It’s not every day that a bonafide hip-hop legend plays a small club show DJ set in Brooklyn. Let alone a hip – hop that headlined every major national music festival in the country 2 summers ago, but if you were smart enough to go to Williamaburg’s Output Wednesday Night then you saw just that.
Big Boi One half of the legendary Atlanta based hip-hop group Outkast was on the premises a few nights ago and Sir Luscious Left Foot was definitely holding court.
Perhaps the crowd was inspired to dance by the infectious grooves coming from Daddy Fat Sax set, or maybe it was the clubs strict no cellphone policy that let the patrons let loose with no fear whatsoever of winding up on someone’s social media looking silly. But whatever it was the Atlien had the whole crowd of about 350 getting their lives on the dance floor in the laser light lit club.
General Patton was cooler than the other side of the pillow throughout the set, smoking on a black and mild while surveying the crowd full of diehard fans who stayed out with him until 3 A.M. on a school night. A lot of people look like real tool bags when they wear sunglasses at night, but when Big Boi does it it only adds to the overwhelming veneer of cool which is such a huge part of his allure as an artist.
American rapper, song-writer, record producer and actor, Antwan André Patton, better know by his stage name Big Boi, poses for a portrait on Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2012 in New York. (Photo by Amy Sussman/Invision/AP)
Even though Big’s set was awesome and totally worthy of the nearly mythic artist that played it, it wasn’t without folly. In my opinion some of the contemporary radio tracks were just unnecessary. Tracks like “Jump Man” and “Cutty” are fine for the average club DJ to bust out on the regular. But an artist the caliber of Big Boi really should be digging deeper for the bangers.
Other than that however the set really was a total gem on an off night in a major city. Had Big rolled through on a Saturday his set would no doubt have sold out Output or even been hosted at a bigger venue. But on an odd Wednesday in March the pimp daddy laid down an intimate set for a room full of real fans. He even gave us all a treat when he tapped his own verses to Outkast Classic hits “Bombs Over Baghdad,” and “Ms. Jackson.”
