TLC, En Vogue & Salt-N-Pepa Bring the IT’S ICONIC Tour to Riverbend

Riverbend Music Center | Cincinnati, Ohio | August 21, 2026

 

I found an old mixtape the other day.

You remember those, right?

I dug out my old cassette player, popped the tape in and hit play.

The first thing I heard was En Vogue singing “My Lovin’ (You’re Never Gonna Get It).”

Then TLC came through the speakers.

Then Salt-N-Pepa.

Before I knew it, I was right back there. Cassettes. MTV. High school. Songs I hadn’t thought about in years suddenly sounding as familiar as they did the first time around.

Except…

Wait a minute.

This wasn’t an old mixtape.

This was Friday night at Riverbend Music Center.

And Cincinnati had just hit play.

 

Starting With THAT Song?

 

 

En Vogue opened the night with “My Lovin’ (You’re Never Gonna Get It).”

Seriously?

We’re starting there?

That could have been an encore.

I remember thinking, If they’re already playing this, what in the world are they going to play later?

Turns out I had forgotten just how deep these catalogs go.

Because the hits just kept coming.

That became the rhythm of the entire night. En Vogue would come out and give us a few. Then TLC. Then Salt-N-Pepa.

Back and forth they went, almost like a musical relay race where nobody wanted to be the one who slowed things down.

There really wasn’t a lull.

At one point, I finished shooting, put my camera gear away, grabbed a beer and started listening as a fan.

Another hit.

Then another.

Then another.

It became almost ridiculous.

Oh my gosh, I forgot about this one too.

That’s what made the IT’S ICONIC Tour such a blast. On paper, putting TLC, Salt-N-Pepa and En Vogue together already sounds pretty great. In reality, you start realizing just how many songs these women gave us.

 

Funky Divas, Indeed

 

 

If I had to pick a favorite from the night, I’m giving it to En Vogue.

And maybe part of that goes back to being a kid with a cassette copy of Funky Divas.

I’m a rocker at heart. Always have been.

But when En Vogue released “Free Your Mind,” even the rock kids paid attention.

That song had some teeth.

More than three decades later, it still does.

When En Vogue hit “Free Your Mind” at Riverbend, everything I remembered about that song came rushing back. The power was still there. The message was still there. The voices were still there.

It didn’t feel like three decades had somehow watered it down.

If anything, hearing it again reminded me why that kid bought Funky Divas in the first place.

And yeah, I was probably shaking my moneymaker a little while holding a camera.

Rock credibility intact.

 

No Scrubs Here

 

 

Then there was TLC.

I didn’t realize how badly I needed to see TLC live until I actually saw TLC live.

There was something about seeing Chilli walk onto that stage that immediately triggered another part of my musical memory.

Like, Holy crap. That’s Chilli.

And these songs?

I knew every one of them.

“Creep.”

“No Scrubs.”

The songs and videos that seemed to be everywhere during a certain period of our lives were suddenly happening right there in front of us.

But one of my favorite moments wasn’t even a song.

Someone near the stage was wearing a shirt featuring Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, and Chilli spotted it.

She acknowledged the shirt and, for a moment, Left Eye became part of the night too.

I loved that.

There was no pretending that part of TLC’s story didn’t exist. No trying to move beyond it or erase it.

She was part of TLC.

She always will be.

And for a few moments Friday night, Cincinnati got to celebrate her too.

 

Salt, Pepa…and Spin

 

 

Salt-N-Pepa brought another piece of history with them to Cincinnati.

Behind the decks was none other than DJ Spinderella.

The original Spinderella.

Deidra “DJ Spinderella” Roper parted ways with Salt-N-Pepa in 2019, and what followed wasn’t exactly pretty. There were disagreements, a lawsuit and years where seeing Salt, Pepa and Spin together again didn’t necessarily seem like a given.

But time has a funny way of changing things.

Spinderella reunited with Salt and Pepa for the IT’S ICONIC Tour, marking the first time in years that the three have toured together.

And there they were Friday night, sharing a Riverbend stage again.

That made songs like “Push It” and “Shoop” feel like more than another trip through the ’90s.

There was some history standing on that stage.

And maybe that’s one of the things this entire tour gets right.

It doesn’t pretend the years between then and now didn’t happen.

It celebrates everything that did.

 

Friday Night at Riverbend

 

 

And the audience was absolutely along for it.

Look around Riverbend and you could see people who probably owned these albums on cassette standing next to people experiencing some of this music for the first time.

People dressed for it.

People danced.

People sang.

People came ready to have a good Friday night.

And that’s exactly what they got.

It may have been nostalgia that got some people through the gates, but nostalgia wasn’t enough to explain the energy inside.

Nobody onstage seemed interested in treating this like a museum piece.

There wasn’t a lot of ego.

There wasn’t a lot of downtime.

It was just fun.

Remember fun?

Sometimes after a long week, that’s exactly what you need.

 

We Weren’t Hanging Onto the Past

 

 

There’s always a danger with a tour built around artists whose biggest records came decades ago.

Nostalgia can be great.

Nostalgia can also get a little awkward.

Friday night wasn’t awkward.

Not even close.

Nobody was desperately trying to recreate 1994.

We weren’t hanging onto the past. We were celebrating it.

There’s a difference.

These songs still sounded good.

The women performing them still commanded the stage.

And watching different generations singing and dancing together made it pretty obvious that this music didn’t disappear when the ’90s ended.

I’m a rock guy.

Give me loud guitars and I’m usually pretty happy.

But there’s absolutely no shame in putting those horns down for a night and shaking your ass to TLC, En Vogue and Salt-N-Pepa.

Because those ladies rocked Riverbend too.

Maybe that’s what surprised me most.

I walked into Riverbend expecting a fun throwback.

Instead, I found three acts that still have plenty left to say.

 

Maybe I Need That Cassette Again

 

 

By the end of the night, something had definitely been reactivated.

The fun button?

Maybe.

Whatever it was, I walked out wondering how I’d gone so long without regularly listening to some of these songs.

Especially En Vogue.

I started the night thinking about that old cassette of Funky Divas.

By the time I got home, I was already looking for the album on vinyl.

Maybe that’s the best compliment I can give the IT’S ICONIC Tour.

It reminded me of music I used to love.

Then it reminded me that I never really stopped loving it.

I just needed somebody to hit play again.