MCB's Andrew Bender was up at the DTE Music Center on Sunday for the 2009 Rock the Bells tour as it rolled through Michigan.
Billed as the premier hip hop festival, RTB brought such highly regarded artists as Tech Nine, Big Boi of Outkast fame, Reflection Eternal with Talib Kweli, the Roots, and NAS with Damian 'Jr. Gong' Marley, and old skool legend KRS-One was the master of ceremonies keeping everybody entertained between sets. Busta Rhymes was slated to also be performing at the Detroit show, but he had to cancel at the last minute, supposedly due to a conflict with the BET awards the same night and the venue was offering a refund to anybody who wanted it before they entered the venue. It's unclear how many people took advantage of that, and Palace Entertainment was not forthcoming with numbers regarding attendance, but clearly it was a pretty dismal turnout for an amazing day of music.
As a photographer and writer, I hate getting jacked around by the venue and PR people who don't have their $#!t together, and such was the case on Sunday. Without any information or instructions, I finally made it to meet up with their contact to get my photo pass only to be informed that following the first 3 songs the credentialed photographers were to be escorted outside the gates to wait for the next act to go on. I was fortunate to also be granted a press credential, so after the 3 songs of shooting, I ran back to drop my camera gear at my car, go back into the venue to see a few songs and make some notes, then run back to get the camera and repeat this five or six times. What crap. Such was my experience at the Rock the Bells. This was apparently the policy of the tour, not Palace Entertainment, although they couldn't or wouldn't actually show me anything with this policy written on it.Usually I prefer to see shows at smaller venues from bars to theaters because those giant stadium and pavilion venues only care about one thing - getting as much of the concert goers dough as they can squeeze out. Sure bars and theaters want that too, but at the pavilions and arenas, the whole thing is set up to make their job easier, not to enhance the audience's experience.
Enough bitching - here's a little bit about the actual festival and the music.
I showed up after a few of the earlier acts had already performed, just in time to see Tech Nine take the stage with a thumpin' off the hook set. Unfortunately, it seemed that the venue was less than one-third full, although the audience that was there was definitely enjoying it. Following Tech Nine was the project Reflection Eternal featuring Talib Kweli and DJ Hi-Tek. They pulled out some of Kweli's older joints and some newer material and soon enough they had arms wavin in the air (like they just didn't care?) and the crowd on its feet. In between acts, old school rap legend KRS-ONE kept the crowd entertained with some mad freestyle and some proselytizing about what hip hop really is. To quote the band Sublime:
Watch him he'll take hip-hop to a higher ground.
cuz I know (How do I know?)
And I know because of KRS-ONE.
After the Roots was Big Boi from the hip hop group the Outkast who brought a taste of the dirty South up North to Michigan. Even though the sound was pretty messed up during his set, Big Boi's southern hip hop style still came through as the Hotlanta star brought his A-game. The last spot of the day belonged to NAS and Damian 'Jr. Gong' Marley who brought an incredible mix of hip hop and reggae to the day as NAS would spit some lyrics to a reggae back beat after which Damian would perform his own or his father Bob Marley's songs, including a great cover of the hit 'War.'
Even by the time the headliners were performing, the venue never got close to half full, which was a shame for such a great day of music. I see a lot of bands skip Detroit on their tours and it's really too bad that the people of Motown and Detroit Rock City can't make it out to shows. Of course, when the economy is in the toilet, a LOT of people have been out of work for a LONG time, and things don't seem to be getting much better, it's hard to justify even a $20 lawn ticket (particularly when that comes up to $30 after fees and all that - but that's a rant for another day). But you'd think the promoters and venue would do more to help fill the seats. Apparently even a stage full of great artists just isn't enough - hopefully as the economy improves and people's job situations start to turn around, bands won't be taking a risk just by coming to Detroit.
Werd!!
-drew
"MCB IS DETROIT"
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