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Verbal Tribez Report – Rushay

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4 April 2003 No Comment

This is my experience of last weeks event called Verbal Tribez which featured local artist sharing the stage with Swedish hip hop group Looptroop, Spot Runnaz, Rantoboko, Timbuktu, Chords and U.K rapper Blak Twang. Well at this moment I’m feeling like a scanner scanning the event and now I need a outlet to put out the material. I just scanned and this website is the perfect means for me to expose my brain.


Well Thursday was the boarding day for me my boy J-bux (aka Mr Nobody) and Ian my other compadre from Grahamstown, Intercape was the mainliner, hip hop was the topic, not even a 12 hour ride could break our spirit. The only thing that pissed me about the trip was this corny “coloured” guy and white dude trynna hit on this fine ass “coloured” chick with corny lines that made Bux spit some lines that made people think we fuckin insane. 

Well we arrived at about 8:30 the next morning decided to go to the Milkman aka Shane’s crib to drop our bags. After 30 minutes we decided to go search for some graf pieces to take pics of cos emceeing aint the only vocab to me . We walked into heaven, some tight pieces laced the walls of Woodstock while busy taking pics this white chick (Faith) drops on us and started to chat to us and to our surprise she is one of the artist. She decided to invite us to her crib and introduce us to Nicholas Ganz a German cat who is touring the world writing a book on graffiti. A few minutes out of no where pops Mak1 pops up. We chilled, talked about his graf and his future. 

After a short pitstop we decided to bounce to a venue called The Valve where the event was suppose to take place. The artist started rocking up for there rehearsal session. We chilled with some local cats who seemed to blaze more smoke than a chimney. Like Ghostface on his Ironman album I decided I had a need for track number 9 some dish called fish. It was now 6 hours later and the workshop was supposed to start. All the elements were represented at the workshop. Dj Hamma showcased the skills needed to be called a dj, Bux laced Blak Twang with questions about the skill of freestyling. The joint was hot and I had a huge headache, I decided to cool down outside where we found Falko doing a piece for everybody. Emile and his Black Noise crew got people involved in the b-boyin aspect. Everybody was hyped and the place was vacated to get ready for our international and local artist. Then we chilled outside for something like 2 hours with local heads speaking about the positivity of hip hop. We saw little kids who would surely been involved in gangsterism fighting it out on the dance floor continuing to do so outside on the hard gravel road. 

Well the place was abuzz now after it seemed as if Cape Town heads wasn’t gonna rock up for the show the stage was lit the night was young and who was gonna open up the stage? The ice breaker was a cat called Jamaica and he really rocked us with his presence. I felt his vibe although I couldn’t understand alot of his message since he was doing it in his native tongue. I can’t recall if he was Angolan or what! Benga Benga…well the dj’s played some music inbetween sets which I wasnt really feeling cos I think musically I’m deeper than some of the shit they was playing but thats my opinion and does it count? If I’m correct B.V.K (Brasse vannie kaap) was next up on the stage Mr Fat seemed to be happy to be back in Cape Town. Perhaps he missed those Gatsby’s from home they also took the time to introduce their latest recruit who is a ragga cat. Well as I could have predicated Mr. Fat had his shirt off along time by now sweating some kilo’s off him. The b-boys was rocking the show with them, Mr Ready D showcased his lyrical skills and Dj Azhul was spinning the disc the crowd seemed more hyped than Public Enemy themselves. Ready D wasn’t on the decks, guess the arthritis got to him that night he took time out to send a note to George Poes (Bush). Another set change and it was time for a cool down set. I went to chill with Milkdadda himself who by now was gulping more drinks than ODB himself. Some chickie oh shit sista popped in who is she? Well she came for a short pitstop introduced herself as MissL. Yeah the infamous one from some site that I can’t recall. Nice seeing you though. Black Noise was next showing an impressive set. Emile’s fro was almost blocking the lighting but shit went down nice. Their set was quite short. Next was Goddessa who had a band with them. The sound system was abit shitty cos the band was too loud but the Goddessa girls was nice. I’m eagerly waiting for their album to come out. 

Spot Runnaz ran the next line up. The brothers was all over the place the whole time now it was their time to shine. They had a nice vibe to them after about 3 tracks they left the stage. I gave Timbuktu who was next to perform a real shocker when I asked him to perform that “Gott Folk” track he was asking me how I know that shit! He and Chords came on as a duo. Their gig was rushed. I could sense it they didn’t even have a break and went straight into the Gott Folk track. I could feel the ishhhhhh from miles away. Music is a universal language and I already knew the translation of the track so I was enjoying it. The last of the Swedish artist was Looptroop who are a trio led by Promoe. They showed us how to do the “revolutionary step”. Everybody was jumping again. David overcame Goliath that night. They ended off their short time onstage due to time constraints with a banga which I felt was their best track for that night the chorus went 

we don’t need a weather man to know which way the wind blows, we don’t need you politicians to know which way to go we don’t need you teachers leave the kids alone, and we don’t need the poisonous fruit of Babylon!” Aghhhhh!

They was nice and they was down to earth, big up to the Troop. The last act to hit us up was U.K emcee Blak Twang who had some shit with the sound by the time when he was suppose to come on after 15 hours of being at a gig. I was fucking tired and I couldn’t move one inch. The crowd felt his presence but I was outdone. Decided to chill outside. I just heard my track “Rotten” from outside but the night was over for me. Our ride was gone and we needed to get home we was fucked. We gave our final daps to the cats from around the way and we started looking for away back home, we finally got a cab and we went straight to bed. Our departure was Sunday and hip-hop seemed to not be outdone cos we met some fellow heads on the bus who pissed the bus attendant the fuck off!

Report by PE Hip Hop Activist Rushay

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