Rhyme Calisthenics @ Shadow Lounge

So I missed MURS in both Cleveland and Pittsburgh. Major scheduling issues. But good news for me since I learned that there would be a nice little hip hop show in Pittsburgh yesterday night. And at the infamous Shadow Lounge, no doubt.

I read about this in the City Paper. The show was billed as The Embedded Music Showcase. I was all geeked to see Loer Velocity, who I've raved about in the past. Others on the bill were Junk Science, Bisc1 and Iller Than Theirs. This was all in conjunction w/Rhyme Calisthenics. Cool, right? And all for the cool price of $7.

Well, seeing a hip hop show must not be meant to be for me. You know the show was scheduled to begin @ 9 p.m. and I had initially decided to be there promptly. Because there were so many folks on the bill, I thought that they would actually start on time. Then I decided against that move and milled around until about 10 p.m. I even called my mom when I arrived @ the venue. Though she sort of discouraged me from attending a hip hop show so late on a weeknight. I think she really wanted to come along ...

At any rate, the show had not started when I arrived. Which was cool because I could check out some reggae music next door. But the show soon got underway and it was nice. Gene Stovall performed first. I like Gene. He sings, beat boxes and rhymes over some beats; sometimes not w/beats. I first got wind of this guy from Paulie Rhyme of Finless Brown - though I think they are under a different name these days and out west too. But Paulie sent me some cds at one time and Stovall's was one of them. Very cool. Stovall's got a rendition of "The Humpty Dance" that is killer.

There was some other guys too: Stretch and Ground Flow. Nice.

So the bad news is that most of the Embedded Music crew got stuck in traffic behind some crazy accident and did not make the event. That would include Loer Velocity. My loss, huh? But Bisc1 and dj Snafu held it down. I was up and outta there @ about midnight. Which is just about my style.

Catch yourself a show hip hoppers and tell me all about it. kfox.