Joji, Dhruv, Savage Realm
October 11th, 2022
MTelus, Montreal QC
Canadian Beats Passport
Last night, MTelus was the place to be as Youtuber-turned-singer Joji brought his Smithereens Tour to Montreal. With fans lining up since the beginning of the afternoon, the venue was packed to the brim with more than 2,000 people in the audience.
The evening started with Savage Realm, Joji’s very own hype man, who gave a short but great rap set punctuated with a lot of jokes, and a circle rock-paper-scissor pit (a first for us!). Up next, singer Dhruv took things to a more mellow level, performing a pop set radiating with the band’s contagious joy.
Finally, around 9.30pm, Japanese sensation Joji emerged on a lit-up platform under a thunder of applause. The man formerly known as oddball comedy character Filthy Frank has now retired from Youtube and turned to lo-fi, trip-hop music. With 15 songs on the setlist, the show was on the shorter end, but full of entertainment as Joji regularly hopped down from his platform to be closer to the crowd, and catapulting free merch into the audience with the help of a lit-up trebuchet. The highlight of the show came towards the end, with his biggest hits Slow Dancing in the Dark, and the hauntingly beautiful Glimpse of Us, lit up by a sea of cellphones and fans singing along.
Joji
Dhruv
Savage Realm
