Editor-in-Chief, Music
Childish Gambino The New World Tour Concert Review
Donald Glover, aka Childish Gambino, keeps you waiting.
He’ll be quiet for a year or two, and you’ll occasionally wonder where he’s been, but then he’ll suddenly announce a huge new album or even a surprise release, or a new season of “Atlanta” or a low-key movie starring Rihanna or, as was the case this year, two albums, a fully booked world tour and an accompanying movie that we still don’t know much about and probably won’t until he wants us to. The sheer scale of the rollout is more than matched by the depth and complexity of the projects (not to mention the NDAs) — you could theoretically spend hours unpacking the references and meanings of the lyrics and music and staging and wardrobe and all that, or you could just enjoy it without thinking too much about what you like and why. He’s into the mystique and seemingly magical tricks, and that’s what makes it fun for fans, too.
This latest round is the self-proclaimed “final” project of his Childish Gambino persona and includes his latest album, the excellent “Bando Stone and the New World,” an upcoming film of the same name, a reissue of his also excellent album “3.15. 2020” — which he hastily released in the early days of the pandemic but has remixed, revamped and retitled “Atavista” — and, perhaps most expansive of all, this “New World Tour,” which landed Monday at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center for the first of a two-day stand.