Scaled-Down Festival Draws Rap’s Faithful

The Hip-Hop Unity Festival, the ambitious rap concert that many industry insiders predicted would never happen, went on as scheduled Friday at the Los Angeles Sports Arena.

Well, part of it.

The five-hour event started on time at 7 p.m., had smooth set changes and the few thousand fans on hand seemed largely entertained by much of what they saw.

So what was missing?

Most of the all-star lineup.

No DMX, one of the hottest figures in contemporary rap.

No Shaquille O’Neal, the Laker star whose rap skills don’t equal his basketball talent, but whose presence in this city made him one of the evening’s top lures.

No Run-DMC. No Redman. No Warren G or Kurupt--and the list goes on.

Also: no explanation from the stage about why these acts didn’t appear.

Even festival organizers acknowledged in the days before the concert that they were having credibility issues in trying to spread the word on what they initially hoped would be the largest rap event in recent memory.

Wilson Ebiye, president of Edgewater Entertainment, had said he hoped to attract 80,000 fans to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for the show, but announced Nov. 22 that the show was being scaled back to the 16,500-seat Sports Arena because of slow sales.

One reason for industry skepticism was that rap concerts have long been tainted by a reputation for poor production values, last-minute cancellations and other problems.

The image of live rap has begun to improve, thanks to a series of well-organized “Smokin’ Grooves” summer tours and Sean “Puffy” Combs’ “Bad Boy” tour, and rap insiders hoped this event would add further to its credibility. The plan was to tape the event for a possible cable TV special.

Although the concert was billed as a tribute to late rappers Eazy-E, Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. and was paraded as a happening that would unite rappers from both coasts, only two of the name performers were from outside California.

Some out-of-towners--including young Chicago hopeful Feisty, who mixed reggae and rap, and UGO, thanks to considerable help from his dancers--generated enthusiasm from the audience, but it was the local heroes generally who fared best.

Inglewood rapper Mack 10 thrilled fans with renditions of his gangsta rap hits during a 20-minute performance. Like many of the other artists showcased, Mack 10 was joined by a throng of friends, such as Compton rapper MC Eiht, many of whom took turns performing their own material during their comrades’ time.

Earlier, abbreviated routines from high-energy acts such as Tha Alkaholiks, Xzibit and Gonzo had excited the crowd.

The sets of hip-hop veterans KRS-One and Slick Rick served as a testament to rap music’s longevity and to the genre’s virtually instantaneous turnover rate.

KRS-One is one of the most politically charged, lyrically talented and universally respected rap artists of all time. Slick Rick is one of rap’s most potent storytellers.

Despite these lofty resumes and recent, popular recordings, most of the younger fans appeared confused as to why--and how--several of their older neighbors were rapping word for word with KRS-One and Slick Rick. Considering all that was missing, the audience seemed content with the chance to experience this much rap in one evening--a sign of the hunger in the rap world for concerts.