Jay-Z Ready To Open Brooklyn's Barclays Center Tonight

Jay-Z is getting ready to open the brand new Barclays Center in style tonight. The Brooklyn based venue that will serve as the Nets’ home floor has been in development since 2004. Various lawsuits and unexpected roadblocks caused the lengthy delay, but none of those annoyances will be on the mind of concertgoers tonight when the popular musician takes the stage for his first of eight performances.

All of the gigs, which will take place between now and October 6, sold out within hours of the tickets first being offered online. The new partial owner of the Nets decided to keep many of the seats at the extremely affordable price of $30, which now seems like a great decision given the crazy demand and all the good public relations the move has brought.

If all goes according to plan, Barclays Center will become a routine stop for the biggest touring events in the world. In addition to at least forty-one regular season basketball games, the arena is already signed on to host Lady Gaga, Bob Dylan, The Who and Justin Bieber. If the NHL hadn’t locked out its players, it would have hosted some preseason hockey as well.

According to CBS, Jay-Z is widely expected to trot out numerous guests during the eight impending performances, but for the time being, they will remain surprises. Here’s to hoping they all live up to the very lofty expectations of Brooklyn residents.

Mack Rawden
Editor In Chief

Mack Rawden is the Editor-In-Chief of CinemaBlend. He first started working at the publication as a writer back in 2007 and has held various jobs at the site in the time since including Managing Editor, Pop Culture Editor and Staff Writer. He now splits his time between working on CinemaBlend’s user experience, helping to plan the site’s editorial direction and writing passionate articles about niche entertainment topics he’s into. He graduated from Indiana University with a degree in English (go Hoosiers!) and has been interviewed and quoted in a variety of publications including Digiday. Enthusiastic about Clue, case-of-the-week mysteries, a great wrestling promo and cookies at Disney World. Less enthusiastic about the pricing structure of cable, loud noises and Tuesdays.