“You’re giving me Soundset vibes.”
So said Slug to a crowd of 12,306 at the Minnesota State Fair Grandstand Saturday night. And that stood to reason, for the Minneapolis-reared rapper born Sean Daley – half of the duo, Atmosphere – was standing mere blocks from where the hip-hop festival he helped found spent many a Memorial Day weekend: The State Fairgrounds’ Midway area.
One could say that Saturday’s show was something like a smaller-scale Soundset, which usually hosted dozens of acts and about 30,000 people and was last presented in 2019. Atmosphere was a Soundset constant, and the acts that preceded them to the stage had all played that festival at least once: Their fellow act from local label Rhymesayers, DJ Abilities, the reunited and perpetually light-hearted Pharcyde, charismatic “conscious rapper” Lupe Fiasco and one of the genre’s superstar acts of the ‘90s, the unfailingly aggressive Cypress Hill.
It proved a tremendously satisfying five-hour show, with every act embracing it as an opportunity to bring their A game alongside colleagues they greatly admire. In a field known for competitive one-upmanship, this seemed more a joyous rap party.
Unlike Soundset, this wasn’t just a one-off evening: These acts have been touring together this summer. On this night, Atmosphere headlined, presenting a powerful set that reminded those in attendance that Slug remains among the most courageously vulnerable acts in the genres, a heart-on-his-sleeve poet of the genre, be he expressing angry heartbreak or reflecting on the loss of his father. And when he was joined near set’s end by fellow Rhymesayer Brother Ali for some improvisational freestyling, it felt more like Soundset than ever.
That said, Cypress Hill was a hard act to follow. Despite it being three decades since the Los Angeles foursome’s popular heyday (when they placed albums atop the pop charts), the group remains impressively committed to its material. The distinctive high, nasal voice of B-Real still sounds like he’s holding a hit while rapping, and it remains an effective instrument as he holds forth about guns and ganja atop infectious bass lines.
If B-Real had competition for the most magnetic performer of the evening, it was Chicago’s Lupe Fiasco, a master of mixing up the pace and dynamics of his songs and set. Fiasco can spit out rapid-fire lyrics with the best of them, which made it all the more affecting when he shifted gears to the smooth, sweet tale of love among skateboarders, “Kick, Push,” and led a full-crowd sing-along in the balladic “Superstar.”
Add smile-inducing contributions from the fun-loving Pharcyde, and it was a wonderful re-summoning of the spirit of Soundset.
Rob Hubbard can be reached at wordhub@yahoo.com.
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