Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Concert Review: Travie McCoy and Donnis

About a month ago, during the heart of March Madness when the VCUs and Butlers were still wrecking shop on the industry heavywieghts, I ventured down to TLA to catch one of my favorite up and coming artists @donnisxdonnis. The irony on the timing of this review is that he just released his much anticipated Southern Lights mixtape yesterday via Karmaloop , which I'm still on my first full lap around as I write this. Sounds pretty dope so far, but you can be sure I'll find a way to run a mile around it before I make any judgments.

Alright, so, rewind back about a month and I find myself walking into Theater of the Living Arts confused as hell as I see @PETEWENTZ onstage with a girl I don't recognize and have never heard of before. As it turns out, he and Bebe Rexha recently former a band called the Black Cards and they were the openers for the opening act. Being a pretty hardcore Fall Out Boy fan at one point, I was happy to see Pete back in action, but at the same time mad as hell all over again because the group disintegrated. If you're curious how they sound, it's very upbeat, punk, reggae influenced music that sounds sorta like No Doubt. Not really my cup of tea, but it was sort of alarming when 90% of the crowd cleared the floor just to get an autograph from him, which left about 50 fans to watch the upcoming acts. Makes sense considering his 2.5 million followers, but to be honest (and he knows and admits this willingly onstage), it's weird to have a guitarist talk just as much or more than the lead singer between songs. Sorta goes against the whole hierarchy of tradition for band performances, but considering his popularity, I guess it's warranted?

For me, Donnis, not @TRAVIEMCCOY was that someone who I'd made a point this year to somehow find a way to see. As he hit the stage with a burst of energy, I immediately felt like it was a great decision to pay the price of admissions. Despite the sound crew sabotaging his entrance by muting his mic and making him literally replay his walk out song, Donnis took it in stride and even joked about it as he continued on. One thing was for sure, the diminutive crowd wasn't gonna hold back the characteristically charismatic MC from creating a party atmosphere. Below are two of my favorite tracks he performed, Tonight and Gone ...
Donnis - Tonight at TLA
Donnis - Gone at TLA
Front to back, it was a greatest hits so far type of performance where he spotlighted damn near every song you may have heard from him. I got more videos of him doing his new track Me & My Boo as well as his first breakout single Over Do It, but the audio is waaay to heavy so it's more for visual. All in all it was a great performance EXCEPT he was capped at the knees early when the powers that be shortened his set for some probably terrible reason. He got to perform maybe 6 or so songs before being CUT, which pissed me off quite frankly. Even worse, I was actually looking forward to seeing @xtothev, but he was completely axed from even getting on stage. I don't know who made that ruling, but it was messed up and ultimately made me feel like the money I spent on the concert was mostly wasted. No disrespect to Black Cards or Travie McCoy, but I didn't come to watch them, I came to watch one of the game's up and coming stars and y'all cut him short. Oh hell-to-the-naw...#VenueFuckery

I don't wanna sound entirely negative either because Travie did his thing, he held down his live-band-style Hip Hop sound, was engaging and funny throughout the performance. You'll appreciate his rendition of Billionaire below...
Travie McCoy - Billionaire at TLA
The energy was high throughout the concert, which kept my attention and gave some entertainment value. Still, I expected more from the lineup and am more pissed off at the powers that be for pulling the wrong strings for seemingly no reason. I came away wanting to hear a lot more from Donnis and feeling like I wasn't as big of a Travie McCoy fan as I thought. To each their own though, if you like his music, you'll enjoy his live act, but it didn't end up bein' my favorite cup of tea.

What you need to do is download Donnis's Southern Lights mixtape though, it's well worth a download and multiple listens...

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