De La Soul NXNE '10

After a very weary week of 4 days of extended drinking hours, sets, surprise sets and mainstage headliners the NXNE music festival in Toronto, Ontario, Canada has thankfully wrapped up with a mainstage free concert in Yonge Dundas Square by pioneering Hip Hop legends De La Soul. In a by-no-means chronological (in career or setlist terms) order De La Soul, (literally translated as 'Of The Soul' (feminine)), had a truly multicultural and multi-lingual audience rapt and spellbound as they kicked through cuts not limited to Potholes In My Lawn, Ring Ring Ring, Oooh (originally De La Soul featuring Redman here with Canadian Hip Hop legend Kardinal Offishal), the title track of The Grind Date and possibly one of the greatest Hip Hop tunes of all time (the singularly J Dilla produced) Stakes Is High (which contains a definitive sample of James Brown's Mind Power).

"I be a piece of the East Coast, so give a toast to Plug Wonder Why / Back in the day who soaked his words in ginger / So when I ran a phrase in June, you didn't catch it 'til December"

- Stakes Is High/ De La Soul Encores included; audience favourite Me, Myself and I (their breakthrough single from 1989 that ensconced the bands, somewhat frustrating as expressed lyrically in this particular song, 'hippie' label which they addressed in their typically dry humour), Rock Co Kane flow (unfinished due to the lack of MF Doom in the municipality of Toronto), and early rarity Buddy (Native Tongue Decision) originally by the Native Tongue Posse (De La Soul,, Jungle Brothers feat. Q-Tip, Queen Latifah and Monie Love. Buddy famously contains a brief definitive sample of the hook of The Five Stairsteps Ooh Child (quite possibly the greatest pop song of all time) bringing the total soul tally to at least 2 James Brown Samples and a very brief 'Skiddley-bo-oh-oah' reference to Barrington Levy). The sample of the Burke family's song Ooh Child appears at 3:19 in De La Soul's Buddy. Although live in their rendition at Dundas Square MC Posdnuos ((aka Mercenary, Plug Wonder Why, Plug One born Kelvin Mercer) repeated the refrain for an extra bar milking raw emotion out of the crowd after a heartfelt spoken word by Trugoy the Dove (aka Dave, Plug Two, born David Jude Jolicoeur) about how no one talks about the emotion of Hip Hop painting a picture of a young black man on a bus stop bench nodding away in his own heartfelt world. For his part P.A. Pasemaster Mase largely known as Maseo, or Plug Three within 3 Foot High and Rising's concept) pushed the sheer utter limits, at times testing new counter-insurgency sound cannons just in time for the G20, of the federally, provincially and municipally funded sound system. If Socialism means I can get hit by a bus and walk into any hospital and get fixed up right quick with a green card and De La Soul playing for free in a pedestrian space, adjacent to Toronto's first scramble crossing, then bring on the Socialism Teabaggers.