Ugly Duckling
Old school, funky sounding Ugly Duckling stepped up to the mark as support in a big way. Einstein took to the stage and riled up the crowd with some big beat, jazzy hip hop with a heavy brass presence, which was the perfect soundtrack to burning some excitement energy by dancing about like a nutter. After a few tunes, he was joined by Dizzy Dustin and Andy Cat who, fittingly, started to chant Opening Act and get everyone up with loads of crowd participation - a snippet of things to come. During I Did It Like This, the crowd responded with “I did it like that” with fat grins on faces and arms in the air. There was quite a funny contrast between Andy Cat’s sunny California accent and our collective thud of a voice.
They also played Slow The Flow, Turn It Up, A Little Samba, Einstein Do It and Eye on the Gold Chain, for which Einstein emerged from underneath the decks with a fat gold chain, stirring up a few chuckles. He showed us exactly what he could do on the ones and twos with a master solo scratching session and Andy started a chant of “Go Einstein! Go Einstein! Go!” We were tickled with some actions to train sound effects and reminded that hip hop built its foundations on soul and funk as they closed with Rio De Janeiro, a chorus of “We gotta go” in the air. A perfect warm-up act.
There was a weighty break before J5 came out and the place packed itself out, wall to wall with eager fans. We managed to grab ourselves an awesome spot at the front of the crowd in the middle, practically smelling the vinyl. Speaking of which, there was a huge J5 vinyl taking over the centre of the stage, I’m talking a couple of metres square huge. On either side of that, there were two sets of decks being set up and tweaked as we listened to classic RJD2 beats being pumped out. Happy days.
DJ Nu Mark and Cut Chemist jumped on the decks before they were joined by Zaakir, Marc 7, Akil (diamond studded mic in hand) and Chali 2NA, with energy that burst into I am Somebody. From the word go, it was clear that every member of Jurassic 5 is a well-seasoned showman, making eye contact with us all - winking, laughing, smiling. There was a glowing, peaceful, at-home vibe that emanated from the stage as they seemed to genuinely be enjoying themselves, a truly infectious feeling that only swelled as the night went on.
Jurassic5
After they dropped a mind-blowing rendition of Break, all four emcees left the stage, while Nu Mark and Cut Chemist each grabbed themselves a guitar. But of course, these were no ordinary guitars. The two DJs flipped between using a vinyl, MPC and CDJ strapped to their chest to pump out interesting, distorted beats in a crazy exhibition of skill. They even pulled out an MPC made out of touch-sensitive, multi-coloured vinyls – it was a creative and innovative touch that had everyone talking about it afterwards. The massive vinyl on stage wasn’t just for decoration it seemed, the two DJs took it in turns to scratch with it, hilariously outstretched arms gripping onto either side. We had some debate as to whether they’d meticulously rehearsed doing so to a recording or it was attached to a CDJ, and settled on the latter. These guys don’t exactly do stuff in half measures.
As the quartet returned to the stage, Chali 2NA thanked us for joining them on their twentieth anniversary tour with humble words and a twinkle in his eye. My gut says we shouldn’t have favourites when you need all cogs to make a machine run, but 2NA and Akil were difficult to take your eyes off, they projected such warmth and were always doing something interesting.
Quality Control was blasted out of the speakers and everyone went nuts before Concrete Schoolyard rang around the room, with a kazoo section from Chali 2NA. Ha! He lobbed it into the crowd when the song finished and some guy a couple of metres away from us caught it. The look on his face was priceless. Future Sound was next, with its hook of “you don’t see us but we see you” being rapped at the top of everyone’s lungs. Then, 2NA got us all to raise our arms into the air, we opened and closed our hands in time to the beat, creating a sea of fingers I can’t wait to see on the footage of, from the GoPro that was strapped to his head.
The mood was mellowed and the attention was turned to the sparkly disco ball, which flickered splashes of light around the room as they played a little tune for the ladies. Call me a cliché, but God damn it, that shit was magical. Akil invited us all to raise one fist into the air as Freedom emerged. I had the song as my ring tone for about two years straight, so to hear it live was really special. The lyrics of “Hold on to this feeling of freedom” being sang by the whole room hit me right in the feels. Just when I thought things couldn’t get much better, the unexpected sounds of Thin Line crept in, and it didn’t even matter that Nelly Furtado wasn’t there to sing the hook cos we got to belt it out, albeit a little less gracefully that our Nel. Chali 2NA ripped a piece of paper in half on stage as he rapped the words “…or write a letter, then tear it up.” One of many nice touches.
Before dropping a track quoting the riffs of Another One Bites the Dust, the two DJs came from behind the decks to join the foursome in a mini dance routine and, again, they looked like they were all having an amazing time. They left the stage and dutifully returned when the crowd went crackers in their encore demands. On their return they asked for song requests – “the more obscure, the better.” After giving us a taste of thirty seconds or so of each tune, they dropped a new tune which reflected their undying abilities to churn out classics. Red Hot was lovingly played to a now glowing-red room, and then Chali 2NA told us all to imagine we were on a motorbike, dishing out all the sound effects of keys jangling and the engine starting. We all did the actions for it before going absolutely mental and bursting into a mosh pit. Even getting slapped in the gob with a dreadlock couldn’t deter my joy.
“This is a showdown!” screamed Akil, as faces were covered with balaclavas and microphones were turned into guns, the foursome taking on a cowboy persona and turning Rock City upside down, into the craziest party. What’s Golden concluded the evening, and everyone was left a little dazed as to what on Earth just happened, like we’d witnessed a moment in history.
J5 were on stage for almost two hours, and it was an absolutely monstrous set throughout. And, to top it all off, Chali stuck around to sign everyone’s stuff. What a gent. If you ever get chance to see these lot perform, do it without hesitation. They’re true kings of hip hop, with a charmingly humble vibe impossible not to fall in love with.
Jurassic 5 played at Rock City on Tuesday 24 June.
Jurassic 5 website
Ugly Duckling website
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