Rod Wave @ Nationwide Arena

A fantastic show with Rod Wave at Nationwide Arena on October 30, 2023 in Columbus, OH. Supporting Rod was EELmatic, Toosii & Ari Lennox.

EELmatic

Born into a big musical family in Buffalo, New York, EELmatic moved to Kansas halfway through his freshman year of high school & enrolled at Shawnee Mission West. After high school, he attended Hutchinson Community College for two years to play football. He later transferred to Southeastern Louisiana University.

One day, EELmatic decided to quit his job at UPS and take a leap of faith for a better opportunity. He traveled to Dallas with a friend, Lay’Trion Jones, whose mom noticed he was doing an Instagram one-song-a-day challenge, and introduced him to another local singer/songwriter, Xyzsa.

As it all fell into place, Spight felt like an overnight success story. He created a TikTok & put together a video showing himself listening to “Letter from Houston” by Rod Wave in a UPS truck. It then transitions to him in front of thousands of people performing the same song behind Rod Wave on stage.

pulled from Fox4KC

Toosii

Nau’Jour Lazier Grainger (born January 9, 2000), better known by his stage name Toosii, is an American rapper, singer, and songwriter. He is known for his TikTok-viral song “Favorite Song”, and his debut studio album, Poetic Pain (2020). The album peaked at number 17 on the Billboard 200.

Nau’Jour Grainger was born & grew up in Syracuse, NY, but later relocated to Raleigh, NC at the age of 13. It was in Raleigh, North Carolina where he began to seriously pursue his musical career. Rap was an escape route from his issues as a youth. He started recording music at age 16, while playing high school football and figuring out his life path.

Toosii’s stage name derived from his childhood nickname of “Toota”, and changed it to Toosii after his football teammates said it as a joke, adding the two I’s because “You need two eyes to see the vision”. Toosii was discovered by the South Coast Music Group. He signed with the record label in 2019. Toosii’s inspiration to music came from both his brother and father. He also spent a period of time homeless before his career began to further develop.

pulled from Wikipedia

Ari Lennox

Courtney Shanade Salter (born March 26, 1991), known professionally as Ari Lennox, is an American R&B singer from Washington, D.C. She signed to J. Cole’s record label, Dreamville Records, being the first female to do so. She began gaining recognition after the release of her first EP Pho (2016) on the label. That same year, she made an uncredited guest appearance on Cole’s song “Change”. Lennox’s debut studio album Shea Butter Baby followed in 2019.

Lennox has also been featured on the Dreamville compilation albums Revenge of the Dreamers II (2015), and Revenge of the Dreamers III (2019), the latter of which debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 chart and earned Lennox a Grammy Award nomination for Best Rap Album. In 2021, Lennox earned her first entries on the Billboard Hot 100 with her single “Pressure”, and her feature on “Unloyal” by Summer Walker.

pulled from Wikipedia

Rod Wave

Rodarius Marcell Green (born August 27, 1998), known professionally as Rod Wave, is an American rapper, singer, and songwriter. Signed to Alamo Records, Green is known for his strong voice and incorporation of hip hop and R&B, having been recognized as a pioneer of the subgenre “soul-trap”.

Green rose to fame with his 2019 single “Heart on Ice”, which went viral on YouTube and TikTok and peaked at number 25 on the Billboard Hot 100. Ghetto Gospel (2019), his debut album peaked at number 10 on the US Billboard 200. His second album, Pray 4 Love (2020), peaked at number 2 on the Billboard 200, and included the song “Rags2Riches”, which peaked at number 12 on the Hot 100.

His subsequent studio albums, SoulFly (2021), Beautiful Mind (2022), and Nostalgia (2023) each debuted atop the Billboard 200—the latter of which for multiple weeks—and earned him further critical acclaim for his soulful delivery and lyricism. The success matched that of Taylor Swift as the only artist to debut a new chart-topping solo album within in each of the previous three years.

pulled from Wikipedia