John Legend welcoming the Minneapolis crowd with open arms

John Legend performing “Ordinary People”: incredible mood with the song and lighting

John Legend in the spotlight

Bear with me because I’m still recovering from a beautiful concert put on last night in Minneapolis by John Legend and opener, Raphael Saadiq. The Northrop Auditorium on the University of Minnesota campus was the ideal venue for a booming live band and R&B and soul music all night (not to mention walking distance from La Casa de Tibs :D.. I digress). Raphael Saadiq opened up the show with a very energetic set as his two backup singers and himself were dancing and shuffling along to every song. His live band created a jazz feel as well and as people filed in, the crowd was more receptive to Raphael Saadiq, with the highlight coming with Saadiq’s closing song where he got everybody out of their seats clapping.

After an intermission, out came John Legend to a chilling, boxing themed entrance launching into his Get Lifted hit, “Used To Love U”! Legend kept it going throughout the entire show by going from one song to the next with no break and smooth transition from the live band and jazz section. Legend fluctuated between the microphone stand and the piano as he killed song after song, from new hits like “Quickly” (above), “Satisfaction”, “Everybody Knows”, and an energetic performance of “Green Light” to classics like “Heaven” (perhaps my fav. JL song ever), “I Can Change”, and “Slow Dance”, where JL brought out a lucky fan in the first row to come up and slow dance on stage. I’ve seen him do that before and that’s always a hit and Legend was beyond smooth.

As was the case when I saw him in Minneapolis a couple years ago on his previous tour, Legend closed the concert with brilliant song choice and even greater performances. The finale of the concert started with a chilling rendition of “Ordinary People”, where the lights were off except for the spotlight on Legend and the crowd eerily singing along to every word. He then made a speech about the progress of his Show Me Campaign, which ignited a “change is in the air!” exclamation that got the crowd roaring again. He then belted out “If You’re Out There” from the piano, with the big screen in the background displaying images of influential figures throughout history, ending with an image of our next President, Barack Obama, which resulted in perhaps the biggest overall cheer of the night as Legend concluded the song accordingly. He took a bow and seemingly left for good, but came out for an encore ballad of “This Time” (my 2008 R&B jam of the year!) and his usual concluding song, “So High”! Overall, the show was a top-notch performance and I was glad to experience the sounds and booming voice of John Legend in an auditorium atmosphere, compared to the club scene that I experienced last time I saw John Legend live. Even if you’re not a huge fan of John Legend, grab some tickets to enjoy a show unlike any other and a show that promises to entertain and appreciate the wonderful musical talent of John Legend.

Top 5 PERFORMANCES (in order)

1. “Ordinary People”

2. “If You’re Out There”

3. “So High”

4. “Everybody Knows”

5. “Good Morning”

I never came through with a review of Evolver when it was released 3 weeks ago and besides my busy schedule, I have to allow some time for John Legend albums to fully set in and some songs to grow on me. In the case of Evolver, I concluded that John Legend comes through with a handful of classics like with any other album, but when considering the entire album as a whole, I feel the rest of the tracks do not live up to that extra level that John Legend has always consistently attained. I would rank Evolver 3rd out of John’s 3 LPs, with Once Again 2nd and the CLASSIC Get Lifted an undisputed number one.

That being said, Evolver is still an above average album that is actually appealing to a wider audience compared to his previous albums. With this album, John Legend wanted to take a different direction and experiment with different sounds and genres of music to show the artist’s evolution (hence the title, if you couldn’t connect it already). At times, Legend executes it flawlessly, like in the duet with Brandy over a new-age Midi Mafia R&B production. The beat really enhances Legend’s booming voice at times that has yet to be explored on his previous two albums. Conversely, I liked Legend’s effort to sing over reggae with “No Other Love” f/ Estelle and while the pair’s voices and the lyrics keep me on that song, the production holds the song back. Normally, Legend would take those lyrics and sing them over a piano or a soulful beat, but decided to branch out into other genres of music throughout the album. I would never say it works for him negatively as his first single, “Green Light” f/ Andre 3000 was his biggest single to date and was a solid track over a poppy beat, but I think the hardcore John Legend fans like myself would prefer an album where Legend sticks to what he does best: belting over a piano or soul productions.

