Sunday, August 29, 2010

Rock the Bells NYC

The day after we arrived in NYC we went to Rock the Bells on Governors Island, just south of the Brooklyn Bridge in the East River.

I had been to the show in Vancouver last year and it was awesome. This year one of my all time favorite hip hop acts, A Tribe Called Quest, were performing in their home city and there was no way I was going to miss it.

DJ Premier did an intro set and he was followed by three other hip hop legends, Slick Rick, Rakim and KRS-1. At the beginning of Rakim's set I managed to sneak backstage and hang out for a while, getting some pics with Method Man and having a chat with Primo (DJ Premier). I scored a Ol' Dirty promo shirt from his son and a Phife Dawg T from one of his groupies.

Lauryn Hill came on before Tribe and in my opinion, totally destroyed the old school vibe, yelling and screaming over a set of hard rock tracks that were unrecognizable and not at all what you would expect from her.

Tribe lived up to all expectations and played a set of tracks entirely from their first two albums to the crowds delight.

Wu Tang were next and got everybody hyped up with another old school set. We didn't make it through to see Snoop's set as we were suffering mild sunstroke and dehydration after 11 hours in the 35C (95F) heat drinking mostly beers and Monster.


The view from the ferry on the way to Governors Island


DJ Premier starts off proceedings


Some great T's getting around


Me and Meth


Boy Jones (Ol' Dirty's son)


Slick Rick (showing his age)


Rakim comes off stage


Chris Rock


Me and Primo


Busta

2 comments:

  1. What a surprise, Lauryn Hill doing some random crap and it sounding bad and turning everyone off. Isn't that what her last album did as well? You are the ultimate groupie but you go some sweet shots indeed.

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  2. i think your showing your age missing the snoop set.....igs

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