On a brisk night in October, people waited in a seemingly endless line that had assembled outside of Jaxx nightclub.
Generally this type of fan frenzy is reserved only for popular artists such as Jay-Z or Taylor Swift. But on this night, the crowd came out to see an 18-year-old kid who had just graduated high school a few months earlier, by the name of Mac Miller.
Miller has experienced a quick rise to prominence after releasing his second mix tape, “K.I.D.S.” which has 60,000 downloads on Datpiff, a popular website for mixtapes, alone since its release in August.
Growing up in Pittsburgh, he naturally looked up to fellow Pittsburgh native, Wiz Khalifa. After hearing Miller’s first mixtape, “The High Life,” Khalifa signed him to a contract with his record industry, Rostrum Records. Since then, Miller has been on the fast track to stardom by going on tour all along the east coast.
Miller has a unique style that makes him stand out from other rappers. While he does rhyme words on a beat, he tends to stick to a more chill style than a majority of rappers today.
“I love [Miller]’s style,” said junior Riley Anderson. “His songs are really relaxing and it sounds different.”
Word spread quickly about Miller making a stop in Springfield. Tickets were sold, with many students, such as myself, left scrambling to buy them from scalpers at the last second. With Miller’s recent popularity, the concert was almost completely full.
“It was completely packed,” said junior Daegen Hilmer. “Once the crowd started coming in I could barely move.”
I was waiting in line for at least an hour and a half. The kids behind me traveled all the way from the Oakton High School area to come to the concert. When I got in, the room was already filled.
For those of you who have yet experienced Jaxx, it is essentially a one room club with a small stage and lights. For Miller’s performance, the room was completely full, especially the area in front of the stage.
The opening act consisted of Uptown XO, an underground rapper from DC, as well as WS graduate Harold Henny, or simply “Henny.”
“It was cool to see Henny, considering he went to WS,” said Anderson. “Every time he does something big, he’s representing WS.”
After what seemed like an eternity, Miller finally showed up at about 10:30, and the ovation was thunderous when he finally did arrive. Because of the small venue, every fan had a great view of Miller and many fans got to meet him.
“He was a funny, down-to-Earth guy,” said junior Nate Buder who was lucky enough to meet Miller. “He was really short too.”
Soon after his performance started, he began giving his personal water bottles to the crowd because of the heat and jokingly said, “people don’t even want to listen to my music, they just want my water.” Due to his late arrival, Miller was only able to perform for 45 minutes. Despite the short performance the experience of seeing one of my favorite rappers in such a personal setting was well worth it.
“It was definitely one of the best concerts I’ve ever been to,” said Hilmer.
