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Chiddy Bang steals the show
Kevin Noonan | Monday, April 11, 2011
The only problem with the Student Union Board (SUB) concert Friday night was that the order of acts was backwards. O.A.R. was good, and they may be the better-known band, but Chiddy Bang didn’t just steal the show; they owned it.
The two-man team of Chidera “Chiddy” Anamege and Noah “Xaphoon Jones” Beresin had the crowd in a frenzy from the moment they stepped on stage. The artists themselves seemed surprised at how active and responsive the crowd was. Both artists said in an interview that college campuses are among their favorite places to play.
“We love playing at colleges. We didn’t really have a college experience, but you know now, we’ve gotten a party at every campus we’ve played at. And I mean you all are our peers, we’re 20 years old,” Beresin said.
The band laid out mostly tracks from their first official production, “The Preview,” a set of tracks meant to preview their upcoming debut full-length album, “Breakfast,” due out this summer. But they also played a few songs from their first mixtape, “The Swelly Express,” and even played a song they made with renowned rapper Big Sean.
For a minute there was a bit of excitement in the crowd when those who recognized the beginning of the song thought that Big Sean was about to step on stage. Instead, Beresin filled in and did a pretty good impression, even though he preceded it with some humor about his lack of rapping ability.
The highlight of the performance, though, was Anamege’s display of pure lyrical talent. Beresin told the crowd that his partner could freestyle rap literally anything, including, as he said, Oogly-Boogly.
They opened it up to the crowd, and a sort of “Whose Line Is It Anyway” of rapping began. The crowd gave the rapper a list of topics to freestyle about and Anamege knocked it out of the park. He nailed every single suggestion, including a memorable line about parietals, an “ole” to Zahm and its moose, and even salt.
They closed their set with a roof-raising performance of the song that made them famous, “Opposite of Adults.” But the night was not over, as the duo came back out at the end of the concert to do a bit of performing with O.A.R., with much crowd approval again.
Though the group didn’t play any songs from their new album, one of which was prevented from being performed because the title contains some humorous profanity, the duo definitely made a few fans Friday night.
All around it was a fantastic show, from both bands. But if Chiddy Bang’s performance was any indicator of things to come, O.A.R. might be opening for them not too long from now.