6 Things You'll Get From a Drake Concert

The first time I saw Drake in concert was on a college campus in 2012: my friends and I made "YOLO" t-shirts and were arguably the oldest people at the show. A year later, when Drake asked "Would You Like a Tour?" my crew answered "Yes, please!" and made our way to Oakland's Oracle Arena in the rain. By this time, "The Motto" was our motto (and go-to group karaoke song), and in 2014, the four of us attended our first outdoor Drake show when he and Lil Wayne went head to head on their Street Fighter-inspired joint tour. My favorite park blanket got taken away by security that night, but I did get some pretty sweet merchandise.

This week, the gang and I headed back to Oracle Arena for our fourth Drake show together. And because we're not brand new to this, we mapped out our evening pretty perfectly; dinner and Santa Margherita (by the liter!) followed by a quick cocktail before getting to the venue. It was eerily calm and empty outside, and we couldn't understand why: did we manage to get our timing so precise that we missed every single line and crowd? Watch out, world! This isn't our first rodeo! But inside was a different story. We must have passed eight drunk, crying girls in the first two minutes and another handful throwing up in the bathroom. I glanced at my watch, realized most of these people had been pregaming for nearly three hours, and expressed silent gratitude at being out of the "puking my brains out at concerts" phase (sadly, there are about 40 minutes of Britney Spears's Circus tour that I'll never get back).

While I definitely had an idea of what I was in for, I wasn't expecting to love Drake's Summer Sixteen Tour so much. It truly was my favorite show of all the ones I've seen, not just because of his set list and stage presence, but also because of the overall production. And because I'd like to consider myself something of a Drake concert expert, I'm offering up a list of what you should expect to get from the show — although unfortunately, you'll find the puking girls no matter which artist you see — and hopefully you can check it out for yourself before Oct. 9, when Drake wraps up the tour in his native Toronto.