“Ayyyeeee! We here. We back!” screamed Young Deji as he stood center stage sporting black jeans and a camouflage Pimperelli vest. “We here y’all. Y’all having a good night? I’m having a good night…and I got verified today!”
The fans at Houston Underground screamed back in congratulations at Deji’s latest Instagram success. The audience, pressed up against the stage, composed of fans, friends, and family are a huge part of Tisakorean’s and Deji’s success. Some of them have been in videos with the two while others have been following, liking, and streaming any media they could get their hands on. The show was more of a homecoming as the audience filled up the downtown bar and danced while songs like, Snapchat, pulsed through the speakers into the humid night air.
Young Deji and Tisakorean have come a long way over a this past year. Deji dropped 13 Reasons Why and Jam Dejo in 2018 and then quickly followed up with FunPlex earlier this year. Those first two albums and their accompanying videos gained the attention of Wiz Khalifa who has featured Deji on his label’s compilation album Fly Times Vol. 1: The Good Fly Young.
Tisakorean was already releasing short videos with Deji and other artists in Alief where the two popularized the dance, The Woah. Since then their dance craze has spread internationally with everyone from Japanese pop stars, professional athletes, and kids attempting to get their parents on video performing the dance for views. Tisakorean dropped A Guide To Being A Partying Freshman as well this year and has since been covered by media outlets like Fader and worked with artists like Chance The Rapper and Lil Uzi Vert.
Tisakorean was all energy as he walked across the stage Thursday night. Dressed simply in an A-shirt and striped board shorts and holding his shirt in hand the rapper jumped on the stage and immediately started hyping up the crowd.
“Man, they almost tried to stop my show!” he yelled as he began pointing and pulling girls up on stage. “I’m three cups in…but we still gonna go!”
The beat for Dip blasted through the speakers as circles formed around audience members doing The Woah. Tisakorean ripped off the band holding his signature colorful hair and jumped on stage in unison with the audience.
Number9ok, who is featured in a number of videos with Tisakorean and Deji, took a break from dancing in the crowd and talked about the growing success of his two friends and what they have planned for the future.
“This just feels good man. Coming from where we come from…We just used to dance every day. Now we’re just trying to inspire the world. We didn’t even have the mindset that we would get famous. We were just making music and having fun and it just worked out. We just looked up and the internet was going crazy. Now we just gonna keep working and doing more.”
While Deji and Tisakorean were only on stage for a short amount of time the two exude an energy that should continue to attract fans, build upon their online success, and have people looking for more from them in the future.
This article appears in Jan 1 – Dec 31, 2019.
