Review & Gallery: Jack Harlow Brings ‘Monica’ to the Oakland
REVIEW
REVIEW
☆ BY ELIJAH CLOWER ☆
FOUR YEARS IS A LONG TIME TO BE AWAY FROM THE BAY - and Jack Harlow came back a noticeably different artist. The last time he was out here, it was a completely different era, all swagger and arena level energy. This time he rolled into Oakland's Fox Theater on the heels of Monica, and the whole night felt like it was built around that shift.
If you came expecting a nonstop rap show, you probably walked out surprised. The set was relaxed and laid back, almost intimate at times, which honestly fits the Fox perfectly. Monica leans so heavily into R&B and neo soul, and hearing it live in a room that size made a lot more sense to me than it did on first listen. Jack seemed comfortable letting songs breathe instead of rushing to the next hook.
That's not to say the energy never picked up. Right in the middle of the set, he dropped "Way Out," "Nail Tech," and "Dua Lipa" back to back, and the floor woke up instantly. It worked as a nice jolt before he eased back into the slower tracks.
What stood out most was how deep he was willing to go. Alongside the Monica cuts and songs from earlier projects, he pulled out tracks like "Sundown," "Warsaw," and "Ghost," which felt like a gift to the fans who've been riding with him since the early days. You could tell who those people were by how loud they got.
The real high note came at the end section of the show with “Tyler Herro," "What's Poppin," "First Class," and "Lovin On Me" closing things out, and the room turned into a completely different show.
Four years away, and Jack Harlow came back with something to prove - not to the crowd, but to himself. Monica is a risk, a pivot, a bet on where he wants to go rather than where he's already been. Friday night at the Fox, that bet paid off. The room left knowing they'd seen an artist in the middle of becoming something, and that's always more interesting than watching someone coast on what already worked.
