Saturday night brought the sold out Fifth Annual Guitar Center Spinoff to the Wiltern, which featured performances by Madlib, Talib Kweli and Common as well as a surprise performance by Kanye West, in addition to the actual spinoff itself, which featured a handful of turntablists battling for the title and a brand new Scion as the grand prize. The evening was hosted by DMC (of Run-DMC fame) and Mr Choc (of Power 106 fame). Let me first start by saying thank you to Guitar Center for organizing such an amazing event. Not only did the event feature
the turntable competition, which was amazing in and of itself, but it also brought a slew of great live performances. The combination of the two made for a most enjoyable evening.
A small handful of finalists competed for the Grand Prize on Saturday night and when it was all said and done, DJ Illtrax was the winner, though to me all the competitors were amazing (I could never come close to doing what these guys do). Each competitor did a 5 minute set in which records were flying and scratching and beats were matching. The crowd loved it. People were cheering and jumping. The universal “go-to” track that a majority of the DJs called upon was Gwen Stefani’s “Hollaback Girl.” It was great seeing these guys perform because there is so much showmanship involved. They were scratching with their elbows, mouths and even using the opposite turntable. It was as much about attitude and presence on the stage as actual talent. What was also impressive was that a many of the competitors didn’t use headphones, but had their records marked and knew them well enough to not need to listen to the next track. Crazy!
DMC and Mr Choc proved to be great hosts for the competition and their between set banter (“tap-dancing” as they called it) was quite
amusing. At one point when DMC was asked to freestyle his response was, “Nuh uh, you gotta PAY me to rap,” (guess that wasn’t part of his contract). He later obliged and spat a few sporadic lines throughout the course of the evening. DMC also announced, to a relatively unsupportive crowd, that he no longer wore Adidas anymore and that they represented the first 25 years of his career. The new shoes he was sporting (which I believe were his own brand) were to represent the next 25 years of his career, a sort of changing of the guards I suppose.
As if the competition wasn’t enough, I sat back and got ready for the night’s performers. Talib Kweli took the stage first. The last time that I saw Talib was at least 3 years ago (i.e. on the Reflection Eternal album), so I was very excited to catch his performance. Of course, he was
incredible. He is by far one of the most exciting rappers of the past few years. He has unbelievable energy on stage and really knows how to work the crowd. At one point he called to all the B-Boys and B-Girls in the audience and brought a few from the pit up on the stage to
dance with him. Some were breaking, some we krumping; it was a great energy and a lot of fun to watch. Talib’s usual counterpart, Mos Def, didn’t come out on stage with him, as is somewhat customary in his live sets (Hollywood is calling, Mos must be filming a movie). It was fine though, Talib was totally capable of ruling the stage on his own. By the end of the set, I had beads of sweat on my forehead from dancing around so much.
Common was next up. There was a lot of buzz around the Wiltern before he hit the stage because Kanye West was rumored to show up as well. I had faith that Kanye would show since I knew he was in LA for two other shows that week and he did produce Common’s new amazing album (if you haven’t, check it out, it’s a gem). Common got a great response from the crowd when he came out. They were obviously here to see him. It was gratifying to see this reaction for a guy that’s been on the scene for over 10 years, but seems to just recently be getting the respect and admiration that he truly deserves.
Common’s years of experience show in his live performance. He is dynamic on stage and knows how to engage the audience. He also is an amazingly good dancer. Towards the end of his set, he got down and breakdanced a bit, ending with an pretty impressive windmill. He was of course joined on stage by Kanye West and the two performed songs off Common’s new record, in addition to some of Kanye’s songs, including his hit “Gold Digger” and the night’s closer, “Jesus Walks.” It was a real treat to see Kanye, as he is becoming one of the most prominent figures in the rap game right now. Talib also joined Common on stage so at one point Common, Kanye, and Talib were all on stage together performing. Talk about triple threat!!! This combination of performers might have been one of the best hip-hop/rap lineups of the year. I am so happy that I was there to see it.
