“Anyone here familiar with The Swelly Express mixtape?” asks Noah ‘Xaphoon Jones’ Beresin, the Philly beat maker, who earlier flipped open his sticker covered laptop on what may be the lowest stage I’ve ever seen. The response is a round of cheers from a packed and ever intimate crowd at the Notting Hill arts club. Some may have never heard of Chiddy Bang, despite the recent regular spins of their debut EP, ‘The Opposite of Adults’, on Radio 1 but as Chidera ‘Proto’ Amanage strolls on stage, the burst of unreserved energy which he explodes into is contagious.
Putting shame to some artists’ lackadaisical approach to performing, they open with ‘Fresh Like Us’, and the message isn’t far wrong. As Proto later delivers the line “They say Hip Hop is dead, we bringing the vital signs” I find myself inclined to believe him.
Combining Electronica and Hip Hop seamlessly together on such tracks as their MGMT sampled debut, sounds pretty close to musical genius, but that isn’t all they’re good at. A third of the way through the set Xaphoon confidently, and without a hint of conventional Hip Hop ego, declares that Proto is the best freestyler we will have ever heard. Point in hand, he puts it out to the crowd to choose the subject
of his freestyle, following which, Proto proceeds to deliver some flawless; extremely tactical; metaphor-laced bars.
There’s little doubt that Chidera has the lyrical originality to live up to his alias ‘Prototype’. Just when you think you’ve heard every Biggie Smalls-related metaphor there is he comes out with “I’m the photo album Voletta has, BIG picture”, give it a second…you’ve got it. Show me another MC that matches him lyrically, I think you'd be hard pushed.
No doubt it was a short set, but as I was leaving I kind of had this feeling like “Wow, one day I can say I saw Chiddy Bang before they blew up and changed the course of Hip Hop”. Not a bad conclusion for any ones first
Better days!!!
