A couple of months ago, the all-time great rap duo Clipse released Let God Sort Em Out, their long-awaited reunion album. As Pusha T explained during the rollout, the record took longer to come out than anyone expected because Clipse had to deal with some label issues. They were signed to Def Jam, but parent company Universal blanched at releasing their song “Chains & Whips” with its Kendrick Lamar feature intact. That led to Clipse buying out their contract, leaving the label, and releasing their album, Kendrick feature and all, independently. Kendrick Lamar probably recorded his “Chains & Whips” verse a couple of years ago, but its release still felt like an event. It also felt like an event when surprise guest Kendrick joined the Clipse onstage to perform the track for the first time this past weekend.

Right now, Clipse are on their first tour in many years. Most of those shows have not featured surprise guests, though lord knows the Clipse have plenty of collaborations in their catalog. Every show opens with “Chains & Whips.” On Saturday, the Ciipse’s tour came to the Novo. Kendrick Lamar, currently on a break from his own stadium tour, popped up onstage and rapped the shit out of his “Chains & Whips” verse. That meant the surprise Kendrick appearance was on the first song of the evening. As you might imagine, the audience lost its collective mind. Watch it happen below.

Clipse bring out Kendrick on stage in LA! https://t.co/DcTRUMzmjw pic.twitter.com/vAUns57fth

— ɖɛռռɨֆ (@_CallMeDennis_) August 24, 2025

So how do you keep just playing a show after that? When the song ended, Kendrick Lamar said that it was a privilege to be “in front of legends” and that he’d be watching the rest of the show with the crowd, and then Clipse just kept performing like it was normal. From what I can tell, the energy never dipped. You can watch a pretty great video of the whole show below.

That’s a good crowd.