Lord Finesse Birthday Party – February 23, Irving Plaza

This was a funny night. Funny, funny night. This is not going to be in any way like the recent post about the Redman/Raekwon show, replete with a tight schedule, ill performances, and an epiphany about how much I love hip-hop. No, not this time.

This show sucked. Well, I can’t speak for the part of the show that we didn’t actually see; perhaps if we had stood there for another three hours watching shitty filler acts, getting hammered on cans of beer and shouting obscenities at Chuck D, we would have seen some awesome old-school hip-hop! However, we did not stand around for another three hours.

First, some background: I saw this show advertised on Ticketmaster. I was psyched, because I knew that any show billed as a “Lord Finesse Birthday Party” would have DITC and who knows how many old-school cats coming out of the woodwork. I headed down to Irving to avoid the Ticketfucker charges and asked the dude at the box office who would be performing. He rattled them off without enthusiasm, as if it was the fortieth time he’d been asked: “Lord Finesee, Grand Puba, Das Efx, DITC, Kid Capri, Chuck D hosting…”. SWEET! Given that two DITC legends – Big Pun and Big L – would not be there due to previous engagements with the afterlife, I was hoping that we’d even get treated to a Fat Joe appearance as well. It was going to be, as they say, off the hook.

So anyway, on the evening of the show, I head over to my man’s office around 6pm, and we could not be more psyched. We pick up his car (which I had the pleasure of driving back to Broo-killin’ – a fresh new sled with all the trimmings) and load it with Lord Finesse, DITC and even the first Fat Joe record. Bump all the way across town and down to the bridge, listening to Finesse…we’re loving it, right? A great NYC night lay ahead. Little did we know that this was going to be the only Lord Finesse we would hear all night.

We get to my joint, have some drinks and dinner, start getting nice on Pappy’s 15 and all that, burn it down in the backyard, and off we go, feeling great. We get to Irving Plaza and the doors aren’t even open yet – I guess “doors open at 9.30” really goddamn means that the doors will remain closed, no matter how goddamn cold it is outside, until 9 goddamn 30 PM. No problem. We roll around the corner to 119 and discover that, while it’s now called the Belmont Lounge or some shit and has a fancy-pants awning outside, it’s still the same old 119 inside – ratty booths, a ripe beer stank, and punk rock blaring out the speakers. They were playing a Dirty Rotten Imbeciles song I hadn’t heard since I was in tenth grade or so – that really took me back to the days of shows at the Cameo with Ean and Kyle and Django and shit like that. Yeah, I had a friend named Django. Was he named after Django Reinhardt? Fuck do you think, monkey?

We had a couple pints and headed back to the venue, and everyone is standing around being their color – black folks reppin’ and profilin’ and so on, white folks rapping along dorkily to “South Bronx” (yeah, we get it, you know the first BDP album, stop doing that), and the Sean Paul dudes swaggering around in their crappy rabbit fur coats that they refused to check because honestly, how can you show everyone that approximately 91 rabbits were killed to make your stupid coat if your stupid coat is in the coatroom? So R and I are posted at the bar, laughing, downing beer and water, and chatting vith Victor while we wait for something to happen onstage.

Finally some no-name act gets up there and we continue to dick around in the back, having a laugh. We move up into the mix when Das Efx does their thing, and it’s like…whatever. It was fine. I have to mention this one dude there with his Ft. Greene girlfriend – believe me, if you live or hang in Ft. Greene, you know what I mean by “Fort Greene girlfriend" – and he’s rapping along to every. Single. Song. Dude behind Ray is doing it, too. Who the hell learns every siggety diggety lyric on Das Efx records? Seriously. They were a novelty act, people! Damn! He gave a haircut to Sinead O’Connor, for God’s sake!

So then they wrap up, and we wait. And wait. And wait. The DJ spins some records. Chuck D comes out and starts his usual babble about society, and we head down to take a piss. Come back up and he’s still rattling on about how can a ten-year-old know what the inside of a strip club looks like? and how fucked up is that? and so on. I just laugh. Chuck, man, you haven’t changed in 20 years. He’s even pulling out lines from the live bits on the Nation of Millions album – you know those bits that they recorded at some show in London? Yeah, he’s pulling that shit out. “I like that for the people up top.” Word? You do? For the people up top? You mean the label reps and the Irving soundman? You know what, dude? Fuck off and bring out the next act. How’s that? For the people down low, right in front of the stage.

Finally, the next act comes out. Grand Puba? Nice and Smooth? Is it DITC? Can it be….Lord Finesse himself? No. It’s some other chumpaloids that the crowd proceeds to boo immediately. They make their way through their set with admirable courage and Chuck D again proceeds to think that he’s royalty enough that he can mete out these hip-hop legends to us once every three hours. I gotta tell you – I never thought, in my entire life, that I would find myself yelling “Shut the FUCK up!” to the legendary Chuck D. Never. But I’m sick of this goddamn shit where you wait half your life for the acts you came to see. Chuck D, you can “birthday party MC” your fuckin’ way offstage. The dude behind Ray was making all sorts of funny comments as well, which neither of us can recall because it’s 1am by now and we’re hammered, having tipped our first glass at 6.30.

At this point, it’s like, whatever. We go take another piss, head upstairs and to the back for another drink, and Grand Puba finally comes on. Go for yourself, dude. I’m not standing around until dawn for this shit. We were thoroughly, thoroughly disappointed. We rolled at 2am or so, having never seen the acts we both really wanted to see – DITC, Nice & Smooth, and Finesse.

Our highlight of the night? The three pieces of pizza we demolished back in Brooklyn. That’s right – I went right back into Floor Pizza, wearing my Floor Pizza Parka, and completely laid into three giant plain slices without floor-seasoning. I’m not joking – that was the best part of our night. I got Dax Efx and some Puba under my belt, I guess. And I had plenty of fun, despite the disappointments.

Ok, that is all.

Chucky