KRS ONE at The Fleece, Bristol 16/7/2016

The real Hip Hop.  Is over HERE.

A towering figure, both figuratively and literally, takes the stage without fanfare.

It’s a sweltering, muggy night in the town of Bristle.  The room is packed.  There are breakdancers on stage; this is live Hip Hop of the realest kind. 

The last time I saw KRS was at Motion several years ago.  I was working shifts in them days, 7-7, nights and days.  The day after the show, I was working at 7am.  The night was advertised as 10-4, so we thought, being the headliner, The Big Man would be on around midnight, maybe 1ish…he went on at 3.  I had a few beers waiting for the main event, then danced like a madman, raced home on my bike for a quick shower, and then headed straight to work.  That’s all possible when you’re young, isn’t it?  (And/or when you have a job you can sleep through when you need to…)

This time, however, is a contrast: it’s a much smaller venue, and because there’s a club night after, the curfew for KRS is 10.30 (regular readers will know what I think about these things.  For irregular readers: I’m not a fan).  Still, seems like the name of KRS ONEis not familiar to everyone at The Fleece...

It’s very kind of the organisers to consider my advanced years – they know that I am older but still well in to KRS, still like to go out but very rarely stay out all night…is KRS getting older?  Well, we all are, obviously, but he shows no sign of it.  If you’ve read The Gospel Of Hip Hop, you will understand why. 

So, anyway, I meet up with the lads (Big Ups Maccy B and Bev – no Ups Hi-D, who lunched it) nice and early, after a brief key-related irritation.  (Was runnin late, so decided to ride, got all the way to the place – shit, where’s the key for my bike? Oh shit, so now I gotta ride home again to get the key to come back to the spot so I can lock the bike.)

The show starts and the first “hold up, hold up” where the MC stops the DJ to change it up happens early.  KRS, known to some as The Greatest MC Of All Time™, launches into some freestyle rhyme.  It’s a good move, because the sound isn’t that great and both MC and DJ are asking for it to be turned up quite a lot.  In fact, it’s as if they’ve not had a sound check…which is a bit disappointing, as the sound for the last few Hip Hop shows I’ve seen at The Fleece has been spot on (regular readers will know how often I’ve seen rap groups with poor sound).  Anyway, The MC will be heard, one way or another (his new album is called Now Hear This).

As he used to with tapes, The MC invites us to film him and share the videos.  He jokes that he wants 20%, before granting everyone their own copyright.  Once again, he’s more generous and real than any of the competitors he has outlasted…

It might be tricky for an artist with 20 albums made to choose tunes to play in a 90-minute(ish) set, but KRS has been dropping consistently good albums with a stand-out hit or two on them for 20 years…tonight, we get treated to classics from the 90s, like Step Into A World, Sound Of Da Police, MCs Act Like They Don’t Know and The MC, even some BDP (Boogie Down Productions) jams from the 80s – South Bronx and The Bridge Is Over, the records that made his name in the NYC Hip Hop scene.  (He even manages to include a personal favourite of mine in A Friend).

Hip Hop Lives also gets in there, which is great news.  The record, made partly in response to Nas’s Hip Hop Is Dead, was made with Marley Marl as a way of finally ending the beef that ran from 1986 and made KRS such a well-known hard-rhymer in New York (look it up, it’s interesting.  If you’re into that sort of thing).  The founder of the Stop The Violence movement is on point yet again, consistent for years, but still keeping up with the times, an educator not afraid to challenge orthodoxy – both politically and in artistic output.  Even if you don’t like Hip Hop, or aren’t familiar with the pioneers, you can see him as a Hip Hop James Brown, a real leader and teacher.  (Or Teacha, in Hip Hop parlance – seriously, read The Gospel Of Hip Hop.)

Late in the gig, The MC spies someone at the front who has something of interest; turns out it’s a portrait of him.  So he gets the artist up on stage and she gets a warm reception.  It looks pretty good from where I’m standing, and The MC looks touched to get it.  

Afterwards, The MC walks through the venue, with a crowd around him getting photos and autographs and Big Ups, just like at every show he plays.  It’s a smaller crowd than the one at Motion years ago, but the vibe is the same.  The energy is up, and there seems to be a healthy mix of those who remember BDP from the late 80s and those who look too young for that.

This whole gig is a moving experience, and it would be impossible for me to review it like I would review anyone else.  I can’t be snide and sarcastic about it, or even critical really, that’s how into it I am…#chchchchanges. (But I would be honest if it wasn’t good.)  If you have even a passing interest in Hip Hop, you will probably know KRS.  If not, get yourself educated.  Forthwith.

I’m not one for hero worship, I like to stay critical (mostly constructively (I hope)) but it’s fair to say the KRS is that towering figure to whom I look up, someone who has mastered the art and stayed true for a loooooooong time – the whole time.  The man has lifetime achievement awards from mainstream players and is still doin DIY albums.  He’s written a book about Hip Hop and does lectures on the history, with a strong spiritual story of the development of the culture.  He’s got some very interesting perspectives to bring – check out his lectures, there’s several available online. Dude takes this shit serious.  This is a vocation.

An inspiration. 

Hip means to know

It’s a form of intelligence

To be hip means to be update and relevant

Hop is a form of movement

You can’t just observe a hop,

You gotta hop up and do it.

Hip and Hop is more than music –

Hip is the knowledge,

Hop is the movement.

KRS-ONE & Marley Marl, Hip Hop Lives

There it is!