By: Lauren Garbutt (@LaurenGarbutt1) –
Yasiin Bey. (Photo: Lauren Garbutt/Aesthetic Magazine Toronto)
If you are going to go see a Yasiin Bey (aka Mos Def) show on his current tour, don’t be surprised to find out that it probably won’t be anything you were expecting.
Hosted by Toronto hip hop vet, Mindbender, a good-sized crowd occupied the Phoenix Concert Theatre on Thursday night. Unfortunately, this excitement was hard to maintain throughout the show’s eight opening acts, who drained the audience as local rappers played almost non-stop from 8pm to 12:30am, with Bey going on a half hour late, at 12:50am.
That’s not to say the opening acts were bad, there were just far too many of them to hold the audience’s attention. At first the crowd was receptive, but as time went on, they began chanting for Bey to appear and some even went as far as to boo the later acts on stage, just out of impatience more than anything else. It didn’t help that towards the end, those on stage kept repeating that he would be out in just a few minutes, and then he wouldn’t appear.
Listed opening acts included Harvey Dentist, Lemony Fresh, ONEoak, MadeWade, the In Tha Kut Showcase, The Mad Poets, Spinoza and Shamans, however there were other people introduced to the stage, such as Brando, a DJ and emcee combination, Robbie G, who did a lot of fast rapping and a song about Canada, and Hezekiah.
Stand outs from the list of openers were definitely Hezekiah, foremost a producer, who flew in from Philadelphia the same day on Bey’s request. As the audience’s energy began to dwindle he definitely brought it back with his high-energy performance.
Finally after some chanting from the crowd, first for Mos Def, and then for Yasiin Bey, he took to the stage and introduced himself as Yasiin Bey and the energy in the room shot back up. As red lighting engulfed the stage, he took his time walking on, wearing a muslim-style outfit along with some Nike’s and proceeded to take the roses that had been laid out in front of the DJ’s and disperse their petals on the stage and throughout the excited crowd.
It soon became clear that this show was going to be a different from a regular Mos Def show – it was a Yasiin Bey show.
Bey chose not to play any of his hit songs despite the audience’s requests, and he shouldn’t have to, but instead he chose to entertain the crowd with a mix of lesser-known material and a number of cover songs, from just clips to entire songs. Covers included Michael Jackson’s “Rock With You” and “Billy Jean” as well as “Leaving On a Jet Plane”, Jay-Z and Kanye West’s “Niggas in Paris” and more.
His own material included songs like “Supermagic”, “Sunshine”, and “Forever Alive”.
While the crowd up front were having a good time and enjoying the show, a number of people were angry that he wasn’t playing the classics despite the high ticket price and the crowd dwindled in size throughout his set. The fact that he was still on stage after 2am had rolled around didn’t help either.
As some people were vocal with their complaints, continually shouting out for old material, Bey handled it well and called them out saying it was “rude” and to “be quiet” and enjoy “Mathematics” as a recording and that he was the one with the microphone, the “boss of the sauce”. The rest of the crowd cheered and the show continued with his song “Love”, after which he instructed the crowd to “put it up for Trayvon Martin”.
The problem with the show is that while the crowd was very hyped up and excited to see Bey, they waited far too long for his appearance, instead having to sit through far to many opening acts and by the time Bey finally did appear, it seemed like he just wasn’t trying that hard. If there had been more original material and less cover songs then it might have been a different story.
Another factor could be that his new material is different from his earlier material. While the older work has more rap influences, his new music differs from his early influences. Either way, if you plan on seeing him this summer, don’t expect the expected.
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Yasiin Bey (aka Mos Def)
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Check out the rest of our photos from the show!
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Aesthetic Magazine | Album Reviews, Concert Photography, Interviews, Contests 
Hey there! would you be able to correct the name to Patman* with Harvey Dentist!? thank you!
respects on the great photos!
Posted by Patrick Younger | July 20, 2013, 12:31 pmWe’ll change the name. Thanks for letting us know!
Posted by Aesthetic Magazine Toronto | July 20, 2013, 1:34 pmI love his Ecstatic album so I was fine with his set. Im a funkhead. But Do agree with the opening acts.. way too many.. I’ll come out right now and say I hadnt heard of any of them (Im not big on toronto hip hop) Mad Poets put on a good set, Made Wade was good, DJ was good (Self taught Astronaut) and there was a duo that was on earlier in the night, one of them ended up talkin about organic gardening, etc.. he was yelling ‘you are a slave’ during one of his tracks.. You know the name of this dude or group? Loved their sound.
Posted by Tyler | July 21, 2013, 1:38 amHi Tyler,
Unfortunately we don’t know the name of the guy who was talking about organic gardening. Haha.
We’re glad that you enjoyed the concert, but maybe the next time Mos comes to town they’ll slice the number of openers in half.
Thanks!
Posted by Aesthetic Magazine Toronto | July 22, 2013, 1:00 pmDon’t forget Lee Reed, Hamilton’s finest, on the mic with Mama T and the Steez!
Posted by funky fresh veg | December 10, 2013, 6:39 am