If there was a mission in the minds of the powers that be (trust me when I tell you, I’m not privy to that stuff, lol), to give the NY hip hop scene a pep rally, then I think it was mission accomplished. Even if at times the audience didn’t know what they had in front of them (ahem, Public Enemy performing “Shut em down,” “911 is a joke,” “Can’t truss it” and “Don’t Believe the Hype.”).
Alicia Keys was really good, as always, and she’s knows better than to just rely on her good looks and musical skill, she played to the crowd with something hood (Maino “Hi Hater”) and something classic….Raekwon, Method Man and Ghostface. Win! I also loved the D-Block set….I just think Sheek, Styles and Jada have all matured into really seasoned and grounded artists, and they gave the audience a reason to be proud of the New York hip hop canon with “F—k you,” “2 Guns Up” “Benjamins” “Wild Out” “I Get High” “Gangster Gangster” “We Gon Make it” “Banned from TV” with Nature and Nore “Good Love”, plus Fat Joe, Fab, Swizz, and LL Cool J. And people backstage were all really surprised at the big response that LL got, lol. I’m sure that made his week.
Anyways, of course Kanye’s freestyle verses were a treat, and Wayne was…interesting. But the crowd response (or lack thereof) to PE was predictable and depressing. There were tons of other performances and artists backstage….but I’m not gonna even try to recap them all, especially since the ration of camera crew’s to artists was probably 4:1. And that’s not even including the artists who were also shooting stuff themselves (lol, Consequence). But the Loser of the night: Rihanna.

Check out Nahright’s recap, Shaheem/MTV New’s recap, Lowkey’s recap, Splash’s recap, Jerry Barrow’s recap, and of course….

big up all the really really hard-working Hot97.com folks who shot mad video, still haven’t slept since yesterday and still more video to edit for the site (Including the backstage fashion chats that I did with Dblock, Meth, Swizz, Flavor Flav, etc). They have tons of video clips and goodies.

Here are some photos that me and my homie Wendy from Nitrolicious took….you can see more at her spot.

kanye dancer
Kanye’s stilt-walking futuristic dancer…love the outfit

rick ross meth missinfo
look at the glee on my face….I was enthralled by the glistening mounds before me.

atrak missinfo kid sister
Atrak and my Chi-town Kid sister…they have photos of me being caught in a maelstrom of man-fan Flavor Flav chasers. Gotta remember to ask Atrak for those.

kanye
Wendy snapped a pic of Kanye onstage and was curious about the new colorway of his Air Yeezys.

missinfo wendy
“Hi Haters” Wendy and I look like 2 girls who got on the wrong bus after a luncheon at Lord and Taylor.

kanye dancer
Kanye loves ladies….and shoulderpads.

dipset missinfo
The annual Dipset and Miss Info summerjam picnic….before the inevitable firestorm. And boy was that a doozy.

ll cool j

missinfo nat peter
Lil’ Nat invites me and Peter Rosenberg to join her on-air break backstage. Thanks Nat!

angie fab
Angie looked super fly with her Memorial Day Wknd DR tan.


Lowkey caught Kanye’s second freestyle on video….this was after he made a tiny mistake at the beginning of Flashing Lights and just couldn’t shake it off. Ye, you sounded great. The crowd loves you. No pressure.