Concert Critique

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went and saw the Rotten American Pie Tour featuring Mac Lethal, Grieves, Approach, Matthew Canvas & Silent Army at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco.

 

First of all, just for the record, Bottom of the Hill is still my favorite venue in San Francisco... Nice design and atmosphere, great sound quality, and shows that actually start on time (a rare feat for hip hop concerts!).

 

Silent Army, a local bay area MC who I'd seen open for Glue a couple of times before, was the first to take the stage to perform. He isn't the most exciting MC live and his performance started off pretty mediocre, but he picked things up with a couple of more danceable tracks with better beats near the end. He also got into the crowd a little and kicked some pretty good flows during the last song of his set, which made for a fairly decent show opener overall.

 

Matthew Canvas, who wasn't mentioned in the flyer but is apparently touring across the US with Mac Lethal and co., took the stage after Silent Army and did a very short set of folk guitar numbers, spoken word pieces, and deliberately bad jokes. He used a large wind pipe with a microphone standing at its base for several choruses, and had nice laid back attitude and sense of humor that made him easy to appreciate for his short time on stage.

 

Approach and his rapping buddy Smooth Confusion were the next up to perform, and they wrecked shop with a show-stealing set of dancehall electro-crunk. High energy is an understatement when it comes to describing the show that these two gentlemen put on, as they were jumping and sprinting across the stage and through the crowd for pretty much the entirety of their performance. If that weren't hype enough, all of Approach's recent music has club-oriented beats with hard buzzing basslines and electro-funk synths, which made for some seriously danceable material. Combine that with the passion that these guys put in their vocals when it comes to rapping, and it adds up to quite a lively show. Very impressed, definitely my favorite set of the evening.

 

Grieves, a Seattle act who I'd heard of a bit in passing but was not really familiar with, took the stage next and put on a nice show. He came out wearing fake neon wire rim glasses and a weird panther hoodie, and kicked off his set by having his DJ spin a soul record by Teddy Pendergrass that reminded him of San Francisco. It turns out that Grieves has quite a bit of quality music in his repertoire, and his debut album "Irreversible" is actually excellent (I bought it at the show), though I'd note that his music does not translate as well to a live setting as Approach's stuff. He performed his tracks without any visible flaws, but did mostly low key depressing-sounding numbers and didn't induce much dancing or have as much stage bravado as Approach. It was still a nice sampling of his tracks, though, and I enjoyed the set.

 

Finally, Mac Lethal came out to headline the evening's show. I'd seen Mac a few times live before opening for P.O.S, and he was always entertaining. Since then, he put out his official album "11:11" (one of my favorites from last year), so I was looking forward to seeing him perform his more recent tracks live. Sure enough, he performed most of the tracks from "11:11" as well as some old favorites like "Walkin on Nails" and "DUI." It was a pretty good set, though I think I've seen Mac on better days... I think that for once, the lively and passionate crowd may have worked to his disadvantage. It seemed like almost everyone there knew all of his lyrics by heart (myself included) and were screaming them throughout his performance. As a result of this, it seemed like he didn't have to do as much to impress people and wasn't trying quite as hard as usual. Still, it was quite a good set... one highlight was when Mac invited Grieves back up to the stage during one of his tracks, and Grieves kicked a hilarious verse about his friends on myspace and how he needs to go to an internet cafe to use the net. Good stuff!

 

Anyway, it was a good show overall. Here's a vid I took of Grieves performing a new track from his forthcoming album on Black Clover Records (Mac Lethal's label):

 

[Wyvern]

Yesterday evening, I went and saw the Year of the Gift Tour featuring Matre, Ceschi, Kirby Dominant, Verble & Nabahe, and Venture Capitalists at the Elements Lounge in San Francisco.

 

Was a little uncertain if I was going to make the show since I was just recovering from a cold, but decided that the line up and the 5$ cover charge were pretty hard to pass up. I'd never been to the Element Lounge before and they seemed like a nice enough venue, with a narrow bar area leading to a small stage along with some pretty interesting designs and a bit of live art. Their sound set up was riddled with technical difficulties, however, and took a while before they got the microphones set up right for people to perform.

 

Venture Capitalists were the first act to take the stage, and featured a rapper named Self Advocate and another rapper whose name I didn't catch. I hadn't heard of either of them before, and they put on a pretty decent set. Their beats seemed pretty original and well-produced, with plenty of cinematic samples and some cool incorporations of beatboxing, but their rapping seemed strictly mediocre and pretty forgettable. Still, their mics weren't working 100% and there are certain acts that are just sound better on a CD than they do live, so not really judging their recorded material (which I haven't heard).

 

In an odd reordering of the show line up, Ceschi was the next up to perform. I think the reasoning behind this was because there were many people in the audience who came out to see Ceschi, and who had to leave on the earlier side due to it being a week night. Anyway, Ceschi Ramos is the main reason that I came out to see the show as well. I think he's an incredibly talented multi-instrumentalist, and is one of those people like doseone who has mastered the art of rapping but doesn't limit himself to it, opting instead to dive into all sorts of interesting styles of music. His set at the Element Lounge met expectations, as he kicked things off by composing a beat on the spot with his array of equipment and sang a soft rock ballad over it, only to break into punk-metal screaming by the end of it. He rapped absolutely ridiculous flows over a club hip hop beat and jumped through the crowd to get people hype then had everyone in the crowd sit down with him for a calm guitar folk song in the middle of dancefloor. What's great is that, while the crowd was mostly sparse and unenthusiastic throughout the show, Ceschi's set had a big flock of people watching and supporting him big time... including several California pseudo-celebrity rappers like Penny and Maleko. Anyway, from his fast-rapping melodic flows to his singing and guitar work, Ceschi is a diverse musical talent that's hard to come by. Great set.

 

Once Ceschi did a few encores and wrapped things up, Verble and Nabahe (hailing from San Bernando, California and Honalulu, Hawaii of all places) took the stage for a very short and rather good set. Verble kind of struck me as your run of the mill nerd rapper and was a little annoying to listen to, but Nabahe actually surprised me with his daring wacko style of rapping... must be something in the drinking water over in HI! Nabahe's voice and flows were quite original and stood out to me, plus his lyrics seemed like they were well-written and the beats that he and Verble rapped over were pretty damn nice. I felt a little bad for them because they had more technical microphone difficulties than any other act, plus they had the shortest set and got little love from the crowd, which had drastically dwindled since Ceschi left the stage. I'll be on the lookout for some of Nabahe's material in the future, though.

 

Matre of the English League was the next to step up to the stage, and was another reason I decided to check out the show. Matre's recordings have never struck me as being outstanding despite him having a couple of really great tracks, but I've gotten the sense in listening to his stuff that he might be a nice act to see live. And sure enough, despite a few turntable difficulties in the middle of his set, he got the place live with a number of really good performances. He was definitely the most traditional party-rockin rapper in the line up, though one highlight of his set was a new track in which he rapped and sung in Spanish over a salsa-type beat. Using his big single "98 Degrees" as his closing number was a nice touch as well. Very good performance.

 

Finally, to wind the evening down, Kirby Dominant stepped in and put on a short set. At this point, the audience consisted mostly of the artists who had performed and a few of Kirby's friends, which is strange because he's kind of considered an underground legend in the Bay area. He had a very different stage presence than the other performers, and was far more laid back with a kind of kingpin-ish swagger. He did a bunch of funny tracks about girlfriends and pimping, and brought out a few of his own girlfriends at one point to let them perform a funny freestyle thing. Not a bad set, kind of a nice way to close out the evening down. I should also note that Factor, the DJ of the evening, has quite an impressive production discography of his own, though he didn't do anything other than putting on records in this show.

 

Anyway, good show. I took some videos of Ceschi's set, but the visuals didn't come out because of the lighting alas.

[Wyvern]

This evening, I went and saw the When Life Gives You Lemons, You Paint Your City San Francisco Gold Tour starring Atmosphere, Abstract Rude, and DJ Rare Groove at the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco.

 

I reserved tickets for this show several months in advance despite the rather lofty price, knowing that Atmosphere tend to sell out their shows about a month in advance. Sure enough, the entire West coast string of their tour dates sold out a week before the shows started, so I'm glad I got my reservation in. Of course, Ticketmaster had to screw up my TicketFast order at the last minute, which resulted me spending an evening and morning with them on the phone before I got the tickets transfered to Will Call. My sister also came out with me to this show to see what all the Atmosphere hype was about.

 

The Regency Ballroom was a nice venue that looked more suited for classical music than a hip hop show, but which accommodated the performers and packed crowd well. They didn't accept cameras, unfortunately, so no photo or video documentation for this particular show.

 

Anyway, things started off with DJ Rare Groove spinning a bunch of classic old school hip hop records in typical warm-up fashion, along with a nice reggae set to add a little variety to the mix. Then, in a brilliant and excellent show idea, Slug of Atmosphere came out to host a set of Atmosphere karaoke featuring a few people in the crowd who were selected from a wider list of people who signed up.for the karaoke at the merch booth. These people took turns coming up to the stage to perform Atmosphere songs they'd memorized over the beat, with Slug acting as their hype man! A great deal of hilarity ensued, since most of the people were either horribly off-beat, forgot the lyrics, or had annoying nasal voices. Yet, all of them were admirable for stepping up and giving the karaoke thing a try in front of a packed crowd, and they each got a free CD for it. The hilarious highlight of the karaoke was probably a duo of girls who stepped up calling themselves the Walker Texas Rangers, who proceeded to perform "Modern Man's Hustle" (one of Slug's least favorite songs out of the stuff he's recorded) by yelling the entire thing with incredibly grating cheerleader voices... just awful, but too funny to watch. The only person who managed to get through his entire song without fault was some guy named John, who performed "Trying to Find a Balance" and had a large group of friends supporting him in the crowd. Great idea for a show starter, very interesting and hilarious to watch.

