The South is something of a quagmire. A rich musical history spanning the decades covering each one with a unique color of collaboration and only the best creativity. Why then, does it seem to have lost steam in the past quarter century or so? Sure, massive acts have broken out here or there, but the muddy past of the rainy South seems to have slowed progress. Larger cities to the North or West seem to have a stronghold on intellectual music and lay claim to more intelligent properties. Well all that’s changing. And there’s a couple mic masterminds who tend to keep good company who are responsible.
11/11/11 was an important date and not just because of its numerical oddity. It was an initial solid representation of what’s happening here these days in the hip-hop community. Not only did Redeye Jedi and Wukasch spin fresh sounds from way out, but both Cities Aviv and G-Side brought their A-Games to the Hi-Tone. Most importantly, G-Side dropped their much anticipated fifth album The Island. Rolling off their tradition of humble lyricism over spacious, trip-induced beats, they solidified their sound with the premiere of several new songs on a night primed for progress.
The evening began with a surprise guest spot from DJ Burn One. Noteworthy from his history on Gucci Mane and YelaWolf mixtapes, his new work with artists like ASAP Rocky is showing that his extent of music has yet to die, much less shown signs of decay. He ran through a myriad of Memphis music and gave love to Three 6 as well as Juicy J’s recent solo efforts.
Music aficionados were feeling the beat and nodded their respective heads accordingly, but it wasn’t until Cities Aviv came on the mic to announce his back-up Redeye Jedi’s solo set before the crowd really began to get hype. As rich of a history as Redeye has, his flavor easily began to shine as he progressed through his first few tracks. Dropping bangers from the second he got behind his impressive set up, he showed his style with avid fervor.
He went back and forth from dropping beats to conducting massive effects with extended echoes, repeated cuts, and various amounts of low and hi EQed cuts. Near the end of his set, and more to introduce Cities Aviv, he broke out a midi-controlled drum head from which he proceeded to create a beat by snapping various regions of the head with drum sticks, triggering different samples in turn.
The hometown crowd out for Cities Aviv went mad as he came into his performance by gracing the stage. By the middle of the first track, it was evident that anyone who could breathe took advantage of the ability by screaming his lyrics back at the stage at what seemed to be an attempt to match Cities heart for the words he’d committed to mic. Cities on stage is a little something of an MC oddity; instead of bouncing to the beat and matching the rhythm of the audience or the track, he moved about the space provided in sudden calculated jerks, playing transformer—except instead of changing from a truck into a gun-toting robot, he went from a fashion-foward midtowner to an honest artist whose limbs were relinquished of their control to that of the hands of his very capable beats.
Not being too selfish to share the the stage, Cities was eventually joined by local rappers Royal T and Pro who bounced off his mechanical vibe with loosey-goosey lyricism and see-worthy swag as they aided him in verses and choruses back to back.
Spinning next was Wukasch. Having been playing around town at Mollie Fontaine’s or random parties, he’s cut his teeth by sporting the latest bass-heavy bangers. I’d seen him a few times around, and he’d too often compelled me to wonder “where’d he find this?” to miss his set. Wukasch dropped some maniacal madness that usually landed somewhere between neo-juke and oldschool crunk. Although it was obvious that most people attending were unfamiliar with a good chunk of his setlist (yeah… for the most part I was among the ignorant as well), he still was able to get people moving uncontrollably to the beat. His music was bass-heavy enough to reference the work that came before and after him, and set up a perfect ramp for G-Side to get mad air when they came up next.
G-Side taking the stage is somewhat like triple chocolate fudge cake, it sounds good initially, but your taste buds have no earthly idea how bad they are about to be rocked at the overy rich serving they’re about to receive. The night being all about their new release The Island, they played half a dozen unfamiliar tracks to a whole bunch of folks who seemed to appreciate what they had not yet encountered. I caught eyes all over the place that matched mine as the owner of the look would nod and smile and without any words imply “this is what’s up!”
Back up vocalists catered to MCs ST 2 Lettaz and Yung Clova during the chorus and gave the perfect breaks for their sermons of truth that travelled through the air in a seemingly endless stream of clever lyrics that seemed allergic to the idea of being “contrived.”
The highlight of the evening was a toss up; Cities’ “Fuck Everybody Here” got the crowd insanely hype and created a mosh pit of middle fingers and open throats who let loose in the chorus and joined the man on stage when he came about the chorus’ declaration “fuck everybody here!” It would have been the apex of the night, but G-Side’s “Aura” gave it worthy competition; the smooth as silk beat sounds oh-so-much-better live and got every waist bobbing back and forth. The smiles of the stage slayers seemed contagious, and everyone bouncing was showing off their pearly whites as they sang along.
To say the show was good is true. To say it was one of the best shows I’ve seen in awhile is also true. But that latter statement has less to do with entertainment and stage presence and more to do with significance of the lone Friday night. Inspired by G-Side’s performance, I’ve taken the liberty to download The Island, and I can easily say that is just about as crunk as Lil’ Jon drunk on a music video set for any pop star that’s used to selling 1 million+ records per release. Do yourself a favor and pick it up ASAP. Also, if you’re unfamiliar with this river cities’ recent breakout, go get Cities Aviv’s record Digital Lows, and while you’re at it, download his new single “Wet Dream.”
G-Side will be playing shows all over the country promoting their new record so be sure to go out and see one and sing along to your favorite verse!
Photos by Amanda Gahan