I admire John Legend’s exploration of the limits of his artistic ability by trying to reach many genres of music, and while that is necessary for artists to explore to keep things fresh, I feel it also held back Evolver from reaching the high status of Get Lifted or Once Again. However, those two albums are pretty high standards so compared to what else is out there, Evolver is typically above the rest. It’s funny how fans always urge artists to explore outside their comfort zone, but sometimes once they do, they never wanted them to leave that comfort zone in the first place. I guess I fall in line with that generality, but I also recognize the double edged sword for Legend because if he did an album a lot like his previous two, then fans and critics would complain that he’s not extending himself as an artist. Interesting, huh? Whatever the case, Evolver has more than enough tracks that appeal to fans of his previous albums while also featuring a lot of tracks that appeal to many genres of music and will open long-time John Legend fans to another side of the artist. Pick up the album below, if you haven’t already, and peep one last lyric from the influential “If You’re Out There”!

“No more broken promises
No more call to war
Unless it’s love and peace that we’re really fighting for
We can destroy hunger
We can conquer hate
Put down the arms and raise your voice
We’re joining hands today

Oh I was looking for a song to sing
I searched for a leader
But the leader was me
We were looking for the world to change
We can be heroes
Just go on and say

If you’re out there
Sing along with me
If you’re out there
I’m dying to believe that you’re out there
Stand up and say it loud
If you’re out there
Tomorrow’s starting now
Now, now”

- John Legend “If You’re Out There”

Top 5 *Tibs Favs.™ (in order)

08. This Time

05. Quickly f/ Brandy

13. If You’re Out There

03. It’s Over f/ Kanye West

04. Everybody Knows

Production: 8/10

Lyrics: 9/10

OVERALL (not an average): 8.5/10

BUY: John Legend - Evolver [iTunes]

~ Sgt. Tibs

MP3 :: “space nut to ape length”
(from Cretin Flowers single/EP. Buy here)

Though the long tracklists/short running time may not seem like wise eMusic purchases, the last 3 Capstan Shafts albums are all available at the mp3 superstore right now and are well worth checking out.
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There is something for everyone in Moon Country. If you want the full effects of the buzzing harmony that the genre has to offer, the album ends quite nicely with the eight-minute long "Open the Gates." Then there are the catchy jingles of "Killer of Dragons" and "Seagull Blues," two songs that I highly recommend for their mastery of fuzzy guitars and muffled drums alongside the sing-along pop quality. To add to the band's versatility, though I am not a huge fan of the heavily altered vocals in a handful of the songs, I can make the exception with the acoustic ballad "Angles and Devils," which not only is strong for its comprehensibility but also for its honest lyrics. 

There is a a lot of power in the The High Dial's musicianship. As a result, the album is quite friendly and colored in warm hues. It has a playable quality that could propel the band into the mainstream culture, but it still holds fast and strong to its essence. Sounds like it's time to give psychedelic rock a try. 

By Louis Peitzman

Don't let the name fool you: MC Frontalot is serious about rapping. He just does it a bit differently than most other hip-hop artists.

Frontalot (real name: Damian Hess) has been called "the godfather of nerdcore" for his role in establishing a genre where it's cool to be uncool. He raps about everything from Internet porn to Magic: the Gathering - exposing nerds to hip-hop culture, and vice versa. Along with his band, he's the subject of the documentary Nerdcore Rising, currently screening in select theaters. In a phone interview, I chatted with Hess about the film and the direction nerdcore is taking. He performs at the Uptown Night Club tonight.

SFBG: My first question is about the name - is it ironic, or do you feel as though you actually front?

