Lil Debbie in Portland on 4/20
Lil Debbie in Portland on 4/20 Claire Holley

Though she lives every day like it’s 4/20, Lil Debbie still celebrated yesterday's holiday in a major way. After taking a weed nap (her words), last night she brought an energetic and cannabis-fueled performance to Portland’s Bossanova Ballroom.

I had high expectations (pun not intended) for this show, as I have been low-key obsessed with Lil Debbie since she and Kreayshawn dropped the ultimate banger "Gucci Gucci" in 2012. My friend (and fellow Mercury writer) Emma Burke and I even filmed a (fortunately unreleased) version of the track's music video back in high school—complete with amateurish verses I have since erased from memory.

Lil Debbie was hesitant to start rapping, choosing to focus on her career as a fashion designer, but finally gave in after Riff Raff insisted she feature on his 2012 song "Michelle Obama." Since then, she's released four full-length albums and a bunch of EPs and singles. In 2015 she released Homegrown, a record entirely dedicated to marijuana.

Lil Debbie’s show promised to be a “4/20 party” but the signs around the Bossanova that read “Weed may be legal in Portland, but you can’t smoke it in here” gave off a different vibe. The few who dared smoke inside the venue had their shit confiscated and a few were asked to leave. (However, the gravel lot adjacent to the Bossanova was a different story.)

Lil Debbie performed a mix of old and new songs, including some off the EDM/house/experimental EP XXIII that she dropped in March with the Barong Family, a record label in Amsterdam that was founded by Yellow Claw. Her performance of the song "Today" was a particular highlight due to the intense bass drops and cocky-ass lyrics—the majority of which are “I don’t give a fuck about you.”

What makes Lil Debbie so great is her mix of shameless boasting and adorable self-awareness. For example, after repeating “Biiiitch, you ain’t got shit on me, you ain’t got shit on me” about a million times in a song, she laughs and says, “Yo, that was a selfish-ass song! Sometimes I listen to music that I’ve made and it’s so selfish!” It’s okay, Debbie, I love it.