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Photo Courtesy City of New Orleans New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell presents rapper Lil Wayne with a Key to the City during Lil WeezyAna Fest at the Smoothie King Center on Saturday, Nov. 2, 2024. |
The event, held at the Smoothie King Center, featured a surprise "Hot Boys" reunion. For the first time in over two decades, Lil Wayne shared the stage with his original group members Juvenile, B.G., and Turk, alongside special guests Mannie Fresh and Rob 49. The reunion was a major highlight for the crowd, drawing on nostalgia and the rich legacy of New Orleans hip-hop.
Lil Wayne gets his flowers! 🙏🏽
— SOUND | Victor Baez (@itsavibe) November 3, 2024
the Mayor of New Orleans surprised him with the key to the city
and Master P says February 6th & 7th will be Lil Wayne day & they are starting a New Orleans walk of fame
(via Lil Weezyana Fest @PrimeVideo) pic.twitter.com/6sqGfXUhQj
"On behalf of your city, the entire city of New Orleans, I’m so proud to present you with this key that is a token of appreciation of who you are," Cantrell said, addressing Lil Wayne on stage. "This is your city saying to you, ‘You matter for generations to come — for what you have done, what you are doing, and what you will continue to do.’"
New Orleans Entertainment Ambassador Master P also took the stage to honor Lil Wayne. Master P, a renowned rapper and entrepreneur himself, was recently appointed to this role in anticipation of New Orleans hosting the 2025 Super Bowl. He presented Lil Wayne with a Career Achievement Award for his decades-long contributions to hip-hop and the New Orleans community.
The Hot Boys reunite at Lilweezyana Fest! 🤯🤯🔥🔥 pic.twitter.com/sRCDwJho3G
— Andrew Barber (@fakeshoredrive) November 3, 2024
Lil Wayne, whose real name is Dwayne Michael Carter Jr., launched Lil WeezyAna Fest in 2015 to give back to his hometown. The festival has become a celebration of New Orleans culture, and this year’s event had a special resonance with the Hot Boys reunion, drawing emotional responses from both the performers and the audience.
"It’s like Christmas Eve," Juvenile said about the reunion. "The wait, the wanting — wondering what it will be like. I’m excited for the moment. I’m at almost at a loss for words because it’s something I envisioned, and I’m happy it’s happening. People are gonna remember the trends we set, with the T-shirts and Gibaud jeans, our whole dress code, our talk, our style. When we first came out, we took the world by storm.”
"I was shocked and excited to see that Lil Wayne — [considering] the caliber of artist he is and where he’s at — wanted to share that stage with us, because he didn’t have to," Turk said. "I remember doing a prior Weezyana Fest and how it felt not having Birdman there, not having B.G. there. It wasn’t complete. So to put everybody on that stage, it ain’t nothin but God — I’m grateful.”
The performance concluded with Juvenile’s iconic track "Back That Azz Up," which brought the crowd to its feet, celebrating the group's influence on hip-hop culture. The song, originally released in the late 1990s, has had a resurgence thanks to TikTok, proving its staying power across generations.
Lil Wayne also addressed a recent controversy surrounding the Super Bowl halftime show. The rapper had previously expressed disappointment after Kendrick Lamar was chosen to headline the Apple Music halftime show in September. During Lil WeezyAna Fest, Lil Wayne spoke candidly to the crowd, sharing his feelings: "I worked my a** off to get that f---ing position, and it was ripped away from me, but this f---ing moment right here, they can't take that, man. They can't take that from me."
"This won’t be the last time," Mannie Fresh said about the reunion. "This won’t be like, ‘They did it and that’s it.’ We plan on doing this for a long time. When we started this, the mentality was, ‘This is not a game, we are not playing,’ and 30 years later, it’s still showing.”
