Drake’s Fake Tough Guy Act Needs to Stop in Houston — This Searching Star Can Be So Much More: Your Bayou City Weekend Guide

Editor’s Note: Houston’s weekends are packed full of events, but how many of them are truly worthy of your time? PaperCity’s Weekend Guru Matthew Ramirez cuts through the clutter to give you the best options in this weekly series.

A Moon Garden

The long-awaited arrival of Lucion Traveling Light of Montreal’s moonGARDEN to downtown’s Discovery Green is finally here: 22 illuminated spheres from six to 30 feet in diameter will dot Discovery Green and the plaza at Avenida Houston, featuring 11 shadow theaters that tell the story of Houston and the downtown park.

Saturday sees a romantic “Moon Dance” featuring a moon-inspired playlist from Dance Houston with salsa, tango, ballroom and more. Monday, October 1 through Wednesday, October 3 brings guided twilight tours of moonGARDEN. All the events start at 7 pm each day, but plan to arrive 10 to 15 minutes early to secure a spot.

The moonGARDEN is free. It is lit nightly from 6 pm to 12 am. This unique, interactive art experience only runs until next Sunday, October 7.

Interpol

Interpol was a victim of its own success. In 2002, at the height of the post-post-punk wave of bands that all had “The” in their name (Strokes, White Stripes, Vines, etc…), Interpol, in their dapper suits, playing songs clearly inspired by moody bands like Echo and the Bunnymen and Joy Division, stood out in optics and sound alike.

Alas, you can only capture lightning in a bottle but once, and after the one-two punch of 2002’s debut Turn on the Bright Lights and 2004’s lesser follow-up Antics, they seemed out of ideas. After a long hiatus and a series of ho-hum releases they returned this year with the surprisingly revitalized Marauder, which does a fine job of applying new paint and sensibilities into a band heading into its third decade of existence.

Saturday, September 29, at White Oak Music Hall. Doors open at 7 pm; general admission tickets available for $32.50.

Lauryn Hill

I will try to avoid the easy joke to make here which is, sure, hip-hop legend Lauryn Hill has a show scheduled for the Smart Financial Centre Saturday, September 29, but who knows if she will show up??? That said, the great Seattle-based weirdos Shabazz Palaces are opening and everyone (and yes that includes Houston’s own Robert Glasper) owes it to themselves to at least attempt to see Hill perform live once in their concert-going life.

Fair warning: you know what it was when you signed up. Doors open at 6:30 pm, tickets start at $29.50.

Drake Time

It’s been a weird year for Drake, who fresh off 2017’s nimble and fun More Life regressed into an increasingly unlikable presence in 2018. “God’s Plan” is a great beat in search of a good song, and the confrontational “Nice for What” is Drake in the mode of his I like least: fake tough guy.

His double-disc June release, Scorpion, was overlong and lacks an emotional center, which you can blame Pusha-T for: his “you are hiding a child” taunt from the instantly iconic “The Story of Adidon” diss shattered all illusions of Drake as a stable, petty tyrant/single man in control of his destiny as the biggest rapper on the planet. As a result, the man born Aubrey Drake Graham, for the first time in his career, seems to be searching.

Perhaps that’s why he booked an unprecedented three shows in his “second home” of Houston, starting Saturday, September 29 and ending Tuesday, October 2, at the Toyota Center.

Maybe he’ll find inspiration down here. I’m still recommending his show because he’ll no doubt run back classics for two hours every night and there promises to be a surfeit of Houston celebrities and musicians at every show. Migos opens each night. Tickets start at $59.50. Showtimes vary on Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday.

Jay Rock

Jay Rock is the quiet soul of Kendrick Lamar‘s Top Dawg Entertainment label, the older brother who kick-started the careers of all the TDE understudies by first signing to a major label way back in 2008. Without Rock, there’s no Lamar, no SZA, no Schoolboy Q, no Ab-Soul, no Isaiah Rashad.

Jay Rock’s 2018 record Redemption is his leanest, most taut record yet, the kind of subtly progressive, throwback rap album that should tide fans over until another zeitgeist-capturing record from Kendrick or SZA. Tuesday, October 2, at Warehouse Live. Doors open at 8 pm; tickets start at $20.