common concert post-game

caveat: this post is going to start a little negative, but IT WAS ALL WORTH IT BECAUSE LONNIE RASHID LYNN JR (aka common sense aka common) IS A GOD AMONG MEN.

so last night i went to a show at toad's for the first time in a while, because...well, who could pass up common playing within walking distance?? we sort of split the baby in terms of arrival- too late to get to the front, but early enough that we waited for an hour and a half for the opener, asher roth, to go on. (predictably, the show started about an hour late).

asher roth...
is a new artist from PA. i knew nothing about him before he came on, so i didn't immediately identify the lanky, tow-headed kid (he's 23) who loped on stage and snagged a floating joint from an audience member as the first act. he's kind of charming, actually, in that wanna pinch his cheeks way...but he's self-fashioned as a sort of chill party boy; his overall vibe says "smoke weed every day! in my mom's basement, in the suburbs". to be fair to him, it's not really his fault that i didn't respond well. first of all, when you show up for common, a man who writes lyrics about his daughter's eyes and redirecting hiphop in a positive direction, a song called "i love college" isn't exactly what you're in the mood for. on a personal note, as someone who's trying to scramble up the cliff-face of adulthood (one foot upwards, two feet back) lyrics like "that party last night was awfully crazy/i wish we taped it/i danced my ass off/i had this one girl completely naked/drink my beer/smoke my weed/with my good friends it's all i need"...not so much. it's to his credit that he doesn't posture and act like something he's not, but at the end of the day, he's sort of like the OAR of hiphop: fun if you're smashed at a party, but otherwise a bit grating and juvenile in all but the smallest doses.


COMMON
it says so much about this artist that he wiped away every trace of negativity that had built up for me in the interim between acts. as much as i love live music, i realize that i kind of hate concert-goers. i was surrounded by every terrible show attendee stereotype...EVER. the couple making out the whole time: to my right. the group of drunk, writing, attention-seeking 14 year old girls with the BRIGHTEST CAMERA FLASHES this side of a red carpet: to my left. the tallest guy in the room: directly in front of me. the guy shouting every lyric in budweiser breath: directly over my right shoulder. BUT in the middle of mentally composing hate letters to all of these people, common swooped onto stage in a blaze of energy, and i immediately loved everyone around me, and not just because of the ambient marijuana finally getting to me (i don't think...).

his set was pretty be heavy (which made me happy), including the title track, "the corner", "go", "testify", "love is", and "the food" (in his encore), but he also threw in older classics like "i used to love HER" (a scathing critique of hiphop's gangsta-turn, which spawned a brief battle with west-coast rappers, primarily ice cube), to which the crowd responded energetically. live-moment highlights included a quick sample from black star's "definition," when he decided to spotlight his INCREDIBLE dj, and an extended free-style, which, starting off a bit slow, made me wonder if he was beginning to show his age, but picked up considerably in the second half, where he offered shout-outs to new haven landmarks and a mini-praise song for obama (AMEN!)**.

this was my first real exposure to his neptunes-produced universal mind control material, which is a departure, especially lyrically, from the gravitas and fusion beats for which he's become known. however, the sheer danceability (less common for common) of "universal mind control" make truth of the lyric "you know you like it/it's calling your name". "punch drunk love" (the album version reprises the successful kanye/common partnership from be) isn't terrible either. i dug "gladiator"; its sky-high energy and horn-and-piano accented electronic beats make it great for a live show, but who invokes michael vick and nelson mandela in the same verse? common's famous and admirable moral compass seems to have gotten skewed there. unfortunately, "sex 4 sugar", weirdly salacious in a crappy club song kinda way, doesn't have the same musical highlights to redeem it.

but let's be real: it barely matters what a mixed bag his new stuff is. the man is a consummate performer. he reminds me of the kind of young, cool high school teacher who had the students completely in the palm of his hand. a commanding, but playful presence; earnest, but mischievous. he seemed like he was having as much fun as the audience was (which was LOT) whether he was bantering with his dj and keyboardist on stage, interacting with the crowd in front, or dancing with a fist-pumping, sweat-soaked energy on every inch of the stage. (it helps that common is not only a riveting performer, but easily one of the most attractive men i have ever been the the presence of; he is sexy in an irresistible, magnetic way. i'm (almost) not ashamed to admit that i would have sacrificed a digit to have been the girl he brought up on stage during "love is".)

bottom line:
there are shows that you leave feeling quizzical, with a sense of anti-climax (dave matthews).
there are shows that you leave feeling satisfied, but ultimately not overwhelmed (catch 22).
there are shows that you leave, drunk as a lord on smuggled nips of bourbon, eating cheez-fries, and having just made out with a celtics-jersey wearing plumber from quincy, in order to tow a distressed and equally drunk friend back to a red roof inn (steve miller band).

and then there are shows, like this one, that make you say to yourself, "i would give up [sex, chocolate, beer, lolcatz, etc] for a whole year, in a hiphop lent sort of way, if i could see that every saturday".... it's the food, baby.

aaanyway, to distract you from the fact that i've been to a steve miller band concert, here's a snippet of "go" from saturday:


**i, of course, got video of the first half of this, but, for no logical reason, stopped taping in the second half. kicking myself...but i'm having a hell of a time getting the videos posted, anyway...so maybe no harm done. i'll try to get something posted, soon, though, whether it's my own or something that pops up on youtube.