Public Enemy at the Roundhouse
Public Enemy released their debut album Yo Bum Rush The Show in 1987 and it remains a classic to this day with iconic tracks as Public Enemy No1 , Your Gonna Get Yours & Miuzi Weighs a Ton.
Public Enemy have a special relationship with the British public ever since. Public Enemy come over to these shores more or less every summer for the past few years. This was the first gig in the UK this summer.
The gig started off strangely with two warm up acts Tim Hecker and Ben Frost who were both strange to say the least and the crowd who turned up to see them were left open mouthed at times. I am sure that they have an audience somewhere but this was not it. So the less said about them the better.
The audience was made up of both young, old and a mixture of races. It was really good to see the younger people there the next generation of Public Enemy fans coming through.
Public Enemy started to warm up around 9.20 for a sound check with Sound Assassin getting the crowd going. The sirens when and the noise level from the crowd when up a notch or two
Chuck started of with Lost at Birth then straight into a couple of classic's Miuzi Weighs a Ton and Rebel Without a Pause at which point Flavor Flav came on to the stage. Some people in the crowd were unsure if Flav would make it as he was arrested in LA the previous week.
Public Enemy played through a repertoire of their extensive back catalogue from their first allbum Yo Bum Rush The Show trough to their new upcoming album "Man Plans God Laughs". To which they played the title track and "Honky Talk Rule" Which is sampled from the Rolling Stones "Honky Tonk Woman" Chuck messed up his lines and as a punishment he was made to to 10 push-ups which he did with ease. For a man in his 50's this was impressive.
DJ Lord did a set where he used Chic's "Good Times" which is one of the all time classic breaks.
Public Enemy played through a repertoire of their extensive back catalogue from their first allbum Yo Bum Rush The Show trough to their new upcoming album "Man Plans God Laughs". To which they played the title track and "Honky Talk Rule" Which is sampled from the Rolling Stones "Honky Tonk Woman" Chuck messed up his lines and as a punishment he was made to to 10 push-ups which he did with ease. For a man in his 50's this was impressive.
DJ Lord did a set where he used Chic's "Good Times" which is one of the all time classic breaks.
The curfew was at 11 and the final track to be played was the classic "Harder Than You Think". Which meant not everything that was due to be played in the set list was played with "Shut Em Down" & "Arizona" we're the tracks to miss out.
After this was finished Flav got on the drums and played a little set and gave the crowd a speach on racism and reminded us that we are all part of one race the human race.
Public Enemy put so much energy into their gig's and shows that they still care about the what they do which is really appreciated by the British crowd. Public Enemy are true legends in hip hop and are right at the top of the tree which is were they deserve to be for all they have done for hip hop all over the world and long may this continue.