 

Once the karaoke was wrapped up, Abstract Rude came out to perform with his longtime associate Zulu Butterfly and another LA rapper who had the first name Hasaan. Ab Rude has been a mainstay of Los Angeles' esteemed Project Blowed collective for many years now, and has quite an impressive discography to his name. He kicked some tracks from his new album coming out soon on Slug's label Rhymesayers produced by Vitamin D, which I'm looking forward to, and also went into a number of his older songs. His swagger is decidedly mellow for the most part, and the laid back nature of the music didn't translate that well to a live setting in my opinion. A fight also broke out between two people in the crowd during the set, and watching an irate big guy get floored by a punch from a guy half his size distracted quite a few people from Abstract Rude's performance. Ab Rude is a damn good MC with some real quality tracks and his new album has a lot of potential, but his live show this evening wasn't really the best means of appreciating him. He performed a couple of great tracks that got the audience involved, but was only a decent act overall.

 

Atmosphere, who had a guitarist, keyboardist, and backup vocalist backing them up this time, took the stage next and put on one of the best performances I've ever seen from them. This is about my sixth time seeing Atmosphere live, but they've put out loads of great material since they last toured and have decided to keep a refreshing focus on some of their more recent stuff. What I loved about this performance from them is that it seemed like they chose a great deal of their best material for the set and then built upon it with the live musicians, adding new elements to it to make it fresh and interesting to listen to. Slug kicked a number of great tracks from his new album (possibly Atmosphere's best effort to date... and now the #5 album in the country to boot!), as well as some awesome tracks from their recent string of seasonal EPs and a couple of real classics from the album "Lucy Ford." Plus Slug's humor and charisma were in full effect in the short intervals between tracks, as well as in the way that he improvised and switched the lyrics of certain tracks to cater to San Francisco and the bay area. Highlights for me included their renditions of "The Rooster," "Between the Lines," "Like Today," "Puppets," "Little Man," "Shrapnel," and the list of hits goes on... Atmosphere also performed the bouncy track "You" from their new album for the first time live at this San Fran show, and while Slug admitted that this was his first time performing it and that the rendition wasn't perfect, it was great to witness him testing it out for the first time and to hear it live. They also slowed things down around the end for the encore, performing beautiful renditions of the tracks "Guarantees" and "Not Another Day" over only the accoustic guitar and few backup singing vocals. Anyway, I could go on and on and on, but bottom line is that Atmosphere is in top form at the moment. Awesome, awesome, awesome show. Glad I made it out to this concert, and glad that I got my sister to witness it too.

[troubled sleep]

One day in 11th grade math class, my then new-friend Paul looked at me and said, "Mary, I'd really like to go see radiohead with you. Next time they're here, we're going."

 

So on May 8th, nearly four years later, I went to see Radiohead at the Lakewood Amphitheater in Atlanta, GA. This was my first time both seeing radiohead and going to Lakewood--formerly High Fi Buys Amphitheater.

 

It was interesting. The opening act was a band called the Liars and whom I had never heard of. Paul's sister's boyfriend was really excited about them, though, and claimed that they were going to alienate nearly everyone in the audience. I'm still not entirely sure what he was talking about--I guess he though everyone would be slightly miffed by their music, but come on...we were going to see *radiohead*, it's not like we're strangers to inexplicable electronic/techno-ish stuff. At any rate, hardly anyone was really paying attention to the poor Liars because they started playing at 7:30, a full half hour before the show was even supposed to start. So nearly everyone with a real seat was still up and about, buying over-priced beers and pursuing the carbon neutral merchandise. Those of us who were too poor for real seats and had to stake out claims on the grass, however, did have to sit through the Liars, though I think my friend Paul and I were the only ones paying attention. Paul described them as kind of a bridge between new radiohead and old radiohead--that is to say, they definitely made use of electronic sounds and that kind of thing, but they actually *sang* and used a little bit of guitar. I wasn't a huge fan, but about two seconds after I turned to Paul and declared that I didn't like the band, they played two pretty good songs. However, from what I heard of the Liars, they seem to be pretty hit or miss when it came to song quality. The frontman was amusing, though, and would talk to us all in between songs about how great it was to be there, and what a bloody great night it was, and how we were all here to see radiohead and that was just bloody awesome, etc, etc, etc.

 

The liars finished up rather quickly--they only played for about half an hour and then disappeared. So 8:00--when the show was technically supposed to start--and nothing much was going on. So we sat. And we waited. And we got rained on. And my poor friend Paul--who is rather asthmatic--almost died multiple times because, again, we were back in the cheap seats on the grass and surrounded by smokers. So now it's 8:40. "They're going to start at 8:45, I bet," Paul says to me. It's 8:45. Nothing. 9:00, they finally get most of the things set up for radiohead--I'll talk about that in a minute--and they start testing the screen behind the stage. Of course everyone stands up, all excited as the screen flashes green and red at us...but it's all for nothing and we have to wait another 15 minutes. Meanwhile, we're getting rained on. Just another beautiful day in the atl! Luckily in staking out our claim on the grass, we'd constructed a sitting space out of ponchos, so at least we didn't have to sit on the wet grass. And anyway, it never rained *that* hard for any extended period of time, and the wind and the cold were nice--otherwise we would have probably choked on all the smoke and been really warm from the crush of people all around. Seriously, the crowd just kept going...especially once the band finally made it out.

 

After much waiting eventually we did get our radiohead!! I was kind of upset that they never turned on the large screens on the wall on either side of the stage--I was pretty far back, and while I could technically *see* Thom Yorke, I couldn't very well and it would've been nice if those screens had been on. Like I said, there was one behind the stage, but it was even further away. The lighting was pretty nifty. They had these huge...well, they looked like tubes hanging from the ceiling, and they would flash different colors and patterns along with the song. Along with the background screen, it created a very nice visual for each song. I've got an example for

and

that I found on youtube. I would have recorded my own, but ever since I got thrown out of the National Archives in Washington, DC on a school trip in 6th grade for trying to take a picture of the Declaration of Independence I've been a little skittish about bringing camera's into camera-free zones. Plus, I was in the cheap seats.

 

I'm going to be completely honest here and say that I really don't like much of Radiohead's new stuff. It was fun in the concert atmosphere just because everyone's all excited and it's live and it's great. But, really, the CD In rainbows has one, maybe two songs I actually like, but other than that, I find each song to be rather repetitive. That said, I *adore* their older stuff--especially things from OK Computer and The Bends. However, as I learned, the band doesn't agree with me and played primarily In Rainbows stuff. One couple help up a sign telling Thom Yorke that it was their 10th anniversary and he should play some old song--I'm assuming they were asking for Creep--but Thom just scowled(at least, I imagine he scowled, I was too far back to judge facial expessions) and told them to take their sign down and keep it down and no, they weren't going to play that song. Well.

 

The point is, however, that the concert was almost exclusively In Rainbows. However, there were some older songs, usually from Kid A or Amnesiac with two--The gloaming and There, There--from hail to the thief. I was especially pleased with There, There, I love that song and it was awesome live. There were some moments when I was a bit bored except for the pretty flashy lights. And I wasn't alone. So, we're all standing around staring at each other then eventually being like, "ok, this is fun...whatever...so, drunk people next to me, how are you? How's life? Hey, is that pot? I don't think that's legal...." And then suddenly we hear the intro to one of their older songs, Just! Everyone looks up all at once, excitedly shout the song title, and then everything went crazy!! And we're all dancing and singing and being insane and having fun!!! And it's great!! . . .and then when the song is over Thom Yorke goes back to moaning his way through more In Rainbows. And what I also found interesting was that while we're all going nuts and having the most fun with all the old songs(ok, so all three of them) that got played, the band--especially Thom Yorke--are super sedate. They looked bored. I suppose it's because they've played the older stuff about a million times, but it was still interesting to see the crowd enjoying themselves so much while the band looked like they about ready to die. Oh well, I enjoyed it! Other songs they played included House of Cards, Everything in its Right place, Where you end and I begin, Idioteque, Lucky(my friend Paul's favorite!), Bangers and Mash, Weird Fishes/Arpeggi, How to Disappear Completely, and other fun songs like that.

 

In a perfect world, they would have played High and Dry(the first radiohead song I ever heard, it remains my favorite) or Thinking About You or Bulletproof(I wish I was), but you cant have everything.

 

They came back out for two encores, as they've been doing at all their shows here on the east coast, at least. My favorite bit was when they played Paranoid Android at the very end!

 

The band's merchandise was all very "go green." For example, I bought a t-shirt made with 100% organic cotton and recycled water bottles. I'm not going to tell you how many hour's pay went into paying for it, I still can't admit it even to myself. They also handed out little pamphlets to raise awareness of human trafficking.

 

The point of all of this rambling is that it was ridiculously fun. I'll always enjoy radiohead's older stuff more, and I wish they'd let their older--and better!--albums figure more heavily into their set lists, but such is life. When we were driving home, Paul and I played all our favorites that we know they'll never play, blasting them as high as my horrible car speakers will go and singing along. It was great, and if I had the time and the money, I'd fly over to the west coast and watch them again and again!

