bbno$ Took Us to The Circus & Storms Couldn’t Hold Tyler, The Creator Back on Day Two of OSHEAGA
Photo credit: Shannon Johnston (@me_onlylouder) - TV On The Radio
The second day of OSHEAGA 2025 was a rollercoaster of genre-jumping performances, chaotic weather delays, and once-in-a-lifetime festival moments. From iconic indie reunions to meme-worthy rap theatrics and a rain-soaked Tyler, The Creator set that still went off without a hitch, Saturday at Parc Jean-Drapeau felt both nostalgic and refreshingly unpredictable.
We started the day with a must-see DJ set from Jojo Lorenzo and Tinzo, the founders of NYC’s Book Club Radio, known for curating some of the most genre-diverse parties in the city. After witnessing their goth and darkwave Halloween warehouse party last fall, their OSHEAGA set was at the top of our list. Their visuals embraced a Windows 98 aesthetic, with pixelated .exe filenames glitching across the screen in hypnotic rhythm. Musically, it was a perfectly eclectic mix of deep cut house and disco edits that felt niche enough to satisfy the diggers but accessible enough for a festival crowd.
Photo credit: Shannon Johnston (@me_onlylouder) - Tinzo and Jojo
The late afternoon belonged to a double-header of indie royalty. Future Islands, playing their final show of the tour, delivered an emotional and cathartic set featuring favorites like “A Dream of You and Me,” “The Sickness,” and the inevitable crowd-pleaser “Seasons (Waiting on You).” Samuel T. Herring’s stage presence was as intense and oddly magnetic as ever, his voice veering from sweet pop melody to death metal growls without warning. It’s this theatrical duality—awkward, raw, deeply human—that makes their live shows feel essential, even if some audience goers had puzzled looks on their faces. The show really came to a head when they closed their set with 2010’s “…Long Flight”, a reminder that Osheaga was almost half over and we’d be on our way home soon, which also seemed like a heavy weight of emotions for the band who were wrapping up their own chapter.
Photo credit: Shannon Johnston (@me_onlylouder) - Future Islands
If that wasn’t enough, TV on the Radio followed. Seeing them and Future Islands back-to-back felt like a time warp to 2006 in the best possible way. “Happy Idiot” and “Wolf Like Me” landed like thunderclaps, but it was their more recent addition of “Careful You”—reintroduced into their set for the first time since 2017—that gave longtime fans a moment to revel in something new. The band brought their politics to the stage, with Kyp Malone wearing a bright green Free Palestine hat and declaring “Fuck fascists” before launching into “Could You.” They closed the set with a heartfelt “Merci beaucoup,” blowing kisses into the crowd like old friends saying goodbye.
Photo credit: Shannon Johnston (@me_onlylouder) - TV On The Radio
Photo credit: Shannon Johnston (@me_onlylouder) - TV On The Radio
Next up, chaos—courtesy of bbno$, the internet’s favourite agent of comedic disorder. Dressed in a full circus ringleader outfit, he kicked off with “it boy” alongside a montage of Twitch streamers asking “Who is bbno$?” culminating in the message: “This is the most important moment of your life.” And if you were there, it just might have been. His band arrived in clown costumes, his flexible gymnast dancer twisted across the stage, and he riffed off Seinfeld sound effects to underline his delightfully bad jokes. bbno$ leaned fully into the meme, gifting a Taste of Home cookbook to the crowd (as he’s done every night for the last seven years), and reading a recipe for popcorn chicken mid-set. “We all play video games, we’re all horny, we’re all a bunch of freaks,” he declared before diving into “lil' freak.” Campy, chaotic, and oddly heartwarming, bbno$ was the ringleader we didn’t know we needed.
Photo credit: Shannon Johnston (@me_onlylouder) - bbno$
But the true ringmaster of the evening was Tyler, The Creator, which was hands down our most anticipated set of the weekend. With a storm delay pushing back his start time by 30 minutes (and leaving Gracie Abrams’ set sadly cut off), there were nerves that the performance might be shortened or pulled altogether. But when Tyler appeared, he made it clear he wasn’t going anywhere: “Montreal, I’m back bitch!”
Opening with the live Montreal debut of “Sugar On My Tongue” from his new album Don’t Tap the Glass, Tyler moonwalked and marched across the stage in signature groovy form. A chromatic banner reading “CHROMAKOPIA” fell away to reveal the album’s real name atop a storage container that held Tyler high above the crowd, signalling a new era with style and flair. “My name is Tyler, The Creator, and I create shit for a living, bro,” he grinned, before launching into a relentlessly energetic set.
Despite the rain, Tyler didn’t miss a beat. He cracked jokes while catching his breath, throwing shade at the VIP section (he asked how rich people have to be to view atop the Coors Light terrace with audience members booing in unison, with Tyler giving the approval that those in GA, were “more hype.”) Things slowed down for “I’ll Take Care of You,” where he let the audience hold the chorus while he swayed, eyes closed. But the vibe shifted when he yanked his earpiece out mid-song around 10:30 p.m. and muttered, “Bitch shut the fuck up,” clearly battling exhaustion and technical limits. Still, when it came time for the finale, he lit up. “I don’t care how tired I am—I’m giving everything I got for this last one,” he shouted before exploding into crowd favourite “NEW MAGIC WAND.”
The set closed with fireworks and a mass singalong of “See You Again,” the crowd’s voices harmonizing while Tyler lit up the stage with pyrotechnics. It was cinematic. It was chaotic. It was a reminder that live music, even in a lightning storm, still commands an audience, especially when Tyler, The Creator brings everyone along for the journey.
