Badshah announces debut USA-Canada Tour

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Amid anticipation for his third studio album, critically acclaimed Hip-Hop artiste Badshah has just announced his long-awaited return to the global performing arena with ‘The Paagal Tour 2024’ that will travel to Canada and USA for the very first time later this year.

With a long-term vision to solidify the Indian Hip-Hop brand imprint overseas, the rapper mogul will be embarking on an expansive global summer tour from May to August of this year.

Currently a 6-date arena run with stops across Toronto (May 31), Vancouver (June 1), San Francisco (June 7), Houston (June 8), Dallas (June 9) and New Jersey (June 15) have been announced. Tickets have gone live for general sales on Ticketmaster and Sulekha from March 1. Additional dates for cities such as Singapore, Washington DC, Los Angeles and Netherlands will be announced over the course of the next few weeks.

Badshah is touring in support of his much-awaited third studio album, Ek Tha Raja. This upcoming global showcase was previously premiered in India with a sold-out 10-city trek and will couple stellar visual storytelling with state-of-the-art production. The tour with its fresh format will entail a 3-hour show and embrace an eclectic set list of over 30 songs. Fans can expect to be regaled with some of his all-time hits such as Jugnu, Paani paani, Garmi, DJ waale babu, Lets nacho, Kala chashma, Kar gayi chull, Genda phool, Abhi toh party shuru hui hai and Paagal, among others.

While Badshah has delivered global performances over the past few years—such as his sold-out shows across London, Leeds, Dubai and Abu Dhabi— ‘The Paagal Tour 2024’ will mark the rapper’s first-ever multi-city global arena trek of a considerable scale.

The nomenclature of the tour, suggestive of a celebration of the 38-year-old’s artistry and legacy over the last decade, sums up Badshah’s sentiments of the unprecedented run as he prepares to hit the road and set a new milestone for the Indian Hip-Hop industry.

Recently the rapper-entrepreneur-philanthropist grabbed headlines for becoming the first-ever Indian Hip-Hop artiste to headline the main stage of UNTOLD, which is ranked as the world’s #6 music festival and Europe’s #3 music festival by DJ Mag.

Badshah states, “Grateful and blessed. This year has kick-started on an extremely electrifying note and I am appreciative that I am getting to do everything that I am truly passionate about. ‘The Paagal Tour 2024’ is about the ability to conquer your dreams, break stereotypes and transcend boundaries—inspire to be inspired. See you in the arenas soon for one of my most experimental and never-seen-before live show experiences till date! Love and peace!”

Originally due in 2023, his upcoming album, Ek Tha Raja, was ultimately pushed to 2024. In a message to his fans announcing the postponement, Badshah assured his audiences that his latest album would be worth the longer-than-expected wait. Billed as the biggest gift the artiste has ever presented to his global fan community, the full album will release sometime in mid-March 2024 and will feature a slew of top-ranking collaborators. The first single from the album, Daaku, that was released earlier this week, was trending across all digital streaming platforms.

Badshah, the multi-award-winning Indian rapper from Chandigarh, is hailed as one of the most influential icons within the Indian music landscape. From humble beginnings to stardom, his phenomenal success story embodies the quintessential rags-to-riches dream, becoming one of the most successful generational artistes of 21^st century India, while building a culturally rich empire that has earned him the pedigree of being one of the most respected and most loved music artistes of his time.

Badshah’s streaming repertoire includes being the only Indian music artiste to garner a record breaking 300-plus million views for each of his 18 different chartbusters, which eventually led to music rights data platform Blokur acknowledging him as the world’s No. 1 songwriter on YouTube in 2021. With more than 25.5 million followers and 4.8 million monthly listeners on Spotify, he has a total over 10 billion streams for more than 200 songs in different languages and more than 50-plus million followers across platforms.

His ability to fuse contemporary production with traditional Indian influences to create anthem-like hit records has garnered a cult following and a legion of fans for Badshah and helped him build an unmatched reputation among the global community of producers and artistes.

With an impressive discography featuring not just top-tier film collaborations but also features by global artistes such as J Balvin, Tainy, Sean Paul, Major Lazer, Diplo, Tiesto, Lil Baby and Mikey McCleary among others, Badshah, who is the first Indian rapper to have signed to major global label Universal Music Group, has always strived to bridge Eastern and Western diasporas through his music.

Apart from multi-million-dollar brand contracts, major record deals and top-tier judging reality shows to his credit, Badshah has also invested across multiple non-music businesses such as hospitality, nightclubs, clothing, sporting leagues and not-for-profit organizations, further solidifying his impact in the pop culture movement.

The musical phenomenon’s life story has left a mark within the South Asian entertainment industry, setting an example for future generations of artistes to follow in his footsteps.