Written by Noah Goodbaum | Photography by Philip Litevsky

With this review, I wish to make it known that I am no mere mortal human being. Still less am I a fat white slob . No, for verily I am an initiate of that most fearsome of orders: the Army of the Mash Out Posse.Our leaders: the esteemed generals Sir William Danzini and Sir Fizzleberry of Womack. Our mission: To make any and all jive turkeys kneel. DO YOU HEAR ME?! I’M SORRY, I DON’T THINK YOU CAN HEAR ME, MOTHERFUCKER! BUKKA BUKKA BUKKA BUKKA BUKKA! BLAOW BLAOW GET THE FUCK DOWN!

Yesterday’s math: PANDEMONIUM. Absolute anarchy, totally joyous on every level. Brownsville’s finest, M.O.P., are the authors of a crazed alchemy that, for my money, is pretty much unique in hip-hop, even in popular music; there’s virtually no band anywhere that so completely epitomizes raw primal aggression, and even though there’s a whole wing of hip-hop completely devoted to break-your-face fight music, no one does it with the sheer whirlwind ferocity, the red-blooded conviction, of M.O.P.

And they put on a fucking amazing show last night. Both of them are actually squat, stocky guys, a lot less imposing and threatening than you’d imagine they’d be; they’re actually kinda friendly-looking, which is kinda the antithesis of what you’d expect, considering their lyrical devotion to fucking you up and sticking you for your riches. Lil’ Fame’s got an enormous gold grill stuck on a grin a mile wide; he looks like a gangstafied version of Cee-Lo. Billy Danze looks like one of the bal hedz from Onyx, with squinty eyes and a voice like crushed gravel. Their catalogue is thick with monster bangers, ominous beats alternating with amped-up horn-blast insanity, and even though we never got to hear some of their greatest smash-thwack ruffneck shit (they didn’t do “Rugged Neva Smoove”, nor “Breaking The Rules”, nor “Handle Ur Bizness”), the First Family capos and their talented henchman Sticky were firing on all cylinders, delighted and exultant as they knocked out “Ghetto Warfare” and “Cold As Ice” and “Downtown Swinga” and “How About Some Hardcore”, in response to which I say: YEAH WE LIKE IT RAW! Because we do. And they was raw.

Most meaningful for me, I think, was getting a short sharp burst of “Follow Instructions”, whose beat is completely fucking bonkers (what up Primo!) and whose massive booming anthemic chorus stands tall even in the catalogue of this group so peerlessly adept at massive booming anthemic choruses. But in the final analysis, they could have sat in rocking chairs playing the glockenspiel for 45 minutes if they’d seen fit, and as long as one moment was still coming, no one would really much mind, I don’t think. ‘Cause if you’re at an M.O.P. show, as every hardy cat and dame who knew the time and rightfully braved the cold to troop out to this particularly slammin’ M.O.P. show is aware, everything is just a drawn-out prelude to the moment when that destructive monstrous Sam & Dave sample kicks in and the crazed hysteric madness kicks in and suddenly you’re lost in a maelstrom where every single solitary soul is losing their mind like the world is about to end and all that’s left to do is party. That is to say: AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANTEUP!!!!!!!!!!!

WHAT THE SHIT. Unforgettable greatness. Transcendent wonderment on every concievable level. Forget that it was freezing outside. Forget that the crowd was mostly disenchanted and lackluster throughout the performances by the opening acts, which included the very dope Mayhem Morearty as well as some people called the Fuckin’ Badass Indians, from some place called K-Town (as they incessantly told us), whose members include a Mohawk with a Mohawk (!) and who have all the stage presence of certified public accountants. And who will not be challenging The Goats’ exalted status as the supreme great Aboriginal rap group anytime soon, but they would like us to know that they are from K-Town, and they are Rez’d Out, very Rez’d Out indeed. But no. Forget K-Town. Forget Old Man Winter. Forget whatever wackness and drudgery might have accumulated for those battle-scarred concertgoers all through the week. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANTEUP!!!!!!!!!!! That’s what it is. Simple, joyous, visionary, revolutionary. Awesome. AWESOME.

Peep all the shots here.