Renaissance visuals beyond what we got to see during the Renaissance World Tour. Beyoncé, being the owner of Beyoncé’s internet, must have heard the hive begging cause the tour visuals this time around are significant. Similarly to the RWT, the visuals serve as short interludes in between clusters of songs. But, unlike its predecessor, these visuals feel more complete and way more cinematic.

Images vary from symbolic depictions of a 400-foot tall Beyoncé walking from the Lincoln Memorial to the White House, or lighting her cigarette with the Statue of Liberty’s torch to more pointed messages. In another moment, the words “Never ask permission for something that already belongs to you” appear in red. In yet another interlude, videos play on screen of blurred faces of people wearing red hats saying terrible things about her, to media pundits-also blurred- elevating hatred and racism on their news casts. (Entertainment Weekly has reached out to reps for Beyoncé to confirm if the videos were real news clips.)

Further visuals include a Beyoncé-starring Western superhero mini movie to the more personal, like Mama Bey finally sharing more of her only son, Sir, with her fans, and a sweet video that shows Beyoncé’s own journey, from her early days as a child singing and dancing with her little sister Solange Knowles in their living room to present day. It’s quite an emotional journey for fans who have been there since the TRL days!

The Carter girls

A big theme surrounding this tour is legacy. While using background images to honor the Black artists who broke through barriers to create space in genres like country music — which despite being created by Black people has historically excluded them — Beyoncé also ruminates on her own legacy. By giving eldest daughter, Blue Ivy Carter, her own solo walk down the main stage to be front and center recreating her mother’s “Deja Vu” choreography, she offers a true deja vu for those who remember watching Beyoncé do that very choreo at a 2006 live performance. A glimpse at both who Beyoncé was and who Blue may grow up to be.

By debuting her youngest daughter Rumi with a sweet lullaby about watching your children grow, Bey is allowing her kids to create their own paths, but never too far from mom. For mama Bey, this is one of the many moments we witness how she gives her children a freedom to create, love, and live as they desire, while she stands just a few feet behind them to watch as they shine, ready to catch them if they fall. 

Beyoncé the millennial 

The artist gave up giving media interviews shortly after the release of her self-titled album. After all, if you do a digital drop of your album in the middle of the night and it quickly charts number one without a single promotional interview, there’s no real need for them. Instead, the BeyHive has relied on small clues Beyonce has left like breadcrumbs to her psyche. Is she as chronically online as we are? Does she scroll through TikTok? It turns out, yes. Absolutely yes, At one point while performing “II Hands II Heaven” she paused and did what BeyonceTok knows as the “Drea Kelly.” No, that’s not the actual name of the dance, but it’s the name of the TikTok dancer who unintentionally became a viral trend shortly after the release of Cowboy Carter. In another moment, the singer recreated another viral TikTok trend where she points to someone in the crowd and sings “She ain’t no diva.” This time all her dancers joined in declaring the non-Diva. 

The Production

It’s not every day you get to see one of the world’s greatest living performers fly around a stadium in a sparkly, lit-up red horseshoe, and yet, that’s exactly one of the props and sets you will see at the show. Yes, Beyoncé flies around in a horseshoe. And a car. She also rides a mechanical bull (as in “Like a mechanical bull, look at that horse, look at that horse, look at that horse”). Because of course.

The themes are heavy on Western and Americana, but the Renaissance glitter, dance, and futurism is apparent. The mechanical arms of RWT’s “Cozy” return, now in gold vs silver. Also, the upstanding “Alien Superstar” bed that she sweetly fakes a nap on is back, also in gold. Gold is a heavy influence, both in costumes and outfits — which hail from designers like Mugler, Burberry, Roberto Cavalli, among others — and set pieces.

The rodeo continues with four more shows in Los Angeles, with the next one on Thursday. Then the tour heads to the next Chitlin’ Circuit stops in Chicago and New Jersey prior to a run of shows across the pond in London and Paris, before returning stateside to her hometown of Houston and finishing off with stops in D.C., Atlanta, and closing shows in Las Vegas this July.