For music fans in New York City the summer is a time for an exceptional amount of outdoor and even indoor concerts. New York residents can find live performances from every genre of music imaginable, in every borough of the city. Summer concerts can also be found through out the suburbs of Long Island and Upstate New York as well. For fans of urban music there is Central Park Summer Stage, Black August, Afro Punk Fest and plenty more.
For the last eight years, showcasing non-commercial Hip-Hop acts has been the focal point of The Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival. The organizers have found a formula that resonates with underground Hip-Hop fans. This annual event has been a home to artists and DJ's like DJ Premier, DJ Evil Dee, Nitty Scott, Jeru The Damaja, De la Soul, Atribe Called Quest, Skyzoo and many more. The event has always been hosted by "Uncle" Ralph McDaniels of the now thirty year old Video Music Box. What host could represent the borough of Brooklyn better?
This years performance was made special by it's headline act, Busta Rhymes. The first thing to appreciate about Bustas' performance was the way he opened his show by performing the crowd motivating "Jump, Jump", which drew a very excited reaction from the audience. Busta showed his deep commitment to doing a monumental performance by adding respected Hip-Hop luminaries to his peformance. Lil Fame of M.O.P. joined Busta on stage to do a very energetic version of "Ante Up". Buck Shot of Black Moon touched the mic to do his classics, "How Many M.C.'s" and "Don't Front". The CoCoa Brovaz, Tek And Steele joined Buck Shot on stage to do even more Boot Camp Classics. As if that wasn't enough Busta brought the legendary Slick Rick on stage to do what can be considered a Hip-Hop fable, "Childrens' Story".
Apart from doing a string of his own hits, Busta reached a critical point in his performance when he reunited the members of Leaders Of The New School, Dinco D and Charlie Brown.They did their crowd pleasing classic "Case Of The P.T.A." This was the first time Leaders Of The New School performed on stage together in nineteen years. Busta went a step further to bring A Tribe Called Quest on stage to do the groundbreaking "Scenario", which generated very rowdy reaction from crowd.
In the final analysis Bustas' 2012 Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival performance was equally as good as the legendary past performances of Q-Tip and De La Soul. It will be the topic of discussion for years.