[Wyvern]

Excellent concert review, troubled sleep! I'm sorry to hear that Thom York and co. didn't play more of their older material for you, but am glad that the show ended up being super fun for you and Paul anyway. It's cool that you got to hear "Everything in its Right Place" and "Paranoid Android" live, those are awesome tracks in my opinion (though I tend to like pretty much everything from "OK Computer" and "Kid A"). I haven't heard "In Rainbows," but wasn't that huge a fan of "Hail to the Thief" and will take your word for it that their most recent stuff isn't their best material to date. I've heard that the Liars are a pretty incredible rock band (that is, if this is the same Liars that put out "Drums Not Dead" the other year), but haven't really heard anything from them since it's not really my field... sorry to hear that you weren't too crazy about'em live. I think in general, large stadium events tend to detract from the atmosphere of the performances a bit. Anyway, I just wanted to thank you for sharing this very detailed, thoughtful, and enjoyable review troubled sleep. :-) Good stuff.

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went to see the "ShapeShifters" release party starring Invincible, Finale, Femi, and the Mamaz at Club 6 in San Francisco.

 

I'd never been to Club 6 before and was a little wary of the odd curtains surrounding the outside of the venue, but it turned out to be my kinda intimate spot and was located pretty close to late night public transportation, which is always a plus. I still need to get my timing right for hip hop shows, as I arrived there an hour later than the flyer specified but still had to wait about an hour and a half before anyone came on to perform! I dunno why hip hop shows are perpetually later than I think they're gonna be, but there you have it.

 

A local Bay area group called The Mamaz were the first to step up to the stage and kick it. I'd never heard of them before and feared the worst since their appearances didn't exactly suggest great MCs, but I was very pleasantly surprised by their set and will check for their material in the future. The two Mamaz both seemed to have a good deal of confidence and energy on the mic, and knew how to hype up the crowd and get them dancing with lots of fun club-oriented beats and catchy hooks. They had quite a few friends and supporters in the crowd as well, and got quite a lively reaction while performing their tracks. Quality set.

 

Another local act I'd never heard of, Femi, was the next up to perform. Though she had her occasional rap verses, she was more of a soul vocalist and relied on her singing to deliver her socially conscious lyrics. Unfortunately, I think that Femi was a little quick to jump the gun.... she came onto the stage expecting a really hype crowd after the Mamaz, but her call-and-responds and "get hype"s fell a little short. She seemed talented enough, and I'd be interested to hear some of her recorded material, but she also seemed a little overconfident on stage and didn't deliver as good a set as the Mamaz. A decent set.

 

Once Femi had finished, Finale came up to the stage to shine on the mic. Hailing from Detroit, Finale is one of the reasons I came out to see the show. He doesn't have a great deal of material out, and the one CD he is pushing lacks a bit in the beat department, but Finale is without a doubt a very talented rapper with a strong voice and a real thick Detroit drawl that makes for a natural flow. To my pleasant surprise, the beats that Finale rapped over during his set were all new and a great deal more interesting than the beats I'd heard him on previously, though unfortunately his mic was on too low and it muffled his style of rapping a bit. Normally a low mic wouldn't hurt an MCs performance too much, but I think Finale's laid back natural flow needs a decent sound level to sound right over blaring production. Still, I enjoyed Finale's set overall.

 

Invincible was the final headlining performer of the evening, and another reason I went out to see the show. Also repping Detroit and acclaimed as one of the more talented female MCs in hip hop, she's had a number of impressive guest appearances on people's albums over the years and only recently released her big debut solo album "ShapeShifters." I wasn't sure if she'd be able to hold down a set all on her own, but I immediately learned that she could do it with ease. Great voice and flow, plenty of excellent socially conscious lyrics to make you think, and a lively stage presence with lots of movement and charisma. She performed a number of excellent tracks from her debut album, including several tracks about her Palestinian heritage and the racism that arab people are faced with in the US, as well as tracks detailing the dilapidated state of the ghettos in Detroit. She finished her set with a 5 minute freestyle with Finale, where the two of them asked the crowd what motivates them every day and incorporated those words into their rhymes (I said "writing," for the record ;D). Invincible put on the best set of the evening hands down, very impressive.

 

Very good show overall, and particularly interesting given the number of female hip hop acts that performed. Might edit in some video later , but for now here's a pic of yours truly with Invincible post-show: http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c196/elitwack/DSC01966.jpg

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went and saw "The New Wine" release party featuring Qwel, Dirty Digital, Robust, Influence & RoKnew, and Gune Star at the Element Lounge in San Francisco.

 

I'd gotten minimal sleep the night before this show and had a fairly busy day to boot, so I wasn't quite as social as usual with the artists. I did still rock out in the front row for the whole show, though, and really wore myself out dancing. This was my second visit to the Element Lounge, and I once again thought it was a nice spot despite the sound being turned up a little too loud for a few of the acts (there was a little ringing in my ears for a while after the show, but it's passed now).

 

Anyway, the first act to perform was a bay area group I'd never heard of called Gune Star, who weren't listed in the line up and who seemed a little out of place in the context of the rest of the artists performing. They were pretty energetic performers and seemed to be having a lot of fun with their music, which I appreciated, but their material definitely seemed oriented towards getting radio play and their topics and cadences felt a little played out to me. In some ways, the materialistic elements of their songs reminded me of a B-version of the Chicago rap group The Cool Kids, who aren't exactly my favorite group to begin with. Gune Star had quite a few friends and family in the audience supporting them, though, and put on a pretty decent set overall.

 

Next up to perform were Influence & RoKnew, who also brought their energy to the table and put on quite a nice set. I'd seen Influence open for many Galapagos4 shows in the past, but his buddy RoKnew from Chicago was new to me and performed quite nicely. The songs they kicked definitely showed that they'd been collaborating on music for a while, and the two of them did some solo tracks as well including a few numbers from Influence that I'd heard live many times in the past. Influence's other rapping partner Avalon also stepped up at one point to perform a few of his older numbers with Influence, and the set ended with a freestyle session over the beat for "I've Got 5 On It" between the three of them and Robust. Pretty nice performances all around, I liked the set.

 

Robust stuck around on stage after Influence and RoKnew finished up, and was the first artist from the Galapagos4 collective to perform. Robust has a couple of excellent solo albums under his belt, though the last I saw him perform with Prolyphic as the Stick Figures I was rather unimpressed by his live show and found it kind of lackluster and unprofessional. Fortunately, this time around he was much better. He approached his solo songs in a loose manner that incorporated some freestyling and improvisation, and performed some very good tracks from his albums "El Foto Grande" and "Potholes in our Molecules," as well as some newer verses including his hilarious diss track to Sage Francis "Chubby Vegan." I should note that while Robust rapped well, there is something in his personality and interactions with others that annoys me a bit... he strikes me as the sort of person who would take advantage of those around him to move towards his own goals if given the opportunity. Never the less, quite a good set from Robust, which is a relief after that Stick Figure performance from a few years back.

 

Dirty Digital, a newly formed group consisting of Qwazaar and Silence, were the next G4 alumni to hit the stage and they rocked it really hard. I was once again a little skeptical since Qwazaar, though an excellent MC on record, did not impress me the last time I saw him live as a solo act. It seems that Qwazaar has really reinvented his music for a live setting through this Dirty Digital thing, though, and I couldn't be happier with the transition. The performance essentially consisted of one extremely hype electro track after another, with unusual club-ish synthetic production and lots of killer hooks and ridiculous flows. There were certain tracks where it almost seemed as though the entire song was one huge extended hook, which worked wonders in getting the crowd revved up and chanting along. Dirty Digital struck me as the sort of group that could be big on the dance scene if marketed the right way... their single "Sodapopinski" sounded like a club riot waiting to happen. Great set, I got super hyped over their tracks.

 

Finally, Qwel came out with Robust as his hypeman and put on a pretty crazy set of fun antics and impressive tracks. Qwel is Galapagos4's flagship artist, with more albums under his moniker than I'd care to count and an ever-impressive flow to get his thought-provoking lyrics across. This must be like the sixth or seventh time I've seen him live, and he's very rarely disappointed me with his sets. His performance this evening was particularly crazy, as it went in all sorts of odd and interesting directions while maintaining a certain standard of quality. Qwel definitely struck me as being stoned in a major way during this show, but that didn't hurt his set at all and actually added a certain comedic element to his stage antics and kept people guessing. He performed a number of tracks from his most recent album "The New Wine," some of his old standards like "The Manhatten Project" and "The Highest Commitment," a couple of new acapellas and a variety of other tracks from his body of work. Things started getting really crazy when Qwel called up Denizen Kane, who happened to be in the crowd that evening, to the stage with Qwazaar to perform tracks as their colelctive group Typical Cats. Denizen eventually took the stage after much hesitation due to him being drunk out of his mind, but ended up forgetting about 80% of his lyrics and eventually sitting the set out. Oddly, despite being mostly silent for the performance, Denizen's presence seemed to motivate Qwel and Qwazaar to go into overdrive with their verses and made the crowd go wild. And just when Typical Cats stopped performing and people thought that Qwel had had enough, the beat to one of Qwel's hypest tracks "Broken Wing" came on and he bared his teeth with a barbaric look and started spitting his heart out. That track was followed by another, and another until the show finally let out at 2 in the morning. Qwel gave me several pounds and even hugged me during his set for being such a supporter in the front row the whole time... good times!

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went and saw Flobots, Doomtree, and Busdriver live at Slim's in San Francisco.

