I'm Rick James, bitch! (those are hints for later)
So yesterday I went to the Roots, Mos Def and Erykah Badu show at Radio City Music Hall. After two months of griping and hand-wringing and whining about the evil of Ticketmaster and how I was SOOO not looking forward to this show and no more nevermore concerts ever (yes, most of you were witness to it), I ate my words*, downed some Alizé and had a righteously wicked-awesome time.
*along with a great uttapam at Saravana
The Good: The Roots' marching-band-style entrance into the concert hall complete with Black Thought rapping via megaphone, Rahzel reunion!, Angelique Kidjo's adorable dancing (too bad she only sang one song), Erykah Badu's fly-ass dress and ability to belt it, Mos Def being generally cute and charming and the boy can SING. Also, Slum Village showed up which was pretty neat.
The Bad: J*Davey was a disappointment. This is a duo which The Roots have been promoting, and honestly, it really wasn't clear why. I am guessing their style of pop/electronica/soul/funk sounds better at home than live. The beats did not resonate at all. Miss Jack Davey sauntered on stage wearing a halter top, hot pants and a ginormous Native American-style feathered headdress. Pretty spectacular. She reminded me of a cheerleader chicken (albeit with killer legs). Like for real, her singing sounded like squawking to me. I may take a listen to their other songs, but the way they hype themselves on their websites makes me roll my eyes.
The Ugly: At some point during crooner Bilal's performance, some foul liquid substance started dripping on me. It was gross lukewarm beer and it came from above. At Radio City. Classy. Luckily I could change seats. 15 minutes later the guy in front was dripped on too. This is why large plastic cups of beer are an abomination.
and the moment you've been waiting for....
The HUGELY UNBELIEVABLY AWESOME:
DJ Jazzy Jeff! How cool is that?! Uncle Phil could not stop him from ripping the turntables. and also...
Um, DAVE CHAPPELLE.
and oh yeah. just someone sometimes known as JAY-Z.
!!!!
shine your light, shine your light on the world
5 comments:
oh. my. gosh.
it is rare that i burn with jealousy.
but that moment is now.
all i get is seeing alicia silverstone at a west hollywood overpriced vegan restaurant. as if.
I had the great pleasure to be at the event with zuppe and other hip-hop royalty and it was pretty f*&^!@# awesome. it was an interesting crowd, well-dressed people of color mostly--- lots of dapper hats and hip jackets.
dave chappelle riffed sociological in his stand-up routine about the game that is Hollywood, by that I mean, he seemed to really want to analyze (in the most academic sense) why he skipped out on his Comedy Central contract and went to South Africa. He gave a long allegorical story about a "pimp and a ho" where one of the key themes was how you become dependent on and indebted to those that "make" you in ways you don't even realize, inlcuding emotional and psychic. I was impressed by his abiity to do a pretty nuanced reading of ideology and false consciousness, albeit with the misogyny of a pimp-n-ho sketch, and still make it funny.
totally all-star!
question: were you sitting the entire time? perhaps it is simply the *awesome* post itself, but i get the feeling that the event was full of energy, and i wonder if people are expected to sit through that?
Radio City is a place w/ seats and we were in one of the mezzanine levels, so there aren't even any aisles to dance in. So basically all we could do is stand up and, well, sway to and fro.
Which somehow was murder on my knees. Getting ye olde.
Post a Comment