Leftover photos - Rock the Bells, Shoreline Amphitheater, 2008

The Pharcyde is one of the most innovative and exciting groups to come out of the '90s era of hip-hop. Their first album Bizarreride II sounds like a circus happening inside a mental institution. Their second album is cleaner, more produced and melodic, but it's just as good, if not better. A hip-hop artist maturing, and actually sounding better on the second album is almost unheard of. Then Bootie Brown and Imani came out with another album that everyone forgot about.

Slim Kid3, Bootie Brown, Imani and Fatlip (above) envisioned and executed a twisted take on what hip-hop should be. And it worked.




The crowd, when I got to the Shoreline, was a little embarassing; there was a ton of empty seats. But by the end of the night, the place was packed with people doing things in unison—like saying "Ho!" and putting their cellphones in the air.

A Tribe Called Quest is pretty much the first hip-hop group to introduce a bohemian, jazzy and soulful flair to the genre. Here's Phife, a bit chunkier and glowing with irridescent colors (I took shitty photos and tried to fix them digitally). It was really hard for me not to jump up on the stage and hug Q-Tip and Phife and say, "You guys are like my long lost black fathers." You know, because they raised me. Anyway, watching ATCQ was worth having to share space with high-school geeks with gold fronts and Mac Dre shirts, which there were a lot of.

Nas, of Queensbridge, NY, made the classic album Illmatic in '94. It changed the way people looked at hardcore hip-hop because he embraced the most artistic elements of hip-hop while maintaining a thugged out persona. He's one of the few artists featured on the Rock The Bells main stage who has achieved a lot of commercial success. Except Mos Def and Method Man (but for acting).

There'll be better photos and a story in the SN&R next week or something.