Lyrical Lemonade’s Summer time Smash Competition returned to Chicago on Friday (June 12), kicking off its 2026 version with a packed setlist.
The annual competition has continued to develop the momentum of earlier years. In 2025, Summer time Smash featured a lineup that includes Don Toliver and Yeat headlining the opening night time. Future took over Day 2 with a set full of lure classics, whereas Younger Thug closed out the weekend in memorable vogue throughout one in every of his main performances following his launch from jail.
This 12 months’s competition wasted no time delivering memorable moments.
Chicago natives Chief Keef and G Herbo obtained welcomes from their hometown crowd, simply one other reminder on why they each stay a few of the metropolis’s most influential rap figures. Rising star, Molly Santana additionally capitalized on the excitement surrounding her look on Drake’s ICEMAN, delivering one of many day’s standout performances.
As nice because the supporting acts have been, the night time was flipped the other way up when Lil Uzi Vert got here out.
Whereas followers proceed to demand new music from the Philly rapper, his Summer time Smash set proved his catalog stays as impactful as ever. Working by means of his basic hits together with “XO Tour Lif3” and even one in every of his newer information “What You Sayin,” Uzi stored the group engaged from begin to end.
His efficiency set the bar very excessive for the rest of the weekend. Amongst them is his boo, JT, who’s scheduled to carry out on the competition’s last day.
Hip-Hop Wired additionally caught up with Taylor Bennett, brother of Probability The Rapper, who mirrored on watching Summer time Smash founder Cole Bennett flip a dream into one in every of Hip-Hop’s premier festivals.
“I’ve recognized Cole [Bennet] since I used to be a child, we placed on our first present collectively within the Music Storage. In a room that held like 50 individuals, it was packed out, however that is f*cking loopy.”
Try the complete recap of Day 1 of Lyrical Lemonade’s Summer time Smash Competition under