Mos Def and Dessa at the Guthrie
Hip-hop at the Guthrie? Oh, big deal—it's 2010, for Ludacris' sake, hip-hop is everywhere, and the fact that no big-name MC had taken the Wurtele Thrust Stage prior to last night seemed a simple oversight. (After all, Brother Ali and P.O.S. performed as part of the new theater's opening ceremonies in '06.) So when Mos Def strode out on the balcony of the Guthrie's set for A Streetcar Named Desire—Doomtree MC Dessa and a jazz-funk three-piece, anchored by bassist Sean McPherson, had already fired up the material on her excellent A Badly Broken Code—cultural barriers did not crumble. Mos offered nothing more (and nothing less) than a great hip-hop show—with comfier seats, if anyone had bothered to sit in them.
Mos' real challenge was musical. What made The Ecstatic the best hip-hop album of 2009—its murky flow of bass-heavy funk and international rhythms, its free-associative mix of lyrical quotations and abstract ruminations—doesn't necessarily prove ideal for a live setting. But tracks like "Supermagic" and "Twilite Speedball" lent themselves well to audience-integrating call-and-response, and to Mos' simultaneously casual and energetic performance style. A run of oldies, mostly from his 1999 solo debut, Black On Both Sides, beginning with "Hip Hop" and including the welcome vulgarity of "Ms. Fat Booty" ("Ass so fat that you could see it from the front"), was welcome, but hardly overshadowed the newer stuff.
His set was further held together by a surprisingly sturdy shtick. Between cuts, his two DJs spun old records—"If I Was Your Girlfriend," a little Howlin' Wolf, a reggae "Ain't No Sunshine" (Horace Andy, maybe?), even Eddie Murphy's desecration of "The Greatest Love Of All"—and Mos danced lithely, sang along into his bright red hand-held mic, or just vibed. In search of intimacy—what he called "a little ambience"—the rapper repeatedly requested dimmer lights, and was satisfied only when the stage was lit by little more than the onstage bulbs that made up part of the Streetcar set. He also took advantage of what will probably be his only chance to shout "Stella!" onstage to a paying audience. Mos may be a great performer and a decent actor, but with his slight frame and laid-back demeanor, he's no Stanley Kowalski.
