CHEVRON GARDENS REVIEW: Jungle Brothers will make you move
Chevron Gardens patrons were partying like it was 1988, as alternative hip hop legends Jungle Brothers took to the stage on Saturday night. These guys are the underground hip hop legends you need in your life this summer. Their thumping boom bap beats got everyone on the packed dance floor in a matter of seconds, with raps of genuine substance and a positive vibe oozing.
The Jungle Brothers were on form, with Mike Gee flawlessly rapping complex lyrics to the live DJ stylings of DJ Sammy B. MC Afrika Baby Bam (aka Nathaniel Hall) definitely still has the moves to make you move, all between hyping the crowd and dancing across the stage like a man half his age.
They are getting on a bit, as are many of the first wave of hip hop are — slowly sinking into comfortable middle age and middle class lives. However, only sour part of the evening was the small contingent of hip hop fans in Perth who think it’s okay to point this out. In particular, one woman next to me spent the evening calling out Mike Gee for putting on weight, shouting obscenities at him whenever he took to the mic. I can only hope this was too far away for him to hear.
Afrika Baby Bam’s words were, as always, inspiring and powerful enough to drown the negativity out. He told the crowd of his love of hip hop as an empowering movement. The shouts of agreement brought joy to my ears because hip hop is and was always meant to be a political art. It’s been co-opted by the mainstream into something autotuned, meaningless, and aesthetically pleasing. Old school rhymes that call for social change and authentic living are a refreshing counterpoint — even if the lyrics do feature a few obscenities here and there.
Proving they are still as relevant today as they were when seminal album Straight Out The Jungle was released 30 years ago, the brothers kept it truly jungle on this Saturday night.
