Playboi Carti’s record label Opium has been on fire lately, even though its founder has not put out an album in over two years. Signees like Destroy Lonely, Ken Carson, and Homixide Gang have all been surging in trap-rap circles, beloved for their dark aesthetics and mosh-pit-inducing bangers. Now, it seems that Carti is ready to unite the family and galvanize all of their collective fans.
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On Friday (July 7), Opium listeners in London noticed a billboard pop up in their city promoting the Antagonist Tour, including Carti, Lonely, Carson, and Homixide Gang. While dates have not been announced for the tour, members of Opium like prominent producer F1LTHY and the official Homixide Gang page have both confirmed via Instagram that the quasi-announcement is legit.
This pleasant surprise for Opium fans comes just a day after Carti spoke about the label’s momentum during his headlining set at the Rolling Loud festival in Portugal on Thursday (July 6).
“Thank you. I love you guys so fucking much,” he told the crowd. “Thank you for coming here. Thank you for waiting on me. Thank you for supporting me. Thank you for supporting my label. Thank you for supporting Ken [Carson]. Thank you for supporting [Destroy] Lonely. Thank you for supporting my artists, F1lthy, everybody.”
Adding to his spiel, Carti alluded to he and his artists making a big splash sometime soon, which could be a reference to the aforementioned tour.
“You know we gon’ come,” Carti continued. “When we gon’ come, we ain’t gon’ talk about it, we gon’ do it. Fuck everybody. Don’t forget we did it first. I love you. Have a good night.”
Although Opium has been a bit quiet in the first half of 2023, Lonely, Carson, and Homixide Gang all released breakout albums in 2022 titled No Stylist, X, and Homixide Lifestyle, respectively. Additionally, earlier this year, Lonely put out another LP titled If Looks Could Kill, which peaked inside the top 20 of the Billboard 200 at No. 18, and also momentarily competed with Ed Sheeran’s 2023 album on Spotify charts.
The tour’s assumed headliner Carti’s last album came in the form of Whole Lotta Red on Christmas Day in 2020. Peaking at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 with hits like “Sky” and “ILoveUIHateU,” the project quickly became the Atlanta emcee’s magnum opus, widely known as a generation-defining effort for hip-hop youth.
In early June, Carti teased a collaborative project with NBA YoungBoy titled 004KT, which would be the latter’s fourth full-length tape so far in 2023. 004KT has yet to be given a release date, lending even more ammunition to the idea that Carti has difficulty bringing plans to fruition.
On his previous headlining tour in 2021, dubbed the Narcissist Tour and eventually changed to the King Vamp Tour, Carti was meant to accompany his string of shows with an album also titled Narcissist. But, after a failed merchandise sale and an early cancelation of the tour, the LP would never release.
All things considered, Opium fans would likely prefer to proceed with caution before getting too excited about the upcoming Antagonist Tour, regardless of how thrilling the potential of it is.
Photo by Kyle Gustafson / For The Washington Post via Getty Images
