I’ve been trying to write about the Ghost Faced Killah show for over a week now, it hasn’t been going very well. I went to the Ghost Faced Killah show on December 7 and instead of inspiring me to write about it, the show left me with a weird taste in my mouth, kinda like when you get a bad sunflower seed outta yer bag of Spitz.
This “off color taste” has plagued me for the past week, I have run GFK’s performance over and over in my head and I still come to the same conclusion, it was lack luster. This has been a problem for me, you see I have been a big fan of the Wu-Tang Clan since they first dropped their album Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) in 1993. Moreover, I have kept up with the various exploits of the Wu’s member over the past two decades, and I have in particular become quite fond of GFK. I dig GFK because he has managed to stay relevant over the past two decades. His sound and content have constantly evolved; he dropped a duet with Amy Winhouse, made various lame cameos in movies and most recently released his ninth and what I think is his best album to date, Apollo Kids. So when I heard that the Ghost Faced Killah was coming to Fernie I was undeniably excited and I snapped up two tickets for the show. Then I promptly began to get hot and bothered for the coming of the Wu.
After weeks of torturing my neighbors with my Wu-Tang collection, the night of the show finally arrived. I ate dinner, drank some beer, put on my Chucks, got in my car and picked up my friend Tito. We arrived at the bar about quarter to eleven, albeit a tad early but at least we could down a couple beers watch the opening act and get a nice buzz on before GFK took the stage.
I had done a little research on the opening act, his name is PJ, which is short for Peter Jackson, and one can imagine how many Lord of The Rings clips I had to wade through to find a video by the aforementioned PJ. I tried to describe to Tito what to expect from PJ. All I could come up with was that he was kinda white and mostly fat and from Toronto, the end. Regardless of what kind of torture we were about to inflict upon ourselves, Tito and I moved toward the stage. We found a reasonably comfortable spot to stand and watch PJ. PJ however was occupied with his bottle of Grey Goose, so Tito and I were forced to listen to PJ’s kinda white hip-hop DJ do his thing.
Tito snickered as this dude hack apart various songs by Jay Z, Ludacris and Busta Rhymes. This guy was fucking horrible! He would rap along to each track he dropped, not only could he not rap he should have had a sticker that read “I love air horn” plastered across his HP computer. He had a button dedicated to the dancehall sound, and he was not liberal with its use. I think he was averaging 5 to 6 blasts of air horn every minute or so. Barf. Tito continued to giggle as I began to pick a scab on my knuckle to detract from the pain of having to listen to the sounds being farted at me. I looked at my watch, it was 12:30 and Tito and I were through our second jug, GFK had better come on soon or I was going to get drunk and start hitting on girls that were neither good looking or old enough for me.
I was at the bar ordering a Pil when PJ hit the stage and he was very excited, I was not. Fresh beer in hand, found Tito where I had left him, he was grinning ear to ear which made me giggle and squeal a little, if we were going to be subjected to something stupid we’d might as well have a good time, I chugged my beer. I was at the side bar ordering another Pil while PJ was finishing his second song. I was only half paying attention when PJ announce that history was about to be made in Fernie. GFK was about to take the stage!
The energy in the Northern began to change, people started pushing forward from the bar towards the dance floor. The air-horn loving cracker was giving up his spot at the DJ booth to someone who looked a little more seasoned and capable. Beats that made sense started to pulsate through the speakers; the transition took only moments and as soon as PJ and his flunky were gone GFK and the Lox hit the stage.
Silky smooth and raspy, relentless liquid rhymes slid off GFK’s tongue as he and his crew blasted the crowd with Bring Da Ruckus! This classic Wu track whipped the crowd into frenzy! Sweaty, bouncing people flashing the Wu sign surrounded me and it was fucking awesome, now this is what I came for! GFK and his crew expertly dissected the crowd for almost half an hour before things in my mind took an unexpected turn to Sucks Ville.
I found another beer and Tito almost at the same time; we looked at each other and exchanged knowing looks, I gazed back at the stage and there was GFK, sweaty and giving it shit up there, he wore a bright red hoody that was ten sizes too big and draped around his neck was a large gold chain with a rather large shiny bit hanging from it. Maybe it was his heavy bling or maybe the cold weather but he was starting to tire, and it was at this point that he tried the age-old trick of Tit for Tat with the crowd. Whoops….
I’m not even sure which Wu song he tried to do this with but it didn’t work, GFK would spit out part of a song, then DJ would cut the music and GFK would hold out his mic looking for a response, the bar was silent. He picked up the song where he had left off and tried again, mic extended to the crowd, music cut, but it didn’t matter because the crowd didn’t know the words. The show continued, but GFK was somehow deflated, he slid towards the back of the stage with the mic at his side and a look of utter distain on his face. The crowd didn’t hear much more from GFK for the rest of the night, thankfully his entourage was there to continue.
There was one fella in particular, Ghost Faced Priest was his name and he saved the show for me. He was a very fat dude, he was wearing a grey t-shirt with silver bedazzled sequence lettering on it, and a fur hat to complete his ensemble. He looked like a sparkly rapping hippopotamus from a Dr.Suess book, and he got very sweaty very quickly. He was awesome. As great as the Hippo was he wasn’t whom I had come to see, so what the fuck happened to GFK?
Your going to have to bear with me on this, it took me a week of being neurotic to come up with a hypothesis to explain why the show fell short.
So here it is…
The reason the show failed was because GFK was unable to connect with his audience.*
For arguments sake lets say that the average age of the people at the show was somewhere between 19 and 25. That means that when the Wu-Tangs first album hit the charts these people ranged in age from 1 to 10 give or take. So in my mind this equates to something like GFK snorting rails off a hooker’s ass while a kid sings along to Barney. Ya dig what I’m saying? There is a cultural gap between the Wu-Tang and today’s younger show going crowds. So how GFK expected a bunch of younger kids to be able to recite verse for verse
Liquid Swords is beyond me.
Now, I’m not saying that he shouldn’t have played any original Wu. What I am saying is that when things took a turn for the worse he had an opportunity to expose the crowd to some new material. Something for the crowd to make a new connection with, but he didn’t. For whatever reason, GFK was content to perform dated tunes and rest on his laurels while his entourage did his dirty work. Barf. If he had dropped
2getha Baby the roof would have come off the Northern and he would have sold at least five more CD’s than he did and I would have left with a minty fresh taste in my mouth.
You have obviously figured out that I am slightly disappointed by GFK’s performance, but in the words of my wise friend Tito, “at least the show was good for a laugh”. Now if you’ll excuse me I’m going to go brush my teeth again.
Peace,
Spence
* I should mention that almost everyone I spoke with thought the GFK show was the “bee’s knees”, and as a result I think less of them.
