Rock the fuckin’ Bells. URB certainly did. San Bernardino hosted this year’s Rock The Bells fesitval, with over 20 live performances, two stages, vendor fairs, insane heat, and 11 dollar beers. What more could a hip-hop fan ask for? I’ll tell you what more, FREE beer. But like the Stones said, you can’t always get what you want. Aside from the gross prices, this event was pretty enjoyable.
Rolled in around 11:00 AM, right about when the fest’ started, and 45 minutes later we finally got in. Apparently having Guerilla Union(Presenters of the festival) put you on a guest list is just not quite enough. Three lines and some confusing word-exchanges later, URB finally got into Rock the Bells. Of course, it couldn’t be quite this easy. My friend had to take his jacket off and LOSE the press pass it took us so long to obtain. Well, shit. So I met up with some people in the media check-in and, thank God, got another press pass for my bud. Props to Anthony and Yesennia for hookin’ me up.
So now we were all set. We weren’t allowed into the pit(yet), but we found our way around to get some good angles. Read on for an order of main stage events, with pictures and words!
*Note, apologies for any blurry pictures, etc., my camera is not what one would call “professional.”
First up was Dead Prez. These guys were off the chain! I’m talkin’ broken spokes. The usual set consisted of “Crank up your speakers, your woofers and your tweeters,” and closed, of course, on “Hip-Hop.” That song alone will mark this group in hip-hop history forever.
Now for some reason, we were up on the lawn when Murs played; but the lawn area was not so bad, actually. We still heard all the political spitations, and clearly Murs was workin’ the crowd. Nothing too special, but definitely an on-point set by our future President.
Is Immortal Technique allowed to say the “n word?” Oh well, he did anyway. I.T. brought the anger with the best of ‘em; hyping up the crowd and giving awareness to political and social issues alike. I wasn’t too into the music itself, and their straight-forward pitches are a little off setting, but I still appreciated the lyricism, mos’def’.
Rakim started to work the crowd into the party setting this festival deserves. The DJ backed him up, and as they boomed beats, the pit started filling and people started shouting. This was the mark when Rock the Bells was really about to rock.
“Ooooo, oooo, ooo-oooo.” De La Soul, baby! No one could question this group’s dedication to hip-hop music over the last 20 years, and they definitely proved that on stage. Hittin’ with bangers from back in the day, to stuff off their newest efforts, De La rocked the party hard. They also did some cool freezing stuff that they were pretty good at…not surprised if the Soul were Mimes back in the day. Ok, I’d be a little surprised.
Raekwon and Ghostface were definitely good, but didn’t bring the crowd up as much as I thought they would. People were still into it, but it wasn’t anything super special.
“M-E-T-H-O-D, Maaaaan.” This was the fucking bomb. Method Man and Redman brought on a furious weed smoking frenzy that put things like Pineapple Express to shame (although that was a kick-ass movie). Bangin’ out hits from Wu-Tang to their CDs they put out together, this performance left nobody unsatisfied.
Let’s just put it this way…this is where my friend fell asleep for 45 minutes. Although it was a pleasant surprise, I didn’t know they were on the bill.
The Pharcyde. This was possibly the best set at the whole festival. These guys haven’t performed together in so long, and they brought the crowd to their knees. I’ve never seen a hip-hop group rock it so hard, but more importantly, have so much fun doing it. They played ol’ Dilla produced beats, too, which I of course was a huge fan of. This is also the moment where we decided to test our press passes one more time in the pit, and, what do you know? They let us in this time! So from here on out, we got to get in the pit and experience these acts the right way.
To see the night time acts, check out Part 2 of my Rock the Bells experience.
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