Doja Cat, Glasgow review: 'flamboyant and irreverent'
Doja Cat put on a rocking hip-hop show at the Hydro, with some fluttering funk tunes and sultry R&B thrown in for good measure, writes Fiona Shepherd
Doja Cat, Hydro, Glasgow ★★★
Tia Tamera, an early hit by rapper/singer/producer/performer Doja Cat (Sunday name: Amala Ratna Zandile Dlamini), references the twin actresses from US sitcom Sister Sister - and also the names Doja gives her breasts. Tia and Tamera were a big part of this body positive show (along with her shapely posterior), with star-shaped nipple coverings sometimes about the only element of modesty across the 100-minute running time.
While there was no mistaking who the star was, Doja Cat shared the stage, a raised illuminated platform, with a tight live band of drilled, suited and booted white-clad funkateers, playing a big part in early set highlight Get Into It (Yuh). They know the fun they have signed up for and excelled across an early run of fluttering funk tunes, speckled with big drum rolls and even a sax break played on keytar.
Having laid down the groove, it was time to dig in for the sultry hip-hop R&B segment of proceedings, culminating in the Walk On By-sampling Paint the Town Red and the lithe drumming and banshee wail of Ain’t Shit. By this point, Doja was unleashed on the catwalk, ladder in her purple tights, novelty specs on for Silly! Fun!, demonstrating her carefree chops as a performer as her band amped up the energy.
Suddenly the star make-up on her eyes made sense. Doja Cat is a one-woman Kiss, flamboyant and irreverent, gleefully making an exhibition of herself, while marshalling a rocking hip-hop show, with bonus Gene Simmons tongue action and mic lead theatrics on Demons.
As if this were not enough, she threw a few more genre twists into the closing stages, bouncing between the obstreperous funk of the Knight Rider theme-sampling Aaahh Men!, the jittery dance number Boss Bitch and the sunshine soul of Stranger and Say So, all the while making an unrepentant and entertaining show of herself.
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