Damian Hess: I mean, I picked it out originally because I thought there'd be no other rapper who would want to steal that from me. Because rappers generally eschew fronting and, you know, try to convince everyone that they're not fronting at all.

I also sort of felt it was descriptive at the time, just of the amount of fronting I have to do just to pick up a microphone and pretend like everyone ought to pay a lot of attention to me. Seems like a lot of fronting.

Actually I picked the name because someone had taken a snapshot of me rapping on stage with a funk band that a friend of mine was in. I had just sort of stepped up with them for a second. And I was just looking at this picture of myself, like, you know, grinning and holding this mic up to my mouth like all the real rappers, and I was gripped with self-hatred, and I wrote, "MC Frontalot's Raptacular Funfest" on there with like a Sharpie, just kind of stabbing at myself. But I don't know, then I thought it was intriguing and/or funny, and I kept it.

SFBG: Do you worry about being taken seriously as an artist? Obviously there's an aspect of humor to it, but you are a serious musician, so how do you reconcile that?

DH: I guess I don't usually worry about it. I know that everyone who's sort of within the core audience will be attracted to the humor in it, and there's plenty of humor in it. And I love almost everything that I'm into to have some humor in it. Even all of the politics I consume is funny.

You know, I like to read Wonkette and 23/6 and stuff like that. I like my horror movies to be funny. I like everything to be funny. I don't like anything to be disposably funny, and I'm not interested in parody at all. So I do worry, of course, that someone here's like, "Oh, nerds rapping, that's just going to be some kind of a gag, or a one-note joke."

But I don't worry that the people who are gonna have the potential to be my fans are gonna think that, 'cause they'll take one listen and they'll hear what's going on lyrically, and they'll hear that we're serious about the music, and I hope that they'll find there's something worth listening to over and over in there. The way MC Lars put it in the documentary is, the goal is to be funny without being a joke. And that's a thin line potentially, but I'm pretty happy with how most of the stuff comes out.

SFBG: In the film, there's an issue raised of nerdcore being construed as racist. How would you respond to those allegations?

DH: Well, there's a lot of kids doing nerdcore, and I guess you'd need to look at everything case by case. I know there are some kids who are calling themselves nerdcore and don't take rap very seriously, who think that by sort of rapping badly that that's funny and that they're somehow exposing some weakness of hip-hop itself. Of course, those people are idiots. I have no interest in approaching music that way. That would be a big waste of time.

Are those kids racist? I'm not sure. I've certainly heard a lot of, like, indie rock consumers dismiss rap out of hand, and there's always seemed to me to be some seed of racism in that dismissal. But the kids who are making the nerdcore that I like and these kids that I tour with, I think it all comes from a deep and an aware respect of the fact that hip-hop is a piece of black culture that we're happening to try to create something that's associated with it. But like I said, unless you delve into parody, there's no aspect of it that's critical of rap itself. I certainly am never trying to expose anything absurd about rap culture.

SFBG: Another question Nerdcore Rising touches on is whether or not nerdcore can ever become popular to the masses. Can it go mainstream, and will it?

DH: It's not inconceivable. Anyone could make a song from anything that seems to be a niche genre and have a good enough hook to it that everyone's ears perk up when it comes on, and it becomes popular. But just on the basis of it being nerdcore, could the idea of nerdcore become mainstream? That seems unlikely based on what it is.

It's something that's speaking to an identity that's by definition non-dominant, non-mainstream, separated from all the things that make the top strata of pop culture popular, you know, like glossiness, shininess, glamour, beauty, popularity.

SFBG: Returning to the film, what was left out of it - whether about the music or about you personally - that you want people to know about?

DH: What was left out of the film? God, I don't know. What was left out of the film? Hey, Brandon, what was left out of the documentary that the public should have known? What did Negin [Farsad, the director] like hide from the public about nerdcore and what it all means? Exactly the sort of question I don't know how to answer.

