Jermaine thanks the crowd for attending the fifth and final Dreamville Festival. After receiving the state holiday declaration for his birthday from Governor Josh Stein, forgiving his stepfather, and bringing out his friend’s daughter that inspired For Your Eyez Only, the crowd goes silent. The beginning of “First Person Shooter” plays, Cole performs his verse, and a spotlight appears between his Dreamville artists, wife and kids. Aubrey comes out with a patched up hoodie, no smoke or open bullet holes like before. Before the beat switches, BYGAWD!. THAT’S KENDRICK LAMAR! He performs an unheard of verse that should have been on the original version. It’s three G.O.A.T.s left and I’m there to see them hugging on stage.
Yeah, but that’s probably not going to happen. I will be there at Dreamville Festival for the first time and the experience of going and anticipating what will happen is enough for me. Meanwhile, Dreamers (Fuck ICE!) are crashing out online at the lack of a lineup announcement for the two stages at Dorothea Dix Park in Raleigh, North Carolina. There is some relief now that we can expect the guest list to be shared tomorrow, Monday the 17th. Short-T AKA Benevolent-T got yall on this beautiful Sunday. Here is who we can expect at Dreamville Fest:
You already know the artists that live on festival flyers. This is space reserved for the Playboi Carti‘s, the A$AP Rocky‘s, and the artists with a buzz before they embark on their inevitable stadium tours in their careers. I’m looking forward to seeing BigXThaPlug, Bossman Dlow, Coco Jones, Leon Thomas and other buzzing artists perform and get the J.Cole co-sign.
These right here are the ones that have worked with Cole in the past, came out during the Blog Era, or have never been to Dreamville Fest before in the past four installments. It’s long overdue to see Miguel, Cardi B, Childish Gambino, Latto, 2 Chainz, Kid Cudi, Travis Scott, and Meg Thee Stallion on one of those two stages. A set from Mustard or an appearance from Gunna seem plausible, but I’m going bigger with my expectations since this is the last one. We’re getting Doechii, Bruno Mars, and Tyler, yes, The Creator, on that April weekend. We’ll probably see Tyler on April 4th. He’s free that day from his current tour.
Now this tier, I admit, even perplexes me because I can’t decide if they will make an appearance during J.Cole’s set on the closing night or they will have their own 30 minute performances throughout the weekend. Either way, we are going to see Missy Elliott, The LOX, Fantasia, Clipse, Jodeci, Three 6 Mafia, Hot Boys, Bun B, and the man Jermaine let down over a decade ago, Nasir Jones.
Welp! You can thank me now or come back after the lineup is “officially” released and thank me later. Either way, I’ll be outside being the old man in the crowd looking for a seat.