The show was mired with mostly forgivable technical issues. Sound not mixed well(vocals were very hard to discern), mics overdriving speakers if someone got within 15 ft of them. The venue itself did not seem ready for a rap concert. Filling the area that would usually be GA with folding chairs, which lead to people standing on them, which lead to the venues aging security force clashing with concert goers over very minor things.
The local opening acts did more actual rapping than the "gold record" "internationally known" openers(Beeda Weeda), who mostly sang along with the choruses & verses to some remixes they were featured on. When I say "sang along" I mean, literally, the song was playing and they were singing along with it.
B-legit came out for about 5 songs, the technical issues & his delivery made him nearly unintelligible.
The announcer/comedian/whatever who was speaking between sets was largely just a rambling drunk.
Too Short came out next, played between 8-12 tracks. Some of the technical issues cleared up for his set and it immediately became apparent that he was far more experienced onstage than anyone else, even his hype man was understandable/clear.
No singing along here, Too Short/Dolla Will actually MC'd rather well. Worth the price of admission just for this part of the show.
E-40 came out after Too Short, I had high hopes for his set. Those hopes were dashed against the cold, hard rocks of reality when he came out and began rapping with the microphone so close to his face that it could've been a spare bodypart. Could not understand a word(partly due to microphone being located inside E-40's face, partly due to the fact that the sound guys didn't have much time to improve the mix going out to the speakers, apparently) Thankfully, e-40 & the sound guys pulled it together for the last song, which was "Tell Me When to Go". This almost made up for the entire set being pretty lackluster.
Carlson Center @
- Fairbanks @
, AK @
- Sat, Mar 17, 2012 @
Favorite moment: Too Short played songs from across his absurdly lengthy career @
Opening act(s): Alaska Red & some other guy(locals, not really my style, but at least they came out and rapped) good energy, got the crowd involved pretty quickly.
This was shortly ruined by Beeda Weeda's boring letdown of an opener. @