Two concerts, two countries, two days...

This month I've decided to get crazy and see two concerts in two days. I wanted immersed myself in music after months of not seeing a single live show. For those of you who don’t know, DJ Krush is probably the number one DJ in Japan, which is not easy because I can tell you from experience that the Japanese don't sleep on Hip Hop. They take it very seriously. The cool thing about Krush is that he's not just a scratcher. He brings very unique elements of Japanese lifestyle and art to an originally American instrument and genre.

I went to Strasbourg, France, which I hear is a very beautiful city. I wouldn't know because I didn't have time to look around. The concert was at little rave/cinema looking complex on the corner of a small street. It gave the show a very intimate feeling, and not like an arena or something. This shot is of something across the street from the venue. I didn't take a picture of it, but on the wall they had in mixed English and French, "Big up au" and then started mentioning the names of the artist of this painting. I thought it was interesting that the French know about "Big up." Anyways, I've never seen more opening acts in a show then with this one. First he brought on some local French talent. These two guys came out and started mixing up some seriously funky old school hip. I was impressed. I don’t have any pictures of then nor did I catch their names. But if you're ever in Strasbourg and see catch a duo of blonde French guys playing old school hip hop, then that's them. Next out was DJ 0.0001 a.k.a the Mole. This guy was nuts. I thought he was part of the first opener because he came out with his laptop while the other French guys were still playing and didn't say anything. He started mixing in with the French guys set, and eventually spoke to the crowd in American. At first he just looked like some crazy ass otakuplaying a video game on his laptop on stage when he should perform. He had some laptop skills, with his music being a mix of top 40 hits fused in Reason, Cakewalk and possibly other multi-track recording software, with distorted effects which closely resembled guitar pedals and original beats. I'd say it reminded me of Goldie's jungle shit, mixed with the hardest Prodigy you ever heard, with some top 40 thrown in the background. He never once looked at the crowd until he announced a special guest straight from America, called the Mole.He then disappeared under his DJ table, and about a minute later appeared in a red devil consume. I was speechless. He put the laptop on auto, and proceeded to rap for 30 minutes. It was ok. More shock value and humor than storytelling. He took the Mole costume back off and turned back into DJ 0.0001. After his set was the main event. Krush came out and didn't say a word. He just went to the tables. I'd have to break the first part of his set down into atmospheric ambient with some East Asian instruments in there like the Samisen and drums I’ve heard before in Okinawa. It wasn't like a DJ set at all. It was a musical history lesson, with a wide assortment of instruments at his disposal. He dropped the beat and then people started dancing. The second part of his set consisted with a lot of seemingly impromptu beatmaking. He left the turntables alone and went straight for the pads. The last bit of the set was him playing his hits. All in all, I was highly impressed but after those first two really long openers (about 2 and a half hours for both) I was ready to go by the end of Krush's set and didn't stay for the encore (if there was one). Sorry for the grainy pictures but until I get a smaller digicam, these are all I can offer. Peace