RUSTY JABBZ ENTERTAINMENT PRESENTS
CITY PARKS FOUNDATION SUMMERSTAGE EVENT OF EPMD AND FUNKMASTER FLEX LIVE AT QUEENSBRIDGE PARK!
It was a hot summer day, thursday, July 15th 2010 in Queensbridge. To quote the great, M.C. Shan "This is a place where stars are born and where the only other place that can't be worned out". Speaking of stars this maybe an overlooked Q.B. star because he's not ur average Q.B. star. I know most stars from The Bridge are emcees. We have a history going back, starting from M.C. Shan to Marley Marl to Tragedy to Craig G to Shante to Nas to Screwball to Mobb Deep to Nature & the list goes on. Throughout them years we've managed to miss a star not quite known for his emcee skillz but known to Queensbridge more for his basketball skillz. Q.B. followed & accompanied Ron Artest to Queensbridge Park, men, women & children. Ron Artest of the L.A. Lakers return home to Queensbridge after winning this years NBA championship. Funkmaster Flex gets introduced onto the stage. I don't know who gives a rat's ass about Funkmaster Flex but to my surprise Flex got up there and did his thing. It's been a long time since I seen Funkmaster Flex break out the turntablism skillz of course theres always gonna be hater's around. Look, don't get me wrong I'm not a big Flex fan neither but I do show love when he do do something good. It's just that alotta you underground niggaz hate too much. A commercial nigga do something good for 1 day out of the ordinary no one can show love. It gotta be the same ol' comments, I hear, "it wasn't all that!", "so and so or blah blah blah can do much betta". Listen man, STOP THE HATE! I think that dj routine the Funkmaster Flex pulled off was good of course Dj Scratch's routine was much betta but we'll talk about that later. We're going to move onto the 1st act of the night, Superstar B-Baller & emcee, Ron Artest & The World Wide Warriorz. They did a pretty decent job I enjoyed their performance but I prefer Ron to stick with basketball. The World Wide Warriorz if they wanna keep rappin' they can I don't know how far their rap career will go being GARBAGE but who cares. The main event of the night was the group that went real far in their rap careers. The team of Erick & Parrish Making Dollars (EPMD) Did these guys actually make dollars in the 80s/90s. In those days of real hip hop, emcees didn't rap much about the amount of money being made. In those days you had to have talent to make money and these brothers from Brentwood, LI had pure talent. EPMD, beginning their performance with the forever popular James Brown sample to, "It's My Thang" then the proceeding songs, "You Gots To Chill", the Bob Marley inspired & sampled, "Strictly Business", "Time Keeps On Tickin'" and "So What You Sayin'" these were just a few warm ups to awaken the crowd. Then, Erick Sermon blessed us with a raw freestyle. After that it was intermission time for the Brentwood Boyz. There man & dj, The 3x DJ Champion-Dj Scratch stepped on the scene to grace the fanz with wicked turntable wizardry. Dj Scratch performing his dj segment over the popular hip hop classics, M.O.P's "Ante Up" and Black Sheep's "The Choice Is Yours". This is where the show got SICK! Dj Scratch did this turntable trick I know I'm never gonna forget. You have, "The Choice Is Yours" single playing. You hear an adlib of Dres saying, "engine, engine #9" on 1 record and on the next record you have another adlib of dres saying, "pick it up, pick it up". Scratch is going back and forth doing his cuttin' & scratchin' thing. As he does that he starts picking up the turntable on some sort of improntu. Whenever the record plays the part that says, "pick it up, pick it up", Scratch picks up the turntable. The thing that made it look so ILL was the way he did it so sequenced, so choregraphed, SO PERFECT!!! I can only describe but so much I hope I painted a clear picture but if you still can't see it then I guess you just had to be here. Other than that though on the grindside of things, I think Dj Scratch was also trying to shut up Flex. Remember what I mentioned earlier we would talk about this later. Now is the time to talk. Funkmaster Flex, earlier during his segment he looked like he was trying to either impress, show off or maybe call out Dj Scratch. I'm not saying, Funkmaster Flex can not come out to Queensbridge Park and get live on stage and start doing tricks that he rarely do or haven't done in a long time. You start thinking when you see something like that, "Hmmm This is Suspect!" It doesn't matter anyway because DJ SCRATCH SHUT punkmaster flex UP! Scratch just str8 stomped 'em & crushed 'em like a cock a roach. I know I'm goin' to hear it for this. Everybody knows Dj Handspin loves the drama, loves the rumors, loves the beefs. Believe what y' all wanna believe, back to the review. EPMD, back on stage and this time addressing the crowd. EPMD, performing one of their favorite & personal song to them, "Please Listen To My Demo" a song they dedicated to all the aspiring emcees of yesterday & today. After that they performed, JANE. Y' all remember Jane, you can't forget, Jane, "short, haircut like Anita Baker". JANE, was an 5 part song series of a prostitute that Erick & Parrish encountered but later found out. That what they thought was a woman was actually a beautiful CHICK WITH A COCK! This was Jane Part 1 that was being performed by EPMD along with Dj Scratch blending Rick James' original Mary Jane with the EPMD sampled version. That was a great blend and performance of that song. The next song, I remember, EPMD performing is another one of my favorites, "Slow Down Baby". I remember this jam. This was a tight single back then and still is. I just wish LL was there to complete the song with EPMD. I remember, LL being a guest on the single and making that single for what it was worth. After that song, my memory began to fade. As I wandered through the crowd in the park. The night began to whine down I ran into a few homies out there. I wanna give a phat shout out to my dudez, D-biggz, General, Verse E, Ty. Peace to dat nigga, Capone of Capone n Noreaga, who was in da house "CNN WAR REPORT PT 2" in stores now. Dat nigga, Barz was in da house. Holla at dat nigga, Barz on itunes to cop da brand new single, "Da Bridge Aint Over" in stores & online. Oh yeah, you muh' fucka, u didn't think I forgot. I don't know who you are, Investment? Whoever you are that was some real slick shit runnin' up on me and sellin' ur album while I was in the middle of having a seizure. I was totally unaware of what the fuck was going on? I shudn't be putting my biz out there but I gotta let it be known that I did have a seizure at the very beginning of the EPMD concert. Needless to say, Investment imma keep my eyes on you. You seem to be dat type of emcee dats willing to run up on a sick man and sell him ur music that only tells me how determine you are and that you got sumthin' that you want us to hear. Keep doing your thang but keep this in mind. The next time you sell me one of ur cds while I'm in the middle of having a seizure, you betta be prepared to give me my money back when I come out of it. This brings us to the end of the show and the end of the review. It was a good evening out in the middle Queensbridge Park witnessing one of hip hop's greatest groups of the golden era that we very rarely get to see on a regular basis. Everyone give it up to EPMD for coming out tonight. Now give it up to Dj Scratch, Ron Artest, Funkmaster Flex and most importantly give it up to the City Parks Foundation for making these summer events all possible. I just wanna say summer aint over we got a month and 3 weeks left there will be a lot more places to go, people to see and review to read. All courtesy of your favorite writer's favorite writer, Dj Handspin Dinero "PEACE!"
Upcoming Events:
Next City Parks Foundation Concert; starring Doug E. FRESH and D.J. Wiz, live Wed., Aug. 11th @ 7pm @ Jackie Robinson Park West 145th St. btw. 7th Avenue and Amsterdam Avenue (Harlem, NYC)