 

I was very excited when I saw the lineup for this show since Doomtree is pretty much my favorite hip hop group at the moment, and I don't believe they've all toured together outside of Minnesota until now. I'm pretty indifferent towards the Flobots, but Doomtree was enough to get me to order my ticket in advance and my anticipation for the show increased when the ever-reliable Busdriver was added to the bill. Despite my extra high expectations, I must say that the acts that I came to see delivered in full.

 

I wanted to make sure to get in the front row for this show, so I arrived at the venue an hour before the show was scheduled to start only to find that a line had already formed outside the door! Maybe it's because Slim's is an all-ages venue or maybe it's just because Flobots and Doomtree have more committed fanbases than I realized, but I was pretty surprised at the large turnout of people so early in the evening. Fortunately, I still managed to get in the front row despite the crowd. Another surprise to me was that the show actually started on time at 8 PM sharp, which is a real rarity for hip hop shows.

 

Busdriver was the first to kick things off, and he delivered an insane experiment-fueled set of abstract club bangers that ranks up there as one of the best sets I've seen from him. He came out wearing a party hat and Hawaiin lai, and proceeded to fool around with a microphone foot pedal and a sampler/beat machine while crooning some sort of bizarre distorted pop medley. He then went crazy on stage in typical Busdriver fashion, rapping in his twistedly comic voice at lightening fast speeds and manipulating his vocals and beats in all sorts of interesting manners. He performed a number of tracks with beats that worked very well in a live setting, such as "Recreational Paranoia" and "Casting Agents and Cowgirls," and improvised both in terms of his raps and in terms of the way the beats were structured with his beat machine. One highlight moment of his set was when he performed the track "Something Bells" and the talented rapper 2Mex came out as a surprise guest and began kicking verses with him! 2Mex stuck around for the rest of Busdriver's set as a hypeman and kicked a couple of his own verses, including a very impressive acapella that demonstrated his style well to the masses. One image that remains in my mind from the set is when Busdriver transformed the beats to one of his tracks into a ultra-repetitive techno-esque 2-second sample beat and began rapping at dangerous velocities while 2Mex did jumping jacks on stage as if it were a workout video. Really great set. I think a lot of people who came out to see the Flobots didn't know what to think of the madman on stage and Busdriver didn't get as much love from the crowd as he should have, but I was really into it and was very thoroughly entertained and impressed. Busdriver's the man.

 

Once Busdriver finished his set, Doomtree came out and blew people's wigs back with an intense and energetic set of hype anthem-style tracks. P.O.S, Dessa, Cecil Otter, Mictlan, and Sims were all present on stage to rap together, with their resident DJ Turbo Nemesis on the cuts and their super-producer Lazerbeak chilling somewhere in the background. Doomtree is a rare example of a rap group where it's difficult to choose a standout member since all of the MCs are extremely talented and have their own original styles to add to the collective melting pot. P.O.S was perhaps the best known of the performers to the crowd since his albums on Rhymesayers have gotten much better distribution than the other members of the crew, but the audience didn't seem to be prepared for the high-caliber performances of the other Doomtree MCs and got very amped and excited when Doomtree started kicking their tracks as a collective. Their entire set was an extremely energetic rap performance of the highest caliber, the sort of stuff that's very difficult to stand still and not get excited over. Some highlights included the Sims & P.O.S collabo "Accident" which works perfectly in a club setting with its bouncy beat and very hype hook, the Mictlan solo track "Game Over" which had people screaming along in a major way, the crew track "Flex" that showed how well the MCs measured up to each other, and the list goes on... Cecil Otter was a bit of a lone wolf during the set and kicked mainly solo tracks, but the calmer poetic nature of his songs offered a refreshing break from the hypeness of the rest of the set and his lyrics caught people's attention. One thing I was very happy about was how much love Dessa's tracks got from the crowd - she's truly talented and criminally overlooked in my opinion, and the audience seemed to feel the same way as she rarely managed to get through a verse without an eruption of cheering from the crowd! Bottom line: Doomtree lived up to expectations. Awesome set.

 

I was pretty worn out by the end of Doomtree's set, but stuck around the front for the Flobots just to see what all the hype surrounding these guys is about. They had a pretty elaborate live set-up, with a drummer, a bassist, a guitarist, and a violinist all backing them up and performing the tracks live... however, somehow I didn't find them nearly as dynamic or exciting as the evening's other two acts. To the group's credit, they seemed to really know how to perform their tracks live, with the live musicians backing the MCs well. The funk they provided seemed pretty standard to me, though, and was not something I haven't seen other live band hip hop acts cover before. The group also broke out some very nice dance moves and some interesting props, but on the flip side the lead MC of the group seemed painfully average to me. My favorite member of the group was probably the violinist, who really got down on occasion and definitely seemed to know what she was doing... she even sang during one track and was quite good at it. But when all's said and done, the Flobots ended up sort of boring me... after about 7 or 8 of their songs I moved away from the front row and went to chat with some of the Doomtree dudes a bit.

 

... which resulted in the following pic: http://i27.photobucket.com/albums/c196/elitwack/DSC02158.jpg Left to right: P.O.S, Dessa, Wyvern, Sims.

 

And here's some video footage I took:

 

Busdriver performing a new track live:

 

Doomtree performing "Flex" live:

 

Doomtree performing "Kid Gloves" live:

 

Great show! Even the Flobots, while not my favorite, were a nice little addition to the performances.

[Wyvern]

Today, I went and saw a free in-store performance by Immortal Technique at Rasputin's Records in Berkeley.

 

I remember Immortal Technique being a very impressive live performer a few years back when I saw him in Washington DC, but I've gotten a bit tired of his revolutionary "overthrow the government" persona since then and find it a bit gimmicky. Unfortunately, he didn't strike me as being particularly impressive live this time around either... he rolled on stage about 40 minutes late with a posse including rapper Poison Pen and kicked a couple of tracks in an adequate though unexciting manner. While I remember him being very calm and confident with his aggressive lyricism back in DC, he seemed to be trying to be a little more hype with his rapping here and it didn't work as well as it should have. The most annoying part of his set was that he paused between every song to go on a 5 minute tirade of political boasting, which made it feel more like a stuck-up lecturer talking than a performer. There was a large crowd in attendence, including a few 8 year old girls sporting khaki caps and bandanas who were really into it, but overall this show was not my cup of tea.

[Wyvern]

This evening, I went and saw Giant Panda, Hopie Spitshard, and Niko Villamor at the 111 Minna Gallery in San Francisco.

 

This was my first time at the Minna Gallery, and it seemed like a cool little art gallery with some interesting paintings and a nice design. I ended up arriving there way too early (aka at the time scheduled on their website) and had to wait a little over two hours for anything to happen, which was tiring and something I should have anticipated at this point. I was a little surprised at the lack of a stage in the Minna Gallery at first, but they opened a wall that led into another area of the venue with a full stage shortly before the live entertainment started. I should note that their stage was decorated with a very cool Obama-meets-Lincoln painting, and there was also live art by Dyno Crew and J.Todd.O during the sets, which was nice. On the downside, the sound quality of the venue wasn't the greatest, though it wasn't really terrible either.

 

The first act to perform was a rapper by the name of Niko Villamor, who was not very impressive and didn't get much of a response from the crowd. I thought he lacked a certain personality and charisma on stage that prevented his songs from ever really engaging the audience, but on the plus side he invited up a rapper friend of his called J. Millions who was actually quite good and outshined him on their collaborative tracks. Niko Villamor's set was mercifully short, and didn't leave much of an impression on me.

 

The curiously named Hopie Spitshard was the next to take the stage to kick rhymes, and seemed to be the reason that most people came out to the show despite Giant Panda's wider discography and overall popularity. I'd never really heard of her until this evening, but am guessing that she's one of those local bay area phenomenons and that she had a lot of supportive friends in the venue. Her set was a lot better than Niko Villamor's as she definitely had her own stage presence and personality on the mic, though she's far from the most talented female MC and her high-pitched voice and cadence took some getting used to. Still, she had some pretty likeable tracks and a few standout verses, and the crowd seemed to be into her stuff. While I wouldn't run out to buy her CD after seeing her live, Hopie's set gets a nod of respect from me.

 

Giant Panda were the last ones to come out to perform, and put on the best set of the evening by far. They were the main reason that I came out to see the show, and lived up to the fun and energetic feel of their albums with their live show. Newman and Chikaramanga (possibly the best japanese rapper I've heard) were both very good performers, but Maanumental's performance stood out to me the most with his intense energetic rhymes and effortless swagger. The three MCs knew how to play off each others rhymes well, with Chikaramanga mostly handling the turntables but stepping out to kick a verse every now and then, and their set got me dancing in a major way. The frustrating thing about it was that most of the Minna Gallery crowd didn't seem to even care that Giant Panda was there, and kind of peetered out after Hopie Spitshard left! It angers me when a group a hundred times more skilled than another group gets no love because the crowd doesn't know them on a personal basis... the lack of any enthusiasm in music crowds is something that really bugs me about live shows these days. Great set from Giant Panda, overall.

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went and saw James Pants & Daedelus perform at the the Elbo Room in San Francisco.

 

The Elbo Room was far more packed than I'd ever seen it before for this event, possibly because it was part of some weekly clubbing event called "Bodyheat" that seemed to draw a lot of San Francisco people out. That, or James Pants and Daedelus just have much larger fanbases than I expected. Anyway, another thing that was unusual for the Elbo Room this evening was that they had a big set-up of mist machines and dancing light effects from all angles, which made for a pretty cool atmosphere but which also got a bit annoying after a while. Unfortunately, due to the set up it was pretty much impossible to take good photos of the event, so no photographic evidence for this show.

