Formerly Known As Mos Def

Posted by Tracy Kiryango on May 27, 2012 in Mos Def, Music · 8 Comments

Last night Mos Def performed at the HMV Forum in Kentish Town. He put great entertainers to shame, by saying he wasn’t here to entertain. In fact he said ‘F**k entertainment,’ his only mission is to express his passion to those who are willing to listen. When he screams to the crowd ‘Are you not entertained,’ his audience shouts ‘Yes,’ because they understand what he is saying. Mos who has now changed his stage name from Mos Def to Yasiin Bey, stands before his crowd as one man. He came with no one else, but a mic and story he wanted to tell. Only a true Hip Hop legend can stand alone on stage, and make a crowd listen to every word they drop.

The show was meant to start at 9pm, but he didn’t get there till shortly after 10pm. After MC Righteous opened the show with some powerful knowledge, the people were ready for the main act.However luckily DJ Semtex kept the crowd calm, with old school Hip Hop. But once the clock struck 10, the fans lost their patience and started booing. Eventually the boo’s turned into a ‘Yasiin Bey’ chants, which led to him finally strolling on to centre stage with a large amount of applause. The show got started and he performed ‘Sunshine Screwface,’ and few of his big hits, including his own rendition of ‘Ni***s In Paris,’ and ‘The Motto’. How can one man dancing, and rapping create such a beautiful vibe, in a small space. The only negative part about the performance, was that the levels on his mic weren’t perfect, so sometimes his words came out mumbled, but he made up for it with his energy and style, and the intimacy that was formed between him and the audience.

Once Yasiin Bey finished his performance, he danced like a smooth criminal back towards the DJ booth, placed down the mic put on his jacket and his cap. Before he waved at the audience, shook the DJ’s hand and strolled of the stage never to be seen again. The crowd erupted into cheers and whistles, expecting him to come back, but he didn’t. Then they tried booing, but he still didn’t come back. Then finally they tried chanting ‘Yasiin Bey,’ only to discover he really wasn’t coming back, which sent them straight back into booing. He sure knows how to leave a crowd wanting more, and after last nights performance, Yasiin Bey reminds us once again, that he is one of the true definitions of Hip Hop.

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Marion

Bravo Tracy.
D.dot

Enjoyed reading this article as i wasnt able to make the concert. It’s always good to be reminded that Hip Hop is not dead
//D.dot
Ree Ree

Damn! Wish I was there! Mos Def is mos definitely real Hip Hop.
I like the way you described him putting the mic down then casually leaving the stage in his laid back manner. Dope! Lol, although i probably would have wanted to see/hear more…

Ree Ree
Truedat

Nice!
S77

Stop wishing you were there!! As this was the biggest pile of rubbish I’ve ever been to. The sound in the venue was awful & people were getting real pissed with waiting so long. I left after 20mins of him being on stage as couldn’t really make out what was being played & couldn’t really hear what he was saying. Wouldn’t recommend ever going to see Mos Def (he definitely didn’t put great entertainers to shame – I’ve seen amateur shows that are a lot better!!) or going to the HMV forum either. Complete waste of time & money. I want to be entertained for the money I worked for, why else to people go to these things?!?. I’m not into this Artsy BS. I have Mos Def albums & I expected to hear Mos Def if I go to a show, but all I heard heard was muffled sound & vocals, given Semtex was up there for ages + a warm up act as minimum, they could have tried to sort the sound before Mos Def came on. BTW – this review tries to make the evening sound good but it really wasn’t!! Tell me this – If an artist has 13 years of Hip Hop history & only stays on stage for 1 hour after doing renditions of other songs & the crowd are left booing – does this sound like a good gig? I think not.
scenario82

this was the weakest hip hop show i ahve ever seen ans mos def shamed his legacy with his complete disregadr for the crowd – i am lucky enough to ahve seen him before his ego took over so i know what a good mos def gig feels like and this just wasn’t – very surprised this artilce is forcing a positive spin on an evening of abject disappointment
Janek

I really want to defend Mos Def, but can’t. Having been to this gig I re-read the article a few times to make sure we were talking about the same show. S77 and scenario82 are on the money. Yasiin Bey, you can keep my money but don’t put on any more weak-ass shows. London’s got love but plenty more boo’s if you try and play us like fools again.
http://www.3way-records.com/ Aneal

In
short this was an embarrassing performance by a disgruntled artist more
interested in appeasing himself then a willing audience… and it could
have all been so different.

The
crowd was already 10 deep by the time I got to the floor around 7:30, and the
buzz was electric. BBoys and backpackers were trading verses with rude
boys and the girls were eagerly holding their ground. DJ Semtex was on
the decks and doing a good job at building the atmosphere but as already
highlighted the sound was awful, not just the clarity but the set up itself
(the right side speakers kept cutting out). The warm up artist (Mic
Righteous) ran through a conscious set of 5 or so tracks at ballistic pace with
good delivery and the crowd were with him the whole way. Unfortunately it
gave us a taste of what was to come in terms of live vocals from the speakers…
mumbles and distortion.

Semtex
came back on to keep the crowd going this time with a more old school vibe and
a lot of bangers, you could half imagine fellow BBC radio resident Westwood
thumping the “big tune” sample pad along with him. But by 9:30 the
enthusiasm of the swarming crowd was waning and there was little that could be
done to settle the audience. Semtex began to shout out regular updates,
“he’s in the taxi”, “he’s on his way”, “he’s outside”, “he’s in the building”
and so on, this only fanned the flames of discontent further and by 10:00 the
crowd were booing and chanting in an attempt to force Yasiin to the stage.
He eventually gave in around 10:10 swaggering onto the stage with a
controlled and reluctant pace with no attempt to hide his annoyance at being
forced on. His set was unusual only performing a handful of his more
popular songs none of which I would say were his best save Umi Says. He performed
some newer material including a cover and boogied along to a Dilla track for a
couple of minutes. He also paused the set to repeat the same verse of a
track 3 times over, once as the original recording (an actual recording which
he danced along to), once accapella and then combined the two. Although I
was keen to hear more of his better tracks from across his career this would
have all been passable had he not have been so rude. He peppered his set
with the question “are you not entertained?”, not in playful jest as Tracey suggest but with
biting sarcasm akin to Maximus’ disgust at the
audience in Gladiator, this was often followed by a mumble with his back to the
crowd. His statements on the nature of his performance and other
performers only served to confirm his disdain for a packed theatre of
interested and passionate fans. He wasn’t placing himself outside the
description of an entertainer but berating the crowd for getting him on stage I
their time, not his. After 50 minutes the deejay played “lifetime” and
Yasiin left the stage not to return. 5 minutes later the lights went up
and the runners cleared the stage. A very disappointing end to an awful
performance where Semtex performed for what must have been 2 hours and the main
artist performed (I use this word very loosely) for just 50 minutes.

The
shame is that I saw Mos Def last year with Talib for the Black Star gig at the
Appollo. There Mos dominated the stage oozing charisma and confidence
throughout the set, overshadowing Talib and wooing the crowd into a
frenzy. They came back to the stage for a multi-track encore too, this in
stark contrast to his lacklustre attendance on Saturday.

Yasiin
is a very talented musician and this experience will not dent my view of his
music, I just would not pay to see him again, nor recommend someone else to
either…