This year’s Wireless festival is instantly mired in controversy – a decision to finish Sunday’s outing two-and-a-half hours early, allowing fans to catch the European Championship final, sours the mood of the weekend. The disappointment is justified as the adjusted timeline feels convenient. Scheduled Sunday acts Digga D and Tyla were long expected to cancel due to their respective legal difficulties and injury, yet their absences are only confirmed on Friday, with no replacement acts announced. Friday also brings cancellations for Flo Milli and Veeze, pulling apart a promisingly stacked lineup.
Still, the army of Barbz who swarm Finsbury Park clad in pink skirts, bows and baby tees get everything they want from Friday headliner Nicki Minaj, whose fourth Wireless appearance brings the full, maximalist, world-building production of the Pink Friday 2 world tour. She runs the full course of her discography, from fulfilment anthem Moment 4 Life to that iconic Monster verse, and Minaj’s dramatics, rhapsodic delivery and visuals of assembly-line porcelain cyborg doppelgangers make for a playful and genuinely fun headline show.
