Buck65, Lateef's Life Savours and Blackalicious Anson Rooms, Bristol University   The ticket said “doors open 7.30pm” and yet Probe Mantis and I were made to wait for twenty minutes in the hissing rain because the officious steward manning the door had decreed “you can only come in if you’ve got a union card.” Once all the students (with and without tickets) were let in, the doors were finally opened for the rest of us. Normally, I can’t abide folk who lug anything more substantial than their wallets around in clubs but given how my bag contained recording equipment and the fruits of an Aspects interview that had only been wrapped up about half an hour earlier that evening, there was no way I was going to entrust it to the cloak-room. So, me and my minidiscs made our way up the winding staircase into the area of the Bristol university students’ union known as The anson rooms. On my way to getting some liquid refreshments, I passed through the concert hall and was pleasantly surprised to hear a deejay at work on UK hiphop. The records themselves were forgettable stuff but the cutting and mixing was competent and this was an encouraging sign that this was going to be a decent hiphop night and not some studenty pissup. As I handed over the scrilla for my second subsidised cider, some bloke came up to the quiet bar to announce that “Buck65 will be on in five minutes.” This news failed to register any perceptible response from the punters around me but I assumed that this must be because the auditorium was already packed with more than enough people… Caught in a sweeping search-light like he’d just escaped from The maximum security Facility for the correction of Un-American, Un-hiphop behaviour, the self-proclaimed “ultimate Honky” stood centre-stage, clutching a torch in one hand and palming a book in the other. Buck65 proceeded to offer a quality set featuring an enthralling selection of frolicsome raps relaying often dark humour over bewitching grooves - to an all but empty auditorium. After disclosing how he owes his dad for getting him on this tour, Buck’s opening track, a performance of his… (what’s the opposite of “feelgood?”) track “the misery doesn’t go way, it just spreads around” was met by little more than ripples of bemused cricket-match applause. Aren’t students supposed to be the nation’s most clued-up folk yeh? Well apart from me and a guy who I got to take pics for me (and who I only later found out to be Creative Control's Cello), the handful of students who had not stayed in the bar with their snakebites never really got what The Wierdo Magnet is all about. For instance, his set’s second piece was the original mix of his unofficial theme song The Centaur but too many of the small crowd watching him took this to be a comedy song “heheheheh, yeh this is the one about his knob!” – nope. His collaboration with Stig of the Dump ($5 Jesus) got a warmer reception but this was more likely to be because of the grimy analog synth instrumental than the disembodied Recording-angel lyrics. Buck65 is an artist who revels in colouring outside the lines of what a hiphop show should be and if all goes well, his audiences enjoy it too. This night was no exception when, midway into the songs, he broke off the hiphop music to rsight one of his Bill Cosby style anecdotes. The bizarre (yet he maintains true) tale of the hiking boots, the teeth statue and the dog shit had his audience hanging off his every word - Unfortunately, as soon as he returned to the music, his lyrics continued to prove to waaay out and his instrumentals remained too spaced out for so early on this Friday night out for the Alcopop generation. Contrary to my hopes upon entering the venue, it grew evermore clear that most were not hiphop Heads and most weren’t interested in hearing lyrics like “craftsmanship is a quality that some lack, you’ve gotta give a reason for people to come back” set to the pulse of a jazzzified heartbeat. Maybe half-past-eight on a Friday evening should be designated as “Rowdy-time” but to be fair, a lot of the set was funky stuff. The previously ghostly pack animal had a revamp that made it sound more like EVA and Food song had been revamped with a new bubbling rock steady reggae instrumental. And, with the gradual swelling of numbers from the handful of stragglers to a comfortable crowd, things did get better. By this point however, Buck couldn’t resist making fun of the timid applause and “bhooo!” noises in all the wrong places. There were folk there who had travelled as far as Barnstable for this set; just not enough. As is the norm at one of his gigs, Buck65 used this live performance as an opportunity to test drive his latest batch of unreleased material. This selection of tracks unfamiliar to both the biggest Buck65 fan as any newbee, offered a welcomed level playing field for appreciation. The heartfelt stella eased the crowd into a series of tracks about smalltown life and love ranging from one where he observes “Everybody in tolito wants to be the fonz” through to a track about getting dumped by Sarah. The latter went down surprisingly well considering how its minimalist instrumental wasn’t much more than some looped up acoustic guitar strums and foot-taps – but then