I remember the first time I saw the movie I realized, like, the whole thing is sort of from a perspective outside of, like, nerd-ness, you know, outside of nerd culture. It's sort of like an introduction, like, here's what nerds are like. It's almost like you're in a zoo or something. That was sort of her approach, to make this sort of general interest movie, but I guess it ends up leaving out all of the real sort of dorky stuff that we tend to talk about. You know, we'll sit and talk about game mechanics for an hour or something, but that's the kind of thing that would have massive interest to our fans if they were watching the movie but of course, like, no interest to a general movie audience.

SFBG: Have you seen your fanbase increasing with the movie kind of spreading around?

DH: I've been noticing a ton of e-mail from people in Europe, I think because they're all pirating it off Danish torrent servers.

SFBG: The rest of my questions are more about nerd culture in general. First, are there any nerdy things that you just don't get or otherwise aren't into?

DH: Oh, yeah, there's a bunch. Like, I'm not into Harry Potter. I'm not into Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I'm not really very into Star Trek, although many people are on one side or the other of a Star Trek/Star Wars divide.

SFBG: So you fall more on the Star Wars side, then?

DH: Oh, yeah.

SFBG: Do you have a favorite Star Wars?

DH: Well, Empire, of course.

SFBG: And how many hours a day would you say you spend on the computer?

DH: Um, usually, it's like seven to 18. I mean, I just get up and I'm on the computer a lot. I have to walk the dog. I come back, I'm on the computer a lot. I mean, you go on tour and you're not in front of the computer at all for six weeks at a time. Or you go out and actually do something with your day, but most days, it's computer all day.

SFBG: And to close it off back on the music, what's next for you and for nerdcore? Where do you see yourself and the genre moving?

DH: Well, there's this current sort of pop culture fascination with nerds and nerderie. You know, there's like IT Crowd and whatever that other sitcom is. And there's all these comic book movies becoming hits. God, what were we looking through? Like, Maxim, or something. You know, there's this almost entirely naked fashion model sprawled out in a big spread, and the big pull quote is like, "I consider myself a nerd, really."

So there's this little moment of trendiness of it right now. I don't know if that's driven by the techno surge performing culture very slightly, or if it's just one of the many random ebbs and flows of American culture. But it sort of seems like the moment when nerderie could, you know, catch the eye of the kind of people who push culture into the mainstream. You know, the big record companies or whatever could conceivably seize this moment to make nerdcore be much more noticeable than it's been.

But I don't know if that would really, in the long-run, serve us and do us any good. The grassroots approach of actually reaching dedicated fans ourselves through the Internet has been serving us really well. And its trajectory is such that it seems like the handful of us who are viable touring bands and who are very serious about the music side of it - it seems as though we are on trajectory, even without any kind of cultural wave, to continue to have successful careers with it, no matter what the fickle tastes of the general public might otherwise dictate.

So I don't know really whether it would be good or bad to get the traditional success model applied to us. Surely, it would be lucrative in the short-term, but I don't know whether that would be our best bet. You do hear of many bands who hit a moment of their particular style's emergence, and then four years later, feel very ripped off by the hundred grand they still owe their label, or scoffs that they receive from talking heads on I Love the '90s.

(Some time later…)

DH: Yeah, I didn't mean to blow off the racism question. I really contemplate that a lot. It's difficult to, like, hop into the two genres of music that ever emerged out of America, both of which were created by black Americans, and create a small amount of success as someone's who's not black. I don't know quite how I feel about that.

I come from Berkeley, so I have a predisposition for sitting around worrying about the racial politics of everything that I do. I don't know. I don't quite know how to resolve it, so I just kind of hope that the respect I feel for the origins of the things that I'm appropriating is clear enough that no one ever feels offended by the music.

SFBG: I think the music does speak for itself, but I just wanted to get your take on it, because I felt like it was something that was brushed on in the movie, but I wanted to hear your side of it more.

DH: I'm glad it was touched on a little in the movie. I think it would've been interesting if that came out more. Actually there's something I thought there was not enough of in the movie, were people reacting critically to the band.

