MGK tore up Altar Bar with high-energy

With palpable impatience, a young crowd garbed in ragtag bandanas and “I’m Laced Up!” shirts let out a groan each time the lights dulled, luring the concergoers into thinking the show was about to start. Although people danced and cheered for the opening acts, it was done halfheartedly. The crowd only truly came to life once Machine Gun Kelly made his entrance.

Flanked by his band and two enormous speakers, Machine Gun Kelly allowed his vocals to explode throughout the Strip District’s Altar Bar on Monday. He gripped the microphone tightly, as if he would fall to the floor if he let go, and showcased the rapid-fire delivery that earned him his stage name.

Machine Gun Kelly, or MGK, has said in the past that he kills himself every time he goes on stage, and it’s easy to see why, as there wasn’t a single moment of his set during which he wasn’t moving.

The American rapper packed a huge amount of energy and emotion into his performance. Despite constantly darting around the stage, he never displayed any sign of being tired — just signs of being happy to perform.

The crowd didn’t show any fatigue either and had no trouble keeping up with him during his set. Although crowd members simmered to near silence whenever MGK went on long, high-speed lyrical bursts, their excitement boiled over each time, and they found themselves too excited to contain the desire to rap along.

“Those kids will sing every word,” said the 22-year-old Clevelander in an interview before the show. “And those words aren’t easy to keep up with.”

The performer-crowd cooperation seemed to reach its climax during MGK’s performance of “Wild Boy,” one of his most popular songs.

As soon as the song started, MGK mounted one of the stage’s large speakers and climbed up to the venue’s second-floor balcony. Once there, he walked catlike along the narrow ledge and got into as many of his fans’ faces as he could. They extended their arms to hold him for balance while he leaned off the edge and continued to perform.

That is, until he jumped into the crowd from the second story.

“Don’t let ‘Ocho Cinco’ and ‘Wild Boy’ fool you. I do those so I don’t sound preachy,” he warned before the performance.

He eventually found his way to the bar, which he used as a runway into the screaming and grabbing mass of fans all trying to get closer to him. He invited some to dance with him but ultimately returned to the stage after shooting a look of disgust at a young girl he caught taking photos of herself making a duck face and peace sign with him in the shot.

After complimenting many of the women in the audience, MGK decided to bring one on stage. Though he did take time to serenade her once or twice at a breakneck pace, not even the presence of a pretty woman on stage trying to grind against him could take his eyes off the crowd.

MGK was never static and never wavering. His primary concern was always making sure his crowd was hyped up and having a good time. For him, the entire point of putting on a show is to connect with as many people in the audience as possible.

“If I can change a couple of peoples’ lives,” he said before pausing, “that’s all that matters.”

Despite his antics, he wants his fans to always remember the deeper messages of his music, which is laden with accounts of his personal struggles to overcome adversity.

Before performing his song “Invincible,” MGK asked the crowd to sing with him, warning that it would sound badly otherwise. Crowd members passionately used their voices as substitutes for that of Ester Dean, who is featured on the studio version.

During this song — like many others — the individual experiences of the concertgoers converged into a single, collective moment filled with emotional uniformity.

“We take them on an emotional roller coaster,” he said in regard to the arrangement of his set list, explaining that it’s the part of his live shows that he’s the most proud of. “I have you crying in one minute and moshing the next — and it’ll all make sense.”