Despite nasty weather and virtually no local promotion, last night's beans
& prefuse show at the ottobar in baltimore drew a healthy crowd ready to
rock. Here's my amateur breakdown and review...
Beans took the stage sporting a meshback hat with faux peacock
feathers adorning the front. Even though anticon has enjoyed good
turnouts and positive response here in harm city, it seemed like most of
the crowd was there to see prefuse (the "nerd" to "head" ratio in the
crowd was kinda high). Yet beans quickly grabbed the crowd's attention
with a fast paced spoken bit about herb, crack, and the drug war. After
the first couple tracks everyone was obviously converted to his particular
brand of simple hard beats and rapid fire ragga-styled flow. He even
inspired a few people to echo the ends of his lines during some of his
beatless pieces, without asking for any sort of call-and-response. In an
age where platinum-selling rappers have trouble putting on a half decent
live show, beans proved that the other end of the spectrum is alive and
kicking. His energy and connection with the crowd was so tangible, it
made me wonder why more of that wasn't captured on his Warp recordings.
His talent was most evident when he performed acapella, leading me to
speculate on when he might collaborate with a more accomplished producer.
After he had finished his prescribed setlist, the crowd demanded more, and
he delivered another acapella and another beat-backed track to the delight
of the assembled.
Prefuse and his dj took the stage not long after, and jumped right in to a
set that seemed designed to feature the party-rocking side of his output.
He divided his time between twiddling a moog, triggering and retriggering
beats on his mpc, and manning his mixer. Even though it was obvious to
any half-educated producer/beat-maker/etc that most of his set was
presequenced, as evidenced by the way his transitions went seamlessly
together, the overall output was more than enjoyable. He threw in a few
cut and paste bits of some older material along with newer
unreleased/unused parts of a wide variety of hiphop, soul, and funk
tracks that kept everything rolling along in between the more sustained
passages. Having never seen prefuse live before (though I have heard more
than a few live boots) I was most impressed with his mpc work. Many times
he furiously augmented his beats by pounding away on the pads only to
suddenly cut out everything save the retriggered beats and wash over
everything with a wall of squelchy noise. On the downside, I felt he
could have left his moog at home, as it rarely added anything beyond a few
eardrum-raking filter sweeps. I was similarly disappointed that prefuse's
dj was so low in the mix that he was rendered virtually inaudible. Roc
Raida he wasn't, but still I felt that as long as he was gonna be on
stage, the audience should have been able to hear him. Again, once
prefuse had concluded his planned setlist, the crowd demanded an encore
and he delivered.
All things considered, the show was a big success. Baltimore's
hiphop/club scene has been notoriously crippled by the popularity of "club
breaks" over the years, but last night's show (and the attendance of
quite a few people with more melanin than I) proved that it ain't dead
yet. While most people showed up for prefuse, I think beans won more
converts and very nearly stole the show. I've heard varying responses
from people who've attended shows on this tour, and maybe it's the
beginning of a backlash, or maybe it's just all the biters getting tired
of being one-upped, but I just don't see how anyone who's been a fan of
either beans/anticon or prefuse could not want to check this line up out.
...from the city that bleeds,
N.
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