A few weeks ago, on Instagram Live, D-Nice started playing DJ sets and Swizz Beatz and Timbaland went song-for-song. The latter two started organizing a series of follow-up battles, and this livestreaming format has become a regular way of following music during the coronavirus pandemic. On Friday Lil Uzi Vert joined Rihanna’s stream. On Saturday DJ Premier and RZA traded beats and stories for just under 900,000 total viewers. On Sunday Diddy held a charity dance-a-thon for health care workers, where several celebrities joined his Instagram Live stream.
According to Entertainment Tonight, the last of those caused a minor scandal for onlooking fans. When Lizzo appeared on Diddy’s stream, he asked her for “something a little more family friendly” during her segment of the dance-a-thon. Lizzo agreed and put on her song “Juice”; as ET pointed out, some commenters immediately jumped in to claim the request was unfair. Lizzo later reposted an explanation that Diddy gave for his intervention: “My queen, my sister Lizzo, when I stopped the music it was ’cause it had a lot of curses in there, not ’cause she was twerking.”
But by then the interaction had already happened and the comments had been made—ET ran its story on Monday morning and Lizzo was trending on Twitter too. Ja Rule was also trending on Monday; Complex reported that he said he’d be willing to face 50 Cent in Swizz Beatz and Timbaland’s Versuz series, possibly reviving a long-running rivalry. Instagram Live has become the go-to platform for musical performances, and also for participating in the stories just outside of them.
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