again, it worked for Blackstreet’s No Diggity. Between looking down at his book and addressing the difficult audience, Buck65 couldn’t keep an eye on the clock so the final ten minutes of his set found him often looking into the wings to enquire “is there time for one more?” When the answer was “yes” Buck finally indulged in some lengthier scratching than he’d done for previous tracks. Whereas for most of the set Buck65 might as well have been rapping about loft insulation in Latin for all the response he got, everybody is fluent in scratchese and so enjoyed his conversational turntable and echo manipulations. If there was one track that night where Buck65 did completely click with the majority of the audience, it was yet another new cut. A surprise hit of the night was this playful ditty dedicated to that moment in a relationship when it’s OK to share a man-made bubble-bath with your other half. It’s a shame he didn’t get the same response for all his set. Sadly these people had spent so long deciding whether they were allowed to like whatever this peculiar presentation was that by the point they’d made their mind up and given it a label, they’d missed the point entirely. On my way between the bar and back to the gig, I bumped into Buck who said he was happy with how the tour had gone so far. He started to tell me about how he was planning to move to either London or Brighton when his next album drops in September - but By now, The next act were already on stage so I had to leave buck and try and get back to the front of the crowd - BTW, no love to the jobsworths guarding the pit between stage and audience – how much damage do you think a blind guy who you have seen being approached by the acts is going to do if you let him stand somewhere where he can actually see what’s going on and so give your eventa fuller and more positive review? I don’t think anybody there was familiar with any of the next act’s material or even if most of them even knew who was performing the tracks. Still, Lifesavers, a group lead by one half of Latyrx took control of an evergrowing, and evermore largared up rabble with ease. Lateef wasted no time, letting rip with a full-clip of dynamic verbal ricochets around which were incorporated just enough crowd-participation routines to keep the crowd amped and engaged. I can’t remember any specific tracks but I do remember joining in when required to shout “Fire!” and “it’s a Hiphop exercise!” After some freestyling and yet more good but unknown material, Lateef stepped off stage to shake the hands of some folk in the fenced-off front row He then returned to the stage, hushed the crowd and concluded his spry set by speaking with meek sagacity about the current activities of Tony Blair and George W Bush. To reinforce his message, The Lifesavers’ set concluded with a track called Resist that began to galvanise the growing energy levels in the fast growing crowd. Thanks to…Dannielle for taking the pics. In light of Gift of Gab’s unplanned withdrawal from this European tour in order to undergo emergency retina surgery, (get well soon) there was some uncertainty as to who the main act would now be or indeed, if there was going to be a third act at all. The Lifesavers finished just before 10pm so that couldn’t have been it surely? As Chief XL, Lateef and various second-strings from the Blackalicious camp took to the stage, it turned out that the final act was going to be a showcase from the Quannum Reserves. I was surprised to discover just how much soulsides material I knew as the team played a selection of latyrx and other quannum joints including Say that and Green light and padded the set out with yet more freestyling, crowd-participation, some singing and a little pinch of toasting too – But By now, noone could give a crap about song titles, their topics or who exactly is or is not on stage because the swarming crowd were happy just as long as someone gave them enough to chant and as long as Chief XL provided a good enough reason for them to jump around. Indeed, audience-interaction remained the dominant feature of the show till the end where even the calls for “encore! More!” were shaped into another call & response routine. By about half way into this set, I was about three rows back from the barrier and not likely to get any closer. It wasn’t long before I became Sick of being buffeted by idiots so I made a slow retreat back through the riving crowd to retired to the bar from where the show sounded just as good. BTW, if KRS or someone like that ever formulate an official hiphop ten commandments, can I please request that #1 be “thou shalt not push, punch or kick thou’s way to the front of the stage unless you are a female or a cripple” huh? Seriously, there’s no reason for an able-bodied man to be at the front of the crowd – especially not those two cuntrags jumping up and down with their arms around each others’ shoulders as they shoved girls out their way – and as if that wasn’t pathetic enough, when Lateef once again tried to hush the stage to say something important, these chumps decided to use the breif hush to declare “we got to the front so fuck them bitches!” Hmmm, keepin it real eh lads? - Sumo Kaplunk | profile © CD Goldie/ukhh.com 1999 - 2003