NYT reviews Busta Rhymes concert

A Little Nip and a Toast, Before Revisiting a Recession-Proof Songbook
By JON CARAMANICA
Published: March 11, 2009

A few songs in to his set at B. B. King Blues Club & Grill on Tuesday night Busta Rhymes proposed a toast, pouring himself a little nip from a bottle of Courvoisier. He wanted to celebrate the election of President Obama and also the resurgence of New York as a relevant hip-hop scene. “I know it’s a recession,” he said. “If you don’t have a drink, put your imaginary drink up.” He was greeted by as many empty hands as full ones, maybe more.

For well over a decade Busta Rhymes has been remarkably recession-proof, outlasting dozens of artists he has collaborated with by being resilient, flexible and stylistically agnostic — there’s no sound he has thumbed his nose at. Many of his most notable songs aren’t even his own; they’re guest verses on other people’s records. It helps, if you seek longevity, to have no apparent need for superstardom.

His entertaining start-stop tour through his catalog on Tuesday covered more than 20 songs and skipped plenty of great ones. But what he performed was a testament to versatility: songs that emphasize his Jamaican heritage, “Make It Clap” and “Uh Ooh (remix)”; roughneck anthems, “Ante Up (remix),” on which he was joined by the rowdy M.O.P.; collaborations with Mariah Carey, “I Know What You Want,” with Ms. Carey sadly absent. Nothing from his early days with Leaders of the New School, though.

If Busta Rhymes has had a signature sound, it was the digital bounce he perfected at midcareer — “Woo Hah!! Got You All in Check,” “Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See” — party records that also featured impressive, if monotone, vocal calisthenics.

Calisthenics he wanted the crowd here to take note of. On “Break Ya Neck” he repeated his rhymes three times in case people weren’t paying attention. And that was just one of several old showman gimmicks he employed. He and his longtime hype man Spliff Star formed a charming comic duo, like two students in an improv workshop cooking up scenes: dance routines, exaggerated facial expressions, funny voices. During “Put Your Hands Where My Eyes Could See,” Busta Rhymes went from loud to soft and back while Spliff Star mimed turning a key next to his mouth, as if manually adjusting the volume.

Several guests joined Busta Rhymes throughout the night: M.O.P.; the dancehall star Beenie Man; and a trio of young Brooklyn rappers, the brawny Maino, the grim Uncle Murda, the surprisingly catchy Red Cafe. They all came back out at the end of the show to form a united front during the glorious, tacky “Arab Money,” which was a minor hit for Busta Rhymes late last year (with an accompanying dance), and is almost certainly the only rap song to ever mention the billionaire Prince al-Waleed bin Talal al-Saud.

They were joined by its producer, Ron Browz, who sang the song’s nonsensical, fake-Arabic hook and wore not one but two diamond-encrusted chains that read “Ether Boy,” the name of his record label. (He had opened the show with a set that was short, clunky and mercifully steamrolled by a guest appearance from Juelz Santana.)

Earlier Busta Rhymes had gathered the young Brooklyn rappers together at center stage — a grouping he referred to as the Conglomerate, after his recent single — and proclaimed a new era for New York hip-hop. He has played with so many teams, so why not this one?

“We’re going to start repping this city right,” he said, boasting that all the rappers would appear in one another’s videos as a show of support, and promising “a lot of cars, a lot of money, a lot of jewelry.” Later he sprayed Champagne over the crowd as if it were still the late Clinton era. For a minute, at least, there was no recession to speak of.
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