 

After a DJ named Blackjack spun a bunch of techno numbers, Daedelus was the first to take the stage to perform. The last time I saw him was in a much smaller crowd in San Francisco, but the larger audience seemed to be really digging his stuff despite one or two hagglers not being into it. Daedelus did another of his signature experimental beat sets using his laptop and his big machine of flashing buttons, which he used to manipulate the sounds of various tracks in a skillful manner. Some highlights of his set were when he took the beginning of Nirvana's "Never Mind" and constructed a beat out of it using repeated vocal samples and an additional electronic backdrop, and when he did an experimental live rendition of his already crazy track "Sawtooth EKG." Daedelus is definitely one of the best modern beat-makers working in hip hop and electronica, and though his live set is considerably different than his recorded material, it's certainly a spectacle worth beholding. Very nice set.

 

Once Daedelus finished, James Pants came out and spun an impressive and eclectic DJ mix set. James Pants is a weird electronica producer in his own right, with a kind of nostalgic emphasis on music of the 80s and 70s, but he performed very little of his own material in favor of a party mix set that showed his very diverse tastes in music. It seemed that one of James Pants' goals for the evening was to tap into as many danceable genres of music as possible, and he went from obscure funk and soul numbers to disco to rock (Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love" was spun to great effect) to old school hip hop to Brazilian to electronica to regional Mexican music. He even cleverly included a section for karaoke music, singing over some old funk number and holding the mic out for various people in the crowd to sing along too. While I generally wouldn't go out and pay to see someone spinning records, James Pants' mix was exceptional and a nice compliment to Daedelus' electronic set. Good show.

[Wyvern]

Tonight, I went and saw Johnson & Jonson (Blu & Mainframe), the Earth Tones, and Jonah & Timeless at the 111 Minna Gallery in San Francisco.

 

I arrived to the show later than usual since my last experience at the Minna Gallery involved far too long a wait before the show started, and I was shocked to see the line for the show stretching around the block! Apparently, Blu and Jonah & Timeless are far more popular in the Bay area than I was prepared for, though it was nice to see such a great draw to an art gallery venue. On the downside it was a half-hour wait in line and the RSVP I thought I made for the show to get in for free didn't go through (plus the cover was $15, which is pretty steep for this sort of show in my book), but on the positive side of the spectrum I got in just when the performers were starting to come on.

 

Jonah & Timeless, a live soul/hip hop fusion-type band who I'd never heard of before, were starting to perform when I entered the venue. They were surprisingly fresh and got a lot of the crowd dancing with their soulful singing and instrumentation, not to mention the occasional rock guitar hook and double-time rapping flow. While Jonah & Timeless didn't really seem to be breaking any new ground as far as soul/hip hop hybrids with live bands go, they never the less appeared to be very experienced in their craft and put on a very solid effort. Very nice way to start a show.

 

The Earth Tones, who are part of some group called the [corny name alert] Reignforest Collective [/corny name alert], came on next. I hadn't heard of them either, and unfortunately they didn't deliver as good a set as Jonah & Timeless. The two MCs of the group seemed to be very founded in a traditional boom bap style of hip hop, which is dangerous ground to tread considering the number of groups out there who have already perfected the formula, and they ended up being pretty boring though non-offensive. At one point, in an attempt to liven up their set, they brought out a female MC by the name of Ruby to kick a few verses, but she was unfortunately rather unimpressive and didn't add anything to their performance. Kind of a "blah" set overall... I've seen it all done before, and far better.

 

Finally, Johnson & Jonson came out as the evening's headline attraction. I should note that Blu, the main rapper of the group, was the big name advertised on the flyer and the main draw of the event... he's been making some pretty big moves lately and is being acclaimed by many as one of the best new rappers to appear on the hip hop circuit. Anyway, Blu and Mainframe put on a quality set, performing a number of great tracks from their brand new self-titled album like "Bout it, Bout it," "Mama Told Me," and "The Gusto Room." Blu also performed a bunch of audience fan requests from his solo record "Below the Heavens," which got quite a few enthusiastic fans in attendance hyped. He didn't perform any C.R.A.C Knuckles material, unfortunately, though it would have probably been awkward performing that stuff with the other group member Ta'Raach not around for the show. After kickin' a bunch of tracks, Blu invited two additional rapper buddies of his, Cashius King and Sene, to the stage to perform a few tracks. Cashius King was very good, with a nice cadence and some really great beats to rap over. Sene was a bit annoying, however, and was definitely the worst performer out of that bunch... he seemed very cocky in his approach to trying to hype the crowd, and simply didn't stand up to Blu or Cashius King in the skills department. Never the less, it was a very good set overall and Jonah & Timeless came back on at the end to freestyle a bit with Blu and improvise a bunch of tracks off the top of their head. Blu also had only 9 copies of the new Johnson & Jonson record for sale prior to its release date next week, and I bought one of them off him just cus' I needed some new music and I'm hip like that. ;p Nice show.

 

Last but not least, here's some video footage of Johnson & Jonson performing the track "Mama Told Me":

[Wyvern]

I went and saw two free in-store performances this evening by People Under the Stairs and Murs. They performed at Amoeba Records and Rasputin's Records respectively, which are literally a block away from each other on the same street in Berkeley!

 

I wasn't sure if the timing of these two events would give me the opportunity to see them both, so I decided to give the priority to People Under the Stairs since I've seen Murs many times before but have only seen PUTS once in concert. There was a fairly good turn out to the event, though there was no Amoeba employee to introduce the People Under the Stairs and the crowd was pretty silent when they first got on stage... PUTS even cracked a joke about how it reminded them of a high school assembly meeting, hahaha. Anyway, People Under the Stairs rocked it well during their short set, with Thes One and Double K trading some skillful and passionate verses over their trademark funky beats. They performed a few tracks off their new album "Fun DMC," and a few of their classics like "Acid Raindrops" and "San Francisco Knights." They also brought out the talented Shawn Jackson as a guest, who kicked a verse and then got into a pretty hilarious freestyle session between him and Thes One. Their upbeat energy eventually got the crowd chanting along and having fun, and it was definitely a good show overall.

 

After the People Under the Stairs show had finished, I decided to walk over to Rasputin's to see if I could make it to the Murs in-store as well. Sure enough, I got there with plenty of time to spare. Rasputin's Records really filled out before Murs came on to perform, in fact I would say that it was more packed than I've ever seen it before, with the aisles and front area of the store sardined with excited fans. Unfortunately, Rasputin's really blew it as the Murs in-store ended up being pretty disasterous! Murs' mic was fuzzy from the get-go and the sound system lasted for about one song before completely malfunctioning, which resulted in practically no songs being performed. Murs was cool about it and just ended up turning his in-store into a Q&A session between him and random people in the crowd, but another problem with the set-up was that he was speaking from an elevated platform rather than the regular Rasputin's stage, which limited the interactions with the fans a bit. Overall, it was a failed in-store and a bad look for Rasputin's, since Murs' in-store at Amoeba a year or two ago was great.

[Wyvern]

Today, I went and saw a free performance from the group Restiform Bodies at Amoeba Records in Berkeley. I wasn't overly excited about seeing the group since I haven't really been into any of Anticon's newer artists for a couple of years now, but the Restiform Bodies have been around for a while so I figured it would be worth checking them out for free. There was a small turn-out to the event, but they still performed for a solid twenty minutes or so. I found their music technically well put together, with some very abstract beats and half-rapped half-sung cadences, but overall I found the set a bit dull and thought their showmanship was lacking. The producer of the group was not bad on the live sampler, but the rapper Passage seemed like a slightly generic spin-off of Anticon's flagship artists. Not a great show, but not bad for a freebie overall.

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went and saw Awol One, Trey Loc, Paraiah, and MC Philosophy at the Element Lounge in San Francisco.

 

The show started way later than it should have, with the first act taking the stage at 11:45 PM (a 2 hour and 30 minute delay from the door time). Very few people were present at the Element Lounge, and most of them seemed to be friends of the various performers. There were a definitely a few die-hard Awol One fans in attendance as well, though, along with a couple of excellent breakers who were showing off their dance moves.

 

MC Philosophy was the first to perform, and he brought the bay area collective Bayliens on stage with him. They unfortunately more or less lived up to their trite names with a pretty mediocre set, though the freestyle that the Bayliens kicked at the end was fairly good. Their beats seemed party-oriented, which is always nice in a club setting, but the rhymes didn't impress me much and nothing really stood out about them.

 

Paraiah came on stage next with a short set that didn't feel very professional and was even less impressive than MC Philosophy's set. I got the impression that it was Paraiah's first time performing, as he seemed very worried and worked up over technical sound difficulties. Aside from a few of his friends in the front row, no one seemed that interested in watching him perform. And I can see why... his music struck me as generic, and I found him somewhat boring despite the brevity of his performance.

 

Next up to the stage was Trey Loc, who upped the quality of the show with a nice performance. He had the shortest set of the evening, and only performed three or four tracks due to time constraints since the concert started so late. As a member of LA's Project Blowed and the group Chillin Villain Empire, he definitely had a refined style and distinctive voice as far as hip hop goes. While his underground version of hardore gangster rap may not personally appeal to me as much as some of Project Blowed's other stuff, he never the less demonstrated that he was a veteran rapper with a strong voice and flow.

