Smokin’ Grooves

Classic Amphitheatre, July 9th, Richmond, VA.

For some reason they put the Roots on first, I guess they based the line-up on record salesÉ Nothing like a corporate showcase tour. Wait... Corporate Hip Hop?! but no, what about all that keepin’ it real on tha’ streetz’z? Well, suburban crossover is what happened to all of that, and that’s exactly who paid the $35 to see the show. The best part of these shows is watching all the kids walking around all hard like they just capped two cops and bombed a train before they had lunch. That is, until they bump into someone at the snack bar and suddenly intense looks and posturing transforminto:"uhhÉ sorry, excuse me man. I was justÉ I didn’t see youÉ"

The Roots were short -staffed yet still extraordinary and their Hip Hop 101 smokes the Fugees version anyday. After them came Pharcyde, who apparently took Foxy Brown’s place at this venue. The crowd was small and unmotivated for the Roots and started to gain by the time the Pharcyde came on. Now, The Pharcyde can be a bit obscure and they’ve strong crossover response so the crowd tried to play like they didn’t care, yet all the artists that were out in the audience, Black Thought, Kamal, Mad Skillz, and B Real seemed to know all the words to their songs. Damn shame what popularity will do to a Hip Hop group.

After the Pharcyde came Erykah Badu. Black Feminist Tent Revival. She barely had to breathe into the mic and the sisters went crazy. I was glad at that point that Foxy wasn’t there and couldn’t spoil the evening. Erykah was do-- err... beautiful and a great performer.

Cypress Hill without Sin Dog sucked, and B Real’s new group Psycho Realm was more like Suck-o Realm. But, no doubt, the crowd goes crazy whenever these guys come on because the tunes off of their first album are just slammin’, and the inflatable buddha blimp was replaced this year by a Scarface skeleton sportin’ the requisite frat-boy appealing blunt.

As a huge thunderstorm rolled in, the P-Funk crew was setting the stage. George and crew started to the usual funky base-drum cadence that initiates all of their shows. The crowd jumped to its feet to get a collective groove-on and the joint was movin’. An hour later the Mothership had landed Sir Nose was once again thwarted (he never learned to swim), and George had brought a new generation into the league of legions of interplanetary funkateers.

— Daniel Poarch