Midwest Music in NYC

On Tuesday I went to see Los Nativos, Brother Ali, and Atmosphere at Irving Plaza with David. “Nora,” he warned, “This will be a HIP HOP concert. People are gonna be pushing on you, and maybe grabbing your boobs. Are you going to get in a fight? Are you going to punch someone?”

David met up with me near my work, looking like a total square in his work clothes. He fretted about whether or not to bring his brief case, opting instead to shove all of his important work items into my oversized purse, which was awesome when the doorman checked my purse and had to rifle through legal pads to make sure I wasn’t concealing the world’s smallest and most stylish weapon.

The crowd was mainly teens decked out in all their hipster finery. Girls in skinny jeans and asymmetrical haircuts slamming Budweisers and guys in faded black t-shirts and straight-billed baseball caps scratching at their dirty hair.

Luckily, my job allows me to dress like myself, so by peeling of a t-shirt we avoided looking like the douchey businesscouple and instead looked like the cool girl and her businessman boyfriend. Which is weird because I’m not cool and David isn’t a businessman. He hates business.

Los Nativos tried their best to warm up the crowd, which at that point was awkward clusters of white teenage boys chatting quietly while white teenage girls stood in separate awkward clusters. Los Nativos had a revolutionary message, which always appeals to middle-class white kids, who finally agreed to pump their fists in the air while Los Nativos shouted the hook, “I WANT TO BURN THE WHITE HOUSE DOWN!" at which the Dad in front of me turned to his embarrassed son and said, "WHAT did they say?!" Los Nativos smartly followed that song with a commercially viable tune about their low riders, to which all the awkward kids raised their right hands and pretended to drive. I did the same, only with my hands at ten and two, because I’ll dance when prompted, but we can’t change who we are and I am a cautious driver. Even in my low-rider.

The main event turned out to be Brother Ali, the second opening act, who took the crowd to church (or Mosque). I’ve never seen so many people come so alive in such a short period, but this albino held the crowd in a spell. Everyone knew his words, everyone sang along, the crowd shifting like puzzle pieces to fill the empty spaces in the floor, mesmerized and gravitating toward the stage.

By the time Atmosphere hit the stage nearly 3 hours after we had arrived, the kids who had begun the night demurely asking Los Nativos to entertain THEM were instead participating in a party and security abandoned all efforts to stop the crowd from smoking cigarettes or pot or drinking without a wristband. This is what I had come to see, with the exception of the extremely drunk girl trying to dance to the music (about 2-3 beats off) while also trying to make out with her unfortunate looking boyfriend.

Commercial rap usually makes me want to vomit or laugh. As awesome as it is that Nelly has made a career rapping about his shoes or his teeth, it’s also incredibly pathetic. What troubles me about that music is not the message, because we subject ourselves to plenty of negative messages whether or not we listen to rap, but the fact that none of it has a soul. It’s sterile, made in a studio where someone pressed a button to add a whistle, an extra drum beat, a barking dog, a portion of a classic song sped-up to sound like it was sung by Alvin and The Chipmunks. It’s mechanical and dry.

What I like about the Rhymesayers crew is that they bring some life and soul back to hip-hop, so that even if they say something you disagree with, they're at least saying SOMETHING. They bring politics and personality and passion to every track, a little piece of their soul, so that you feel a connection not only to the song, but to the artist and to everyone else who likes that same music. There’s no Cristal or bling, no brand-name dropping or bitches or hos or anything else that would make it to TRL. It feels real and raw and unpolished, like the crowd of awkward teenagers who hungrily ate up every verse.