 

Once Trey Loc finished up, Awol One came out as the headliner and put on a pretty damn good show. He was the person I came to see and was definitely the most original and creative rapper out of the acts that performed, with a very distintive low bass in his voice and plenty of oddbal topics and humorous lyrics. He kicked his set off by playing a bizarre children's song about vampires, and then got into a number of great tracks like "Sleepin All Day," "Old Babies" and "Rhythm." At one point in his set he poked fun at Sage Francis, and then did his own variation of "spoken word poetry" which consisted of a random and hilarious improvised tangent about going to get eggs for breakfast instead of waffles. Trey Loc also joined Awol for one collaborative track, "She Dances Wicked," which worked very well and was quite danceable too. Thankfully, Awol One's set was longer than all of the other set times combined, which sort of made up for the poor quality of the opening acts. Awol's style is perhaps not that concert-oriented when all's said and done, since a lot of his stuff is headphone listening material, but he never the less put on a good show that got better as it went along. Good set from Awol, decent show overall.

[Patrick]

11/11/08 Lyon, Transbordeur

 

So I saw Epica yet again. The show yet again was awesome and if anything the group is getting better live than before. I was especially surprised at how much progress the singer has made. Her voice seemed to be even more powerful and seemed to be able to go even higher. I won't lose more time with Epica I've already praised them quite a bit in this thread, I'll however mention the two opening groups.

 

Kells, is a local group from Lyon, who joined Epica for the French part of their tour. They were quite enthousiastic in front of their home crowd and while their concert wasn't perfec it was quite good. Quite an enjoyable band to start with and possibly a future prospect to follow.

 

Amberian Dawn are a Finnish band. Their singer had a really great voice, but a pretty awful stage presence. A bit of a let down between two enjoyable acts.

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went and saw the Happy Holidays Tour starring Mac Lethal, Grieves, Soulcrate Music, and Approach at the Elbo Room in San Francisco.

 

I was excited about the show since this line-up of artists has proven to be a good show in the past, plus the various performers had a truckload of new merch for sale that I was interested in picking up. The Elbo Room was actually quite crowded and the audience was surprisingly enthusiastic for the show, though there were a few people who were perhaps a little too enthusiastic and tried to jump on stage and hog the spotlight as the acts performed.. Not a good look, fellas.

 

Approach and his rapping partner P Smooth (a.k.a Smooth Confusion) were the first to hit to stage, and kicked things off the right way with an excellent set of high energy club tracks. The last time I saw these guys open for Mac Lethal they were sort of stole the show, and they were equally impressive this time around. Approach really gives it his all when he performers, racing around the stage and through the crowd while performing some very impressive verbal gymnastics. P Smooth is an excellent rapper as well, with a great voice and calculated flow. Combine these elements with the Approach's choice of club-oriented beats, and you really can't lose in a live setting. One highlight of his set was a new track they performed over a beat by Mac Lethal, which was also definitely aimed at a live show with a pounding bassline and catchy hook. Great set, these guys put on an awesome live show.

 

Soulcrate Music came out next, and were the one act that I hadn't seen live before in the line-up. Hailing from the unlikely region of Sioux, South Dakota, Attn:def and Dirt Dee put on a very impressive set of upbeat tracks that got the audience amped and involved. Their music worked very well live, with plenty of chant-along hooks and impressive rhyme schemes to get the crowd rowdy to. Some highlights of their set were the track "Rap Music From the Middle of Nowhere" and a verse that Dirt Dee kicked which he repeated at progressively faster speeds. Another great set.

 

Grieves came out next, with his new producer Budo behind the boards as well as various live instruments that included a keyboard, a trumpet, an electric guitar and a tambourine. The new music that they're putting out definitely seems interesting, with little sampling and a lot of live instrumentation and singing in its place. Despite this, the set they put on was definitely the worst of the evening, as the softer sound of their songs didn't work as well as it should have after the live sets of Approach and Soulcrate Music. The soft singing definitely got tiresome after a while, and to make things worst Grieves seemed annoyed with the apathetic crowd and started to gripe about sound difficulties and so forth. Still, their set did have its highlights, like when Budo started playing a super upbeat keyboard arrangement which triggered Grieves to sing Snoop Dogg-ish lyrics in a very high-pitched and comical tone. All in al, Grieves and Budo have very good recorded material, but their live set could use a bit of work.

 

Finally, Mac Lethal came out to cap the evening's entertainment off with Grieves supporting him behind the boards in a wrestler mask. One great thing about Mac Lethal's songs are their humorous and memorable lyrics, which make them fun to listen to and easy to relate to. It's cool when half of the crowd knows how to chant along with a performer's lines, and that was definitely the case of the Elbo Room fans at this show (myself included). He did a number of great tunes from his album "11:11" and his "Love Potion Collection" albums, including "Sun Storm," "Calm Down Baby," and "Black Widow Spider." He also did a few new songs from one of his future projects, which sounded pretty damn good, and talked it up with the crowd on a variety of humorous subjects. Very good set and very good show overall.

[Wyvern]

A few nights ago, I went and saw the Needle Exchange Tour featuring Existereo, Rec League, Mestizo, Cadillac Ron and the Bottomfeeders at Club 6 in San Francisco. I would have written about it earlier, but my laptop was down and I wanted to make sure to share a few pics in here as well.

 

I learned about this show about 12 hours before the event took place, possibly because it was announced the night before the San Francisco date that the tour kicked off on. Not a good sign for promotion, which was sure enough lacking and drew a tiny crowd of about 13 or so. It was actually one of the deadest and most annoying crowds I've witnessed to date... I was literally the only one cheering and jumping around at times, which is a shame because a number of the performers gave it their all.

 

A crew I hadn't heard of before called the Bottomfeeders were the first act to perform. I can't remember the names of the three MCs or the DJ, but they hailed from Minneapolis and I noticed that their CDs featured some production credits from the producers of Doomtree, which is always a good sign. Their set was not bad, with each MC delivering some good verses. One of the rappers stood out more than the others to the rhythmic cadences and double-time rhymes he kicked, but the other two had some good moments as well. It wasn't a set that really bowled me over and I did start to get slightly restless near the end, but they certainly weren't bad and it was a nice way to kick off the evening's line-up.

 

Cadalak Ron, another MC I hadn't heard of, took the stage next and put on a pretty decent straightforward set. His music was a lot more calm and low key than the Bottomfeeders, and he didn't really have the energetic stage presence of the opening act. Still, his rhymes seemed pretty good with some gritty lyrics and topics, plus the dark beats that he rocked over were not half bad. His set definitely went on for a bit too long though, and his DJ seemed a bit amateur-ish when it came to the scratches. The set didn't really win me over on Cadalak Ron's material, but I'd definitely seen a lot worse.

 

Mestizo came on next, and was one of the main acts I came to see. I'm a fan of his material and hadn't seen him live in a long while, so it was nice to see him perform again. He came out with a brand new track over a beat by the talented Thavius Beck, and I was sorta geeked to learn that Mestizo and Thavius are collaborating. It sounded like a very strong track, with Mestizo flowing just as well over Thavius's electro-vibes as his usual smoothed out California beats. He also played a bunch of his more recognizable material, and brought out the super-talented Denizen Kane as a surprise guest to do a few tracks as well. They kicked a bunch of their verses back and forth and freestyled over some improvised beats. Very good set.

 

Rec League, a group consisting of Richie Cunning, Rob Rush, and another MC whose name slips my mind, were the next to kick some rhymes. I hadn't really heard of them before aside from Richie Cunning's solo material, but they blew my wig back with a really excellent set that may have been somewhat of a show-stealer. My pics of their set are sparse due to the amount of dancing that their performance invoked, but they had even the dead crowd getting a bit amped and yelling along. The great thing about the Rec League's material is that their tracks basically consisted of one party anthem after another, as if all of the material they recorded was specifically oriented towards having a fun time at a live show. These guys also had a huge amount of energy on stage, and busted out some amazing dance moves and other humorous antics that captivated the crowd. Excellent set, color me impressed and a new Rec League fan.

 

After Rec League finished tearing the house down, Existereo closed the evening out with a trademark set of his mindboggling stylistic raps. Exist was another reason I decided to get out to the show on such short notice, as he's never disappointed me with his high-speed rapping antics live. This guy is fully versed in the art of flipping styles to impressive effect, rhyming a thousand syllables a minute only to switch to singing only to switch to a punk rock screaming fest. Mestizo also came out during Existereo's set and the two of them traded skillful verses and freestyled quite a bit. Quality performance, good show. Existereo doesn't get nearly as much shine as he deserves... and neither does Rec League, apparently.

[Wyvern]

Last night, I went and saw K-the-I???, Mister Salty, the Red Fox and Recaal at the Elbo Room in San Francisco.

 

K-the-I??? was the only act in the line-up that I had heard of, but I'm a fan of his extra-chaotic brand of hip hop and was curious to see how he performed live. Fortunately, his style translated surprisingly well to the stage, and all of the opening acts (who I doubted would be good) ended up delivering some good performances as well. The Elbo Room was packed pretty nicely with enthusiastic supporters, which surprised me since I've grown accustomed to the crowds being dead there. I later discovered that it was because many people in the audience knew the acts personally, which doesn't come as a big surprise in retrospect.

 

I arrived to the venue a little later than usual, in the middle of Recaal's set. He seemed to know what he was doing and had a strong punk influence in some of his songs, though the political subject matter of his songs seemed slightly played out. Still, he definitely rapped well and knew how to control his voice and flow in his songs, and the crowd was really into his set and grooving out in the front row. He was not quite as good as the other acts, but was a solid opening act that set things off on a good note.

