After a long time it’ s always good to meet up with an old friend. Meeting up with E-Life in Paradiso, Amsterdam. The night did host the last performance of the Marlboro Flashback to HipHop. A tour of four shows Utrecht, Rotterdam, Enschede, Groningen and Amsterdam. In the serial of Marlboro Flashbacks a famous Dutch band is asked to bring a tribute to a musical icon. There was Kane covering U2, Postmen playing Bob Marley and Total Touch showing Steve Wonder.

Marlboro (Philip Moris) is a popular but controversial brand. In artsistic ways it can a conflict with an artist’s believes and principles. An infamous edition was Postmen doing Bob Marley. Anonymous Mis in OOR Magazine (nr. 3 10 Feb. 2001): “…je mag best weten dat ik met man en macht heb gevochten om die optredens niet te doen.… Voor mij is Bob Marley heilig en ik had het zeker niet in verband met sigaretten willen doen. (…you may know that I fought as hard as I could not to have to do this performances. For me Bob Marley is holly and I really did not want to bring it in connection with cigarettes.” The concert, that was broadcasted on tele by NPS, was great. But indeed it raised worried thoughts as we overhere recognise Bob Marley as a prophet.

We ain’t saints

But know it was time for HipHop. We love it, we like it, we live it. And as we ain’t saints we had less problems with the idea of a tour with a band covering HipHop sponsored by some poisining shit brand. But what to expect? E-Life was asked to bring a tribute to HipHop. E-Life: “When they first asked me, I did not really know what to think about it. Doing covers?! Giving the idea some time to get into me, I started to like it more and more. Just lets have some fun. It’s only a project. And it was very fun to do.”

With a live band he brought old and new material back to the stage. Sadly there was no DJ. Hey! They had a kid playing the syntheziser with an Apple Power Book, containing the typical samples of each song, conected to it. All the musicians where great, the bass player toped it all. Going totally nuts playing famous basslines. Never thought all thsese song could be played so well. I’m proud of my HipHop heritage, where we inovated and invented the digital music, but I’m still missing more and more the essential part. To often we are lacking the skills and experiencing to play instruments live.

Quiet nice

Doing all those songs, was it hard to learn them all from the head? E-Life: “Well you think you know them all, word by word. But you will recognize that you would be the biggest back up MC. You only know the last words in general. It was tricky to learn them all. Sometimes I was on stage and I’m rapping and have to think ‘hell how did it go?!’ …just remembering it right in time to continue.” As the whole Marlboro crew sat down to have diner in the HardRock Café, they occupied a whole floor. Making the comment that it is a great ego boost to have a crew working ‘for him’ that big, he answered with a great smile: “…yes, that is quiet nice.” The show was recorded for television broadcasting. So keep on the look out for NPS on channel 3.

The show went well, the band had to warm up but they enjoined entertaining the crowd who was dancing and even en mass jumping around when House Of Pain’s Jump Around was played. In the intro a piece of 24K could be heard. And E would not be the Grand, he also covered More Days To Come from a well known artist fom the Docks. It should have been nicer if he would have played more Dutch classics as No Enemies by 24K, Roffer Dan Ooit by Osdorp Posse, Ghetto Child by Rowdy, Mind Over Matter (or South Is Taking Over) by Dope Posse, D.A.M.N. and Riot by Crazy Cash Flow too.

The last notes

They started with Can I Kick It, Still Dre, G-Thang. Nice to saw Ganza singing he’s Snoop. Regulate, Me Mysef and I was followed by Go See The Doctor. A song that was also covered once by Cane. With his gold front and big chain he dropped the lyrics Paid In Full, Walked This Way, Don’t Leave by Tupac and Dear Mama made even the cold cat emotional. He teased us when the drummer started a beat nobody could tell what beat it was. To be ashamed and trilled a moment later that it was the famous The Message. Followed with a bassplayer going bezerk on the Good Times bassline which was used by the Sugar Hill Gang’s Rappers Delight. Introduced each band member with solo’s. Ready Or Not ft. Lauryn Hill in the background in a sample. E-Life: “We can’t sing!” Coolio passed by and although everybody knows the names he introduced My Name Is. Followed with More Days To Come and as finishing touch: HipHop Hooray. The band leaving while the piano man played with one finger the last notes.

Ofcourse there was a ‘toetje’ (desert) for the audience that screamed they wanted more. Mrs. Jackson by Outkast followed by Fight For Your Right To Party and finally jumping around with Jump Around.

To be continued…

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