Jurassic 5, Living Legends & Strung Out

Few on the Berkeley campus knew that the Astronomical Association of Northern California officially declared May 10th, 2003, "Astronomy Day." They were too busy concertedly de-pressurizing by getting high and going to a free concert at the Greek Theater. And what a concert it was.

When we got in, Strung Out was somewhat through their outstandingly boring set of nü-metal double bass drum thumpers and half-hearted melodic (emo) tunes. They've been around for over 10 years and have something like five full-lengths released and yet I've never met a single fan of theirs. That's dedication! They did their thing, and that's cool, but I found the crowd-surfing imbeciles getting dropped much more entertaining.
Next up, the Living Legends came out to show us how it's done. They were mostly successful at hyping up the crowd - most of whom didn't know who the Living Legends crew where, many of whom acted as though they did. They were tight and enthusiastic. The beats were really ill and introspective. Each individual performer got to shine, but like the Wu-Tang comes together to form Voltron, the Living Legends were unified for a greater purpose. They got shafted on the quality and loudness of the sound system, however, which can gravely affect a hip-hop act. I was able to clearly hear all of J5, but could barely understand most of the Legends. Although Murs has the Def Jux release (and I know you West Coast muhfuhs love Def Jux), The Grouch was the true star. I rolled my eyes at one of the MC's proclamation that America has "perpetrated a great evil recently," though. Oh, c'mon.

Though many on the West Coast may not realize it, Jurassic 5 has assumed a new spot in the pantheon of hippie heroes by tearing the roof off of last year's Bonnaroo Festival. I thought Berkeley would be the perfect spot to see all the noodly hirsute kids groove out to the positive hip-hop vibes, man. The crowd turned out to be far more thugged out (as thugged out as Berkeley could get) and people were puffing El's rather than spleefs. As the sun went down, the throngs of drunk undergrad chicks traded bareback handmade hippie halters for hoodies. When Jurassic 5 came on, they didn't step off. J5 pulled out pretty much every single song they'd ever even thought of writing. It was like a mix-tape - one after another after another. Every 60 songs or so, they'd stop for one second to say, "Berkeley!" and then it was right back into the "scammin' the slammin I'm in pajammin runnin through Vietnammin body slammin with Andre the Giant and still standin" relentless flow they bring. That wasn't a direct quote, but that's what it sounds like! The highlight was definitely a few interludes with Cut Chemist and DJ Nu-Mark, the former scratching records like Wilt Chamberlain plays basketball and the latter playing live beats like Wilt Chamberlain turns out the ladies. J5 rocked the theater for an unimaginable two hours, leaving the crowd Hometown-Buffet-full and ready for finals week.

- Dan Ambrose

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