It was a long day that Sunday I was up from 7am getting my shit together to put on a BBQ at Novakane’s gaff, and true to Bank holiday form it rained all day so as the night wore on it was down to the HiFi club for a bit of jiving.
We got to the HiFi fairly early to see J-Live warming up the crowd with a solid set on the decks, a nice selection of hiphop and funk classics including a bit of good old Johnny “Guitar” Watson thrown in to boot – Lurvely!
Next up was ASM (A State of Mind) I’ve not seen these guys before but heard good things about their live set. ASM hail from all over the world from 
Leeds to LA to Germany to Oxford. I’m not going to detract from the performance as notably they have skills but if someone was to write a manual on how to put on a hip hop gig then these guys had read it. There wasn’t anything new for me it was a guy on the 1s and 2s, another guy on an MPC, a guy on percussion and 2 MC’s rapping in American accents even though they aren’t American? The choice of samples were ok but if they were a little more adventurous and the MC’s showed greater word play between them then it could have been better.
Following on came Kid Kanevil, his LP went on sale that night so it was a really lively set. Kid Kanevil used very similar tools to ASM for his set with an MPC, a set of Decks, an MC, Percussion and a Flute yet the choice of samples the energy of the talented MC Testament and the energetic performances of Laura J on flute really got the party going and the atmosphere was far more exciting. Dropping already notable UK classics such as “Kranium Rock” the party really had begun.
We were then brought into the set with J-Live on the mic and his trusty DJ on the decks, I couldn’t decide who had the most energy on stage as the DJ notably was one hyped up guy. The set was absolutely solid which you come to expect from a veteran like J-Live and as he pointed out from the start of his set he’s been in the game for a long time and used to open up nights when there were less than 10 people in the club.
The Hi-Fi was absolutely packed that night you could hardly move and I think I almost went deaf as my left ear was rammed right up against a speaker half of the night, but I guess thats the price you pay to have a great night out in Leeds these days.
More Info:
www.myspace.com/kidkanevil
www.myspace.com/astateofmind
www.myspace.com/jlive
[tags] Leeds, Hi-Fi, hip hop, J-Live, Kid Kanevil [/tags]
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