As symphonic rap continues to gain momentum among form fans, it’s Nas’ turn to make the trip and get his audience tripping. Gala outfit, bow tie, black suit, smoked glasses. Behind him, a jazz-groove-hip-hop band, drums, double bass, keyboards, DJ. Behind the band, a full symphony orchestra under the direction of Jean-Michel Malouf, artistic director and conductor of the Orchestre symphonique du Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and the Orchestre symphonique de Sherbrooke. Big business!
Nas emerged from the pack in 1994 with the acclaimed first of his 15 albums, Illmatic. Today, it’s considered a classic of East Coast hip-hop, so much so that a symphonic version is being performed all over the rap world for the 30th anniversary of its release. And Montreal is no exception, its authority unquestionable 31 years on: two sold-out Wilfrid-Pelletier halls in as many nights.
Nas, 51, is a formidable figure. This authentic showman knows how to heat up a room of this size, and his word is golden to the ears of his fans, who know all about this emblematic album, typical of ’90s New York and featuring beatmakers and guests who were very important at the time: Large Professor (Nas’s teenage buddy and main collaborator on this opus), but also Marley Marl, Rockwilde, MC Serch, Nick Fury, Pete Rock, Faith N and even the archbishops of the boom-bap sound, Q-Tip and DJ Premier.
The program included all of the Illmatic classics: “The Genesis,” “NY State of Mind,” “Life’s a Bitch,” “The World Is Yours,” “Halftime,” “Memory Lane (Sittin’ in da Park),” “One Love,” “One Time 4 Your Mind,” “Represent,” and “It Ain’t Hard to Tell.”
Galvanized by this encounter, the audience knew all the lines, applauding wildly at every step of the program. Unfortunately, the sound system for such a marriage of rap, band and symphony wasn’t up to scratch, with the strings generally buried by the otherwise excellent electric band and its MC. The brass and reeds fared better in the context, but we can’t conclude that the orchestral symbiosis between symphony, groove and hip-hop was a success. It’s impossible to make up one’s mind about the arrangements… In any case, there’s every reason to believe that the sound engineer and the acoustics of the hall didn’t really help the cause of intelligibility.
This didn’t seem to bother the fans, who were more than happy to be there in front of a showman who was up to the task. It should be added, however, that the part of the concert without the symphony orchestra, which was machine-gunned during the last half-hour, was the most powerful: “The Message” (Grand Master Flash), “Street Dreams” (less sweet than the Eurythmics), “Got Ur Self a Gun,” “Oochie Wally,” “You Owe Me,” “Made You Look,” “The Don,” “If I Ruled the World (Imagine That),” “One Mic.” Gotcha!
photos : Victor Diaz Lamich
