De La Soul

De La Soul
The Forum, NW5
20th May 2008

Still reeling from the weekend we are in trendy gastroboozer The Oxford on Kentish Town Road. Gently sipping my Harold, I am hoping that Giles Coren is going to mosey on past whereupon I chase after him and beg for some work experience. As this is his neck of the words and I need a job. While Giles would no doubt be off to the latest sustainablecornfedgrassrearedeco restaurant in town, we have a much more exciting prospect lined up. De La Soul. With an eleven piece band.

It's an exciting development for hip hop that it is so 2001 to just rock up with a couple of microphones and a set of decks. Much needed credibility has been established with the addition of proper musicians. Although this may not always transfer well live, what with the sample led beats not being so defined by say a guitar, it certainly adds a different element to the song - a less bass heavy sound that is the norm of most hip hop concerts. We probably have Jay Z to thank for this. When he did the 'MTV Unplugged' album with the Roots as the backing band it set a precedent to the rest of the industry (and has still not been bettered despite Kanye trying his absolute hardest).

Anyway, I divulge. Onwards to Kentish Town Forum, a venue thankfully not awash with Carling but neither an upward sloping dance floor like in Brixton or Hammersmith. And certainly the most hip hop crowd I have seen at a rap concert in a long time. Very gangster. 

Now De La Soul need no introduction. These guys pretty much invented hip hop in my opinion. Seminal debut album 'Three Feet High and Rising' put them on the map way back when I was nine years old. Some would say they have not managed to better it. Their most recent collection was the disappointingly received 'The Grind Date' and with no new album to promote, (and indeed no record label) twas probably the thinking behind the addition of the band.

But this performance failed to deliver. Clarence is dancing but I am not convinced. Despite tickets costing around £30, it would not matter had the three MCs not put in such a lacklustre performance. It did not help that fat chap Kelvin Mercer called the London crowd average, after the tedious call and response routine. ('All the people on the left say Hell Yeah' - literally, bored). In fact the big guy was really quite disappointing throughout the whole thing, probably on stage for about a third of the show - he was either not interested or very unfit. Perhaps both. A hurried reggae version of 'All good?' really disappointed. Admittedly the high light of the evening was the Damon Albarn penned 'Feel Good Inc', performed at the end of the encore. It was certainly the most energetic the crowd were all night.

I left deflated. The prospect of a long, solitary and vaguely inebriated tube journey home was not buoyed by what could have been an exceptional evening of hipperty hop. De La Sold Out.