There was only that one segment of like, sort of meatheads and snobs brushing us off. Like, I think there's probably a lot of very non-meathead, non-snobby hip-hop fans who would have a bad reaction to me. And you didn't see that much of that in the movie. I kind of even think that would have made the narrative of the movie stronger, because there's so much about this idea of the nerds as an identity group being underdogs, but there's not that many people, like, kicking us around in the movie.

And, you know, in adult nerd life there's not all that much of that anyway, if you're not like sitting around in a bar trying to talk to the pretty girl that the guy who was a jock in high school also has his eye on. You don't tend to have those interactions after you leave the world of school. But there definitely was plenty of that in all of our lives when we were younger.

MC FRONTALOT
With MC Lars and DJ Omar
Wed/19, 9 p.m., $15
Uptown Night Club
1928 Telegraph, Oakl.
(510) 451-8100

"I forgot my name, I forgot my telephone number"

I figured that the Britney ship had completely sailed for me. Other than a handful of songs, Blackout was a disappointment and I haven't listened to any of the earlier albums for years. Gimme More, an utter snoozefest and her worst single by a mile, all but nailed the coffin for me. But then I watched the TRL finale and got all nostalgic for the late 90's/early 00's pop boom. Curious, I gave Britney's latest album a listen and although this type of music isn't 100% my thing anymore, I'm pretty darn impressed--especially with the bonus tracks. The best of the bonuses is Amnesia, a Cyndi Lauper-like shuffle that sounds way too good to be Britney. It's one of those songs you flag right away... just so different and catchy than everything else. As with most of Britney's stuff, a different singer would have knocked this into the stratosphere, but at least she's around so that great writers/producers can give her their stuff.

Britney Spears - Amnesia (zshare)

(Music posted for evaluation purposes only. If you like what you hear, support the artists. Preorder the album here!)

In addition to teaching the children of England the meaning of dope, Dan Love blogs at From Da Bricks. 

Stretch Armstrong should need no introduction around these parts. As one half of New York’s most legendary hip hop radio team the unlikely looking Adrian Bartos’ pseudonym will be indelibly associated with establishing the careers of most of your favourite rappers and then some. However, what few people realise is that Stretch built up a modest yet well-executed catalogue of beats towards the tail end of hip hop’s infinitely lauded golden era including work with Lil’ Kim on her full length debut and Shawn J. Period’s original crew Down South that you’d be remiss to overlook.

My hands down favourite Stretch production comes in the shape of his mix of Big Noyd’s ‘Usual Suspect’ lifted from his ’96 solo drop Episodes Of A Hustla, an album that suffers from brevity, mediocrity and the towering shadow of the infinitely superior material put out by close affiliates Mobb Deep. Nice try, Mr Perry. Put these issues to one side though and there are a handful of enjoyable moments to savour for those who miss that gritty New York aesthetic and tangible Queen’s cadence on the mic. That’s everyone, right?

Sample fodder comes care of the late, great Mr Hayes and the third installment from his ‘Ike’s Rap’ series that like the majority of his work has been heavily dug (does the colloquial term for hunting down records even work in the past tense? Who knows). It’s a beautifully simple act of production on Stretch’s part, jacking the first couple of bars and pitching them up with absolutely nothing left out of the mix. You’d be forgiven for writing off Stretch’s innovation behind the boards in this instance if the end product wasn’t so uncontrollably bangin’, but since it is you can officially take your hatin’ elsewhere. Sucka. Crispy drums and occasional sample manipulations complete the picture and give Noyd the space he deserves to get busy. Who ever said this shit needed to get complicated?

Try listening to this without aggravating that pesky crick in your neck: consider that a dare of the double dog variety. Just be aware that any successful attempts touted in the comment section will be immediately discounted on the basis that you’re lying.

Download:
MP3:Big Noyd-”Usual Suspect (Stretch Armstrong Mix)”
MP3:Isaac Hayes-”Medley: Ike’s Rap III/Your Love is So Doggone Good”