By Angharad Williams

Jazz Cafe , London - 15 April 2005

For those in need of a dose of real hip hop, Camden’s Jazz Café was the place to be on Saturday night. Lonnie ‘Common’ Lynn stepped out to a sell-out audience fresh from the Urban Music Festival, where he had rocked the crowd with a set of three tracks. In this more intimate venue, the air was full of anticipation as people took their places to catch a view of the Chi-town rapper in full flow. To a blaze of cheers he came on stage full of energy, which seemed to bounce between the crowd and the host.

His performance was on the eve of the release of his new album, ‘Be’, and in his own words, the album will still be moving forward but will remain true to the old skool - which will please fans who were not bought over by the more experimental ‘Electric Circus’. His set was a journey through his back-catalogue of albums and gave us a preview of his latest release with his performance of the first single from the album, ‘The Corner’, a catchy hip hop track which remains true to its roots and will certainly stand out in the current music scene. However, it was tracks like ‘Funky For You’ and ‘The Sixth Sense’ which got the crowd into a frenzy of dance and cheers, and Common responded by reacting to each part of the venue and at one point jumping into the crowd where he continued in the centre of the room, much to the delight of the audience.

Tour DJ, DJ Dumi from Brooklyn, provided the soundtrack for the evening and proved his skills with a solo stint on the decks, where he mixed old skool hip hop tracks to create a whole new beat and even used his nose to move the fader at one point! Throughout the show, camera phones were annoyingly out filming and taking pictures, which was clear to the star of the show, who at one point took a phone and sang into it much to our amusement.

The night passed all too quickly. Common gave us another exclusive in the form of the track ‘Go’ from his new album, which got hands in the air and everyone chanting the chorus. But, it was ‘The Light’ which got the crowd wild; Common hardly needed to rap as everyone in the crowd knew the ‘Like Water For Chocolate’ classic word for word. After what felt like no time, he left the stage to chants of ‘Common’; of course, he had to come back for one more as nobody moved until we got our final fix.

Hip hop has left many people disillusioned of late, but on a clear night in London the hip hop was certainly alive. Every time Common graces a stage an audience feels blessed and satisfied; this was definitely one of the best live hip hop shows I’ve been to in a long time. The party continued late into the night while people danced and kept on a high from an amazing night of real hip hop.

Return To Concert Review Archive

US Music | Clubs | Front Page | UK Music | Events