 

The Red Fox came on next with his friend Earthquake acting as a hype man and occasionally an extra MC. It was Red Fox's birthday that evening and a lot of his friends in the crowd were determined to root for him and show him some love, so the crowd reaction was great throughout his performance. The support was not without merit, however, as Red Fox had another of very good songs in his arsenal and performed them well. One stand out was a track about his home town of San Pablo, which got the people who drove over from there to represent The beats to Red Fox's songs struck me as being particularly impressive, with an RJD2-ish feel to a number of them and a vibe that complimented Red Fox's style well. Good set.

 

Mister Salty was the next to perform, with DJ Turnstyle backing him behind the boards. Mister Salty was the act I was most skeptical of prior to seeing live, as I'd listened to some of his songs on myspace the day before the show and thought that they sounded horrible. I was very pleasantly surprised by his set, however, and found it entertaining as hell. The thing about Mister Salty is that he's not the greatest rapper in the world, with his rapping voice and cadence working against him, but he makes up for it with an excellent sense of humor, some unique beats, and some hilarious subject matter and one-liners. He kicked his set off with a cover of a 1930s dance song (now that's old school!), and proceeded to rap about Elmo and Big Bird being communists over a beat that sampled music from a toothpaste commercial. It seemed like ten people in the crowd lit up blunts simultaneously when his set started, and his entire performance was clouded with thick wafts of marijuanha smoke. He knew how to really entertain the crowd between tracks, and even rapped over a new Daedelus beat to my great surprise and admiration. I don't know if I'd ever risk purchasing one of his CDs, but as a live act Mister Salty gets two thumbs up from me. Super entertaining set.

 

K-the-I??? finished the show off with a super savage set of his off-kilter cadence and rhythms. K-the-I??? has a very unusual style of rapping in which he stays off-beat, yet incorporates his own rhythms into the track, coming off almost like a spoken word artist yelling at the top of his lungs at times. His style might have been disasterous live if it weren't mastered as well as it was, especially considering that he didn't have a DJ with him and switched the tracks himself on an MPC... but he delivered a very strong performance of raw beats and rhymes. There were no gimmicks or special arrangements in his set, he just stood in one place rapping and did every song from his album "Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow," one at a time. The Thavius Beck beats from that album were killer in a club setting, and the amount of passion and energy he put into his rhymes held my interest. Very good set, well worth my time and money!

 

Here's a clip I took of K-the-I??? performing the track "Cell-Shaded/Daydreams/Nightmares," to give you an idea of his style:

 

 

Great show. :-)

[Wyvern]

Last Sunday, I went and saw the 1969 tour starring Myka 9, Sole, Ceschi Ramos, Def3 & Lovemoney at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco.

 

I drove out to the show for a change, which worked very well since Bottom of the Hill has plenty of parking and it took a lot less time to get down there in a car. I was very excited about the line-up of this show... Myka 9, Sole, and Ceschi are all brilliant artists in their own right, and seeing them all together live is definitely a rare treat. The show lived up to expectations for the most part, though there were a few bumps and snags that prevented it from really blowing my mind.

 

Lovemoney was one of those snags, and kicked off the show the wrong way with an unimpressive set of B-grade synthetic beats and a completely unmemorable voice and flow. Lovemoney certainly boasted about being a next level rapper a lot in his lyrics, with one of his hooks going something like "I'm the best there is" over and over again in a terrible singing voice, but he did very little to back his claims. Not interested.

 

Def3 was the next to kick a set, with the well-established Canadian producer Factor backing him behind the boards. He stepped things up several notches with a pretty great set of traditional rap songs, with lots of great flows and some excellent bass-driven beats from Factor. One highlight of his set was a track he did at the end that incorporated a musical chorus similar to the Buena Vista Social Club, which was apparently composed by his father's band. I'd never heard of Def3 before, but his set definitely piqued my interest in his material (which was unfortunately not available at the merch stand due to shipping errors).

 

J. the Sarge, a friend of Myka 9, took the stage briefly before Ceschi's set to kick a few songs. His tracks ranged from average to mediocre, with a style that sort of struck me as poor man's version of Myka 9, minus the creativity. His performance ended up being another of the evening's little snags for me, as his style didn't stand out in any way.

 

Ceschi fortunately raised the bar once again with his set, which was perhaps the highlight of the evening's performances. Despite having a hoarse voice that prevented him from hitting some of the higher notes of his songs, Ceschi definitely delivered on the genre-bending range of his works, much like the last time I saw him at the Element Lounge in 2008. Different in this performance was a mini-band that Ceschi had assembled for his tour, which included a person on electric guitar and dudes on percussion and drum machines. Few can incorporate speed-rapping into catchy pop ballads as well as Ceschi, and he showed off his skills both in singing and rapping over the course of his set. Some highlights included a new rap song of his called "Count on It" that he performed incredibly well live and a soft folk song where he collabed on vocals with a guest whose name I think was Kyle David. Great set all around, the rest of the crowd was loving it too.

 

Sole came on next to perform, and did a good set of his tracks that maybe dragged on a little too long. Back in around 2002 or 2003, Sole was one of my favorite hip hop artists, with his first two albums "Bottle of Humans" and "Selling Live Water" both really bowling me over. Heck, I still use a quote of his from "Selling Live Water" in my Pen signature! His more recent material, while technically still original and good, hasn't really interested me as much for some reason... it might be that my tastes have changed or that I played him way too much when I was first getting into indie rap, not really sure. Anyway, this was actually my first time seeing him live, which made for an interesting and slightly nostalgic experience. Sole seemed confident in performing his tracks, which often border on off-beat rapping over experimental noise beats, and he did selections from all of his albums except "Bottle of Humans." He didn't have any special gimmicks to hold the crowd's interest, but he was good at performing his style of music live and put on a straightforward set. His music dragged on a tiny bit by the end of his set, however, which suggests that his music might not translate that well live after a while. Still, it was a moderately good set that brought back some memories.

 

Myka 9 was the last to take the stage, with Factor once again handling the DJ side of things, and ran through his gamut of styles from the last 20 years. Myka's one of those LA Project Blowed legends that's been innovating with styles in hip hop since the late 80s, and still has a lot to show for it. He started by performing his early verses from Freestyle Fellowship and swiftly transitioned between tracks, moving through his various solo works and his work in the group Haiku D'Etat before taking it to his most recent songs to date. Myka 9's soft-spoken style of rapping didn't work quite as well with the mic volume as some of the other rapper's, but his crazy creative flows spoke for themselves, at times sing-songy and at times moving too fast for words. It was impressive stuff worthy of an innovator of Myka's stature. His set ended with an hilarious freestyle session between him, Ceschi, Sole, Kirby Dominant, Def3 and Lovemoney... quite an interesting collaboration of styles! Sole came up with the best freestyle lyrics, but Myka and Ceschi impressed the most with their flows. Awesome ending to a pretty great set, not to mention show.

[Wyvern]

Earlier this week, I went and saw P.O.S, Sims, and Hand Over Fist (Mike Mictlan & Lazerbeak) at the Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco.

 

I was excited about this show since it was a number of my current favorite rappers (the whole line-up consisted of members of Doomtree, which is my favorite rap group at the moment) and it took place at my favorite venue in San Francisco. Bottom of the Hill got sold out before the evening was out, and a lot of people in the crowd were dancing away to the music like me. Needless to say, the acts in question didn't disappoint.

 

Hand Over Fist, a group consisting of Mike Mictlan on the rhymes and Lazerbeak on the MPC, were the first to perform. Those who read my review of Hand Over Fist's album in the Music Review thread will know how big a fan I am of these two, and the energy and drive behind their music translated predictably well to a live setting. Lazerbeak was manipulating his colossal beats on the spot while Mictlan spat his heart out, all of which made for a great set. One of my few complaints about the show in general is that at times, it may have gotten a little too loud for its own good... given the "umph" behind a lot of the beats and my postion near one of the speakers, my ears were ringing almost a day later! Can't really complain when the music was this good though... I'll just need to remember to occasionally pack a pair earplugs so I won't go deaf at 50.

 

Sims was the next up to perform, and he killed it with a set of almost entirely new material. Sims's new tracks sounded awesome, with many of them striking me as being a lot more hype than some of his earlier quieter material. They worked great in a live setting, of course, and Sims once again demonstrated how skillful he is on the mic over the course of his set. Another thing I love about Sims's live show is that he has a way of really connecting with the crowd and vibing off of them, which makes him all the more effective at controlling them when the time is right. One new track that stood out to me was a song that Sims described as "his only story song," which seemed to cover a range of personal interactions with people Sims knew and the way they stitched his life together. Lazerbeak backed Sims behind the boards, and apparently is producing the entirety of Sims's next album... can't wait!

 

P.O.S was the headliner of the evening and the person that most of the packed crowd had come to see, and did he disappoint after the excellent openers? Hell no! He actually improved upon his already impressive set, incorporating some electric guitar to let his punk music background shine through and working some drum machines as well. His opening track left me a bit worried as his improvisation on the screeching guitar muffled his rapping vocals (and was a bit too loud in general from where I was standing), but he came back very strong from then on out, performing mostly tracks from his brand new album as well as a couple of tracks from "Audition." It should be noted that some of these new tracks are lethal live... "Drumroll," "The Basics (Alright)," and "Savion Glover" were super great in particular. The highlight of his set and of the evening's performances, however, was when Sims and Mictlan joined P.O.S on stage to perform some collaborative tracks from the Doomtree and Hand Over Fist albums. "Shux" was amazing, "Gander Back" was insanely awesome and kicked off a Doomtree dance party as the rappers performed their verses whilst dancing in the crowd, and "Accident" was just unbelievable live. Me and several other people were yelling "There's gonna be an accident!" long before that track arrived, and when it hit home it certainly didn't let anyone down... it's just bonkers in a live setting. I hope they perform that one every tour stop. Anyway, everyone had a terrific time, P.O.S and co. included.

