Dilated Peoples and Tri State

With Los Angeles independent hip-hop heroes Dilated Peoples, what you see is what you get, and what you see is one of the sharpest, tightest and most honest hip-hop crews in the game today. What you get is hip-hop in its essence — two MCs and one DJ, hard raps over rugged beats. It’s nothing more or less than what Dilated rapper Rakaa referred to in a recent Synthesis interview as “the raw, uncut shit,” and few do it better than Dilated Peoples.
Dilated hit the stage around 9:30, after openers Tri State attempted to prime the crowd but didn’t have much luck. It was obvious by the screams from the audience when the Dilated performance was anxiously imminent, that the evening’s headliners were who everyone was there to see.
There were no frills, no hype men, no posses crowding the stage. DJ Babu was the first to come out into view, and began the set by spinning the intro to “Live On Stage,” the first song off the crew’s new album, Expansion Team (Capitol, out on October 23rd). Rappers Rakaa and Evidence hit the stage and immediately pulled the crowd up close to the stage. Though the room was only about half-full, the audience was loud and full of admiration for the three man crew, and as the Student Union Auditorium’s lighting system flashed across the stage and flooded the room, Dilated Peoples ripped through a number of tunes off the new album — standouts included “Clock Work” and “Pay Attention!” — as well as a number of crowd favorites off the group’s last record, The Platform. Those were the tunes that crowd reacted the most to, though Rakaa and Evidence had enough stage presence to raise the audience hype for even the new songs that no one knew.
One of Dilated People’s credos is that the DJ is the backbone of hip-hop, and Rakaa and Ev have always put their money where their mouth is in that regard. Both The Platform and the Expansion Team dedicate generous time to the legendary DJ Babu, whose skills have garnered him ITF world battle titles, among many others, and whose ability on the wheels of steel put him way ahead of the pack. In the live setting, Babu took the spotlight about half way through the show and killed it on the 1’s and 2’s. He began by scratching out a beat pattern and then juggling and scratching a little before breaking into an impressive routine built on Blackalicious’ “Alphabetic Aerobics,” in which Babu cut the wax to shreds with a speed that increased as the song’s cadence built to a frenzied crescendo.
After a few more numbers, Dilated took their leave of the stage and waited for the audience to show them enough love to bring them back out for an encore. That didn’t take long. The crew hit the stage and closed out with “Soundbombing” off the Rawkus Soundbombing II compilation and the new single off Expansion Team, “Worst Comes to Worst.” Though Dilated Peoples played for only about an hour, it was a good solid set, and there is absolutely no doubt that they’re one of the best live hip-hop groups on the road today. They’ve got the right look (jeans and t-shirts, bling-free), honest aspirations (“we’re down with the science that De La dropped / that means it might blow up but it won’t go pop”) and they put up no fronts whatsoever. They came, they saw, they kicked ass.
– Max Sidman
– photos by D.C. Ramirez

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