Rap started out 20 years ago as party music, and despite many attempts to give it added dimensions, rap artists and audiences alike remain largely content with making some noise and waving their hands in the air.
This shortcoming afflicted the Chicago installment of the Smoking Grooves tour on Friday night at the International Amphitheater. The location itself compounded the problem, as the venue’s horrible acoustics reduced the performances to a numbing din of drum beats, thumping bass and shouting.
Even the return of political firebrands Public Enemy after a four-year absence couldn’t elevate the event. Much of the audience missed the group’s set, having left after having their fill of more recent, party-oriented acts.
The group yielded to no one in intensity, though. The dense, driving sound collages of disc jockey Terminator X accompanied a barrage of classic broadsides, including “Bring the Noise,” “Don’t Believe the Hype” and “By the Time I Get to Arizona.”
Chuck D threw rhymes like Mohammed Ali threw punches but his unrelenting delivery eventually became wearying. His sidekick, Flavor Flav, provided some much-needed levity, bicycling onstage in a day-glo yellow sweatsuit.
Public Enemy concluded with some lackluster songs from their comeback effort, the soundtrack from Spike Lee’s recent film “He Got Game.”
Given Cypress Hill’s longstanding preoccupation with marijuana, they probably were best-suited for the foggy-sounding environs. DJ Mugg’s throbbing, heavy-lidded grooves gave the music both a surreal aura and an addictive momentum.
For all the time he spent lighting up, B-Real’s piercing, nasal delivery remained razor-sharp as he and fellow rapper Sen Dog delivered the likes of “Insane in the Brain” and “How I Could Just Kill a Man” with focused frenzy.
Wyclef Jean, the leader of blockbuster rap group the Fugees, obviously sees himself as a impresario and multiple-threat solo act, but his lack of common sense was far more overwhelming than his talent. Wyclef played guitar with his teeth, rapped in Spanish and ventured into the crowd, but spent little time actually playing songs.
During a performance as energetic as it was dumb–and it was plenty of both–Busta Rhymesrepeatedly plugged his cohorts, the Flip Mode Squad, and suggested a kung fu flick-parody with his hyperactive gyrations.
The tumbling rap of Gang Starr’s Guru yand Black Eyed Peas’ mix of rap with live musicians both were undone by the echo-chamber sound problems.
