Event Wrap-Up: The Message

Friday night “The Message” was held at the Earlewood Park Community Center. The event was put together by Love, Peace, and Hip Hop in collaboration with NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) to raise awareness during Minority Mental Health month. Dee Dee Renee, 101.3 The Big DM’s midday VJ, hosted the event with some assistance from local Hip Hop leader Fat Rat Da Czar. The night started with speakers from different Columbia organizations informing the crowd of the resources available in the metro where people could receive help. While the crowd waited for performances to begin DJ King Pin kept the family friendly audience on their feet with a mixture of old school and new Hip Hop.Playing the classic Orangeburg track “Crank Dat Roy” before mixing in The Electric Slide. After a mental health survivor took to the microphone to tell her story the show began.

Duo The Force were the first to hit the stage, starting off the show with one of their newer records “If You Want It, I Got it”. They followed up by doing a remixed version of Jay-z and Beyoncé’s “Bonnie and Clyde” entitled “Me and My Ink Pen” rapping “All I need in this life of Sin/Is me and my ink pen/Me and my Ink Pen”. They closed out the set with their most popular record “Carolina Souf” which got the crowd buzzing. Although The Force could make some adjustments on how to get the crowd involved during their shows it was overall a solid performance. After a brief intermission Cole Connor upped the ante with his show. He opened the set with a few words about his own personal struggles in a spoken word style intro. Immediately people were on their feet rushing the performance area for a closer listen. After a few snippets of records from his debut Through The Stampede he went into “kNOwledge” the most popular record from the release. His set included covers of Eminem’s “My name is…” and Fabolous’s “Breath”. He closed the show with a few cuts that will be featured on his upcoming album The Seam.

Overall the event was a success. It was free to the public and food and beverages were provided. If you were looking for a positive atmosphere to enjoy some local Hip Hop on your Friday evening then this was the place to be. If you missed this event Cole Connors Kickstarter celebration event will be August 4^th at Yesterdays. Love, Peace, and Hip Hop’s next project includes partnering with Nickelodeon theatres for the Black film festival in September. Stay tuned to SceneSC for more details.

HAVE AN EVENT YOU THINK WE SHOULD ATTEND? EMAIL: KASHAWN@SCENESC.COM