 

I shook Lazerbeak's hand after the show and told him his beats were inspirational to me. Good times! Check these guys out if they're passing through your city. They're super nice people, and amazing performers. And besides, modern hip hop don't get much better than Doomtree at the moment...

[Wyvern]

Yesterday, I saw P.O.S do a free in-store performance at Amoeba Records in Berkeley. P.O.S's "Never Better" tour passed through San Francisco as recently as two months ago, so it hadn't been too long since I'd last seen him perform, but it's always great to catch him live and this was no exception! Granted, it was far from the best set that I've seen from him, and it was much shorter than usual due to the free in-store nature of it all, but he still took the atmosphere of the crowd and vibed with it in a very down-to-earth and personal manner. He did a lot of chatting between tracks, and focused on the less energetic and more lyrical tracks of his catalog to get the audience involved (though "The Basics (Alright)" and "Drumroll" were performed from his hype repertoire). There was a nice turn out of P.O.S fans, which was cool since Amoeba in-stores have occasionally only had a few people in the audience, and it ended up being good times all around. Catch this guy in your area if you have the chance, he's currently on tour with Atmosphere through North America.

[Wyvern]

Last Friday, I went and saw the “I Heard It Today” tour starring Mr. Lif, Grieves & Budo, and Willie Evans Jr. at Bottom of the Hill in San Francisco.

 

I must say, this show thoroughly exceeded my expectations, and I was expecting a good show. I got to the Bottom of the Hill (which is still my favorite venue in the Bay area by a mile) early, got some dinner and chatted with Willie Evans Jr. and Lif for a bit. The spot filled out pretty well by the end of the evening, and as always the sound quality and lighting of the venue were excellent throughout the performances.

 

Willie Evans Jr. came out first to perform as the warm-up opening act. I wasn’t really as familiar with his material as I was with Mr. Lif or Grieves’s stuff, but I knew him by reputation and by the beats he’s produced for a number of solid hip hop artists including Mr. Lif. Anyway, Willie Evans Jr. put on an interesting set that incorporated projector screen visuals into the performance of the songs, and proved to be a good rapper in addition to being a good producer. Some notable moments of his set included a bit where he played a live performance video of Stevie Wonder and chopped up the video and vocals on the spot to rhyme over, and a song where he rapped over a beat that used the sounds of the NES game “Bionic Commando” while projecting a video of himself playing the game in the background. It struck me as a very creative set and I’ll be on the lookout for his stuff in the future.

 

Grieves was the next to come out with Budo backing him up on beats and instrumentation, and they really killed it. I was skeptical about their set prior to seeing them perform at this show, since though I love their recorded material, the last time I saw them perform live at a Mac Lethal show they put on a pretty messy and lackluster set that left me unimpressed. It seems that they’ve learned from their mistakes and constant touring, however, as this time around they brought a very focused set of lively and interesting tracks that really held my attention and rocked the crowd pretty hard. They kicked things off with a great rendition of “Catapults” from their recent record, did some live standards of theirs like “Get Down,” and even got around to doing the track “Irreversible” which features Mr. Lif on a verse. A rare opportunity to see that track live, and it was done exceptionally well. Great set.

 

Mr. Lif came out last, and reminded me what an amazing live performer and showman he is. Now that I think about it, this may be the first paid concert I’ve gone to where he’s been headlining, though I’ve seen him live for free at different rallies and events in the past and he’s always impressed me with his set. Still, this time took the cake for the best live set that I’ve seen from him… maybe because most of my favorite material of his has come out in the last few years. Coming hot off his brand new self-released album, he certainly showed the crowd how to wreck shop on the mic, and performed mostly tracks from his more recent records and two of the best songs from his old ones. Lif has a certain energy and bravado live that’s not present on his records, and he channels that energy into working up the crowd and getting hype on stage. He brought out Metro from the rap group S.A Smash as a hypeman and occasional rapper, and even got around to performing the hype S.A Smash track “Illy” with him to get the crowd bouncing. Lif also incorporated the projector that Willie Evans used into his set, which added another dimension to his music as well as some comic relief in the form of a scrolling list of taxes that Lif dubbed as being “bullshit” and a hilariously bad credit loan commercial that he wanted to show people. The highlight of his set was probably the rendition of one of his older tracks about an office work day, “Live From the Plantation,” where he threw on an old school hip hop track about going to work and danced to it while changing into work clothes. And yes, he did an amazing performance of the track as well. A really excellent show that exceeded expectations. Money well spent!

 

Here’s a video of Lif performing one of the many stand-out tracks from his new record, “What About Us?”:

 

[Wyvern]

I went and saw Blu & Exile perform a free show at People's Park in Berkeley, either day before yesterday or yesterday... whichever was Saturday. (probably the day before the day before given how late on Monday this is being written). There was actually a large line-up of acts for the show, but I only went out to catch the last 40 minutes or so to see Blu's set. Chalk it up to a combination of me not caring enough about the other acts, me not wanting to stand around outside in near rainy weather, and me not exactly being in the music listening mood for the past week (and counting).

 

I got there just as Bambu was performing the last two or three songs of his set, and he seemed like a cool act. His last track used a boom bap rock riff that got people bobbing their heads and raising their hands in the air. I thought he had a pretty good command of the stage and not a bad flow either. Pretty good Bay area act.

 

Blu & Exile were the next to come out, and to be honest, their set was kind of lackluster and far from the best live performance I've seen from Blu. The vibe of the whole thing felt way too laid back, with Blu barely even trying on the mic and forgetting a number of his lines. There was also a person behind me who was continuously screamed obscenities at Blu throughout the set for some reason, which was very annoying and detracted from it more. Anyway, disappointing performance... good thing it was free.

[Wyvern]

The other night, I went and saw the “Kill the Radio” tour starring Xololanxinxo, Neila, Avatar, and a gang of opening acts from the bay area at El Rinco in San Francisco.

 

I had never been to El Rinco before and it seemed like a nice enough small-scale venue, though the show unfortunately suffered a bit from sound difficulties and the poor scheduling of acts. It also felt a bit odd being one of the very few people in attendance who wasn’t a friend or family member of the acts performing, though it was also sort of special given the intimacy of it all.

 

First of all, a summary of the opening acts, who were not bad but who each performed far longer than was merited. A group called Brothers Amos were the first to take the stage, and performed a set of laid back traditional jazzy hip hop that had a few stand out tracks but was mostly pretty boring and formulaic. Thank You Julius stepped things up a bit after them with a set of live funk and some latin hip hop grooves, with a singer and live band backing them up and bringing some good instrumentation to the table. Their set was quite engaging, but at least twenty minutes too long as they must have played for at least an hour. Nomadic Souls performed after them and had a mixed set, as two of the group's MCs were totally lackluster while the third and final MC was surprisingly excellent, with a ton of passion in his voice and some serious rapid-fire rapping skills. Maleko of LA2theBay also showed up to make a guest appearance for a verse on one of their songs, which was a welcome surprise since he was the first rapper in the opening line-up that I’d actually heard of and respected. The verse that he kicked during this set was nothing particularly special though.

 

By the time all of these opening acts had finished performing, it was probably close to 1 in the morning, which cut some of the headlining acts’ sets short. Neila was the first of the central acts to perform, and was one of the reasons I decided to come out to the show. She’s been making moves in the stylistic LA underground scene for a while now, and has a monotone style that takes a few listens to get into but is ultimately rewarding. The tracks she performed were quite catchy and it was interesting to see her do her thing live, though her set was limited to only about 6 songs. Frustrating, since she was one of the more interesting acts to take the stage.

 

Avatar came on next, and I wasn’t that familiar with his work, though I’d seen his production credits on rapper’s tracks here and there. Unfortunately, while Avatar’s beats were pretty well-crafted, his rapping was painfully off-beat at times and didn’t really hold my attention over the course of his set. He kicked things off with a track that sampled “Die Without Honor or Humility” off of “Kill Bill,” which should have been hype and got the tiny crowd moving... but a combination of sound difficulties and his rather poor MCing caused the track to lose its umph. His set was also longer than Neila’s for some reason, though it may have just been that it dragged.

 

Xololanxinxo (pronounced Cholo-lan-seenko) was the final headlining act of the evening, and another reason I chose to go and see the show. He’s another stalwart of the LA underground who’s been putting in work for years, though he’s mostly known as one half of the group Of Mexican Descent and he doesn’t have a huge following as a solo artist. I consider him somewhat overlooked as an MC, as he has a wide variety of interesting styles and is known for freestyling from the perspectives of different characters he invents on the spot. His set was fairly good despite the rather poor sound equipment. He started things off with some very soft almost spoken word-ish verses over reggae-style beats, then moved into some more angered and energetic territory. His set ended with a freestyle session involving all of the show's artists trading verses, traditional LA cypher style.

 

All in all, I would say that this show was slightly below average due to the poor scheduling of the acts, which didn’t allow the main people I wanted to see to go on for as long as I would have liked… Still, it was cool to meet a few of the artists I admire, and I got to pick up Neila’s brand new record there as well.