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Live Review: Illy + Tkay Maidza + Baro - HQ, Adelaide (12.12.14)

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Illy's had a big year. With the release of Cinematic at the end of 2013, the rapper had a huge new block of material which has been toured heavily through this year; national festival appearances, international touring with the Hilltop Hoods, plus two headline tours of metro and regional venues...all of it leading to this, his final run of shows for the year. The 'One For The Cities Tour' marked not only another run around the country off the back of latest single "One for the City", but the final block of Australian gigs for Illy and the Cinematic cycle. And, as expected, the final show of the tour - falling in Adelaide - went out not with a whimper, but a bang.

One of the best things about seeing these sorts of hip-hop shows is turning up for the support acts. For example, on previous Illy tours, we've seen some of the country's best emerging artists do the national rounds; whether it be Allday, Spit Syndicate or even recently, REMI, these stages have become some of the best stomping grounds for discovering new talent. For this show, we got the talents of Melbourne's Baro and Adelaide's own Tkay Maidza. I'd heard many good things about Baro, mainly that he was still 17 or something and had been gathering a sold fan base...fast. People had filed in early for the set and it was good to see the lad hold his own on a stage the size of HQ's. Obviously, he's got a bit of a way to go in terms of development of a dynamite live show, but there's definitely potential there. Will definitely be keeping an ear out for what Baro releases in 2015.

Another artist who has a big 2014 is Tkay. The 18 year old has gone next level in terms of touring and the places she's been able to take her music, all you need to do is quickly Google her name to see where stuff has been popping up. She held a stronghold over the now full HQ, barreling through an intense set of electro, beat driven hip-hop. How Tkay managed to bounce through her set, rhyming like a madwoman without fainting from the heat is beyond me, her long locks whipping around her outfit of miniskirt with oversized zipped up jacket and of course, her now-signature stacked platform boots. As expected, the crowd loved Tkay, stomping along to "Brontosaurus" and revelling in the speed of "Finish Them" and execution of "U-Huh". She says tonight is her first time at HQ ever and let's be real, you'd rather have your first time at this club be because you're performing for a 1000 strong crowd, as opposed to be hitting up Flashdance, right?

Cam Bluff held it down prior to Illy and drummer Ben Ellingworth making their way onstage for the headline set, the DJ throwing down some good hip-hop cuts, including a cheeky spin of the Hoods'"The Nosebleed Section", which predictably, sent the Friday night Adelaide crowd round the bend, a good bit of foreshadowing for what was to come. The headline set which stretched right out to 11:30pm, properly covered Cinematic, while also revisiting some other tracks from Illy's past three albums. By the end of the set, you could tell his voice was waning and the exhaustion was creeping in. Illy didn't let it hinder his final show of the year however, managing to pull off one of the best shows I think I've seen him do in the four or five years I think I've been seeing his gigs now.

From the onset, you can tell this live set is one that has been honed and refined to a tee. Between Bluff, Illy and Ellingworth exists a strong dynamic that is easy to observe. They don't need to check up on each other and you can tell they're at ease with each other in trusting what one another's role is within this trio. Ellingworth is a boss drummer, to put it simply - situated on the right of the stage elevated on a drum rise, he kept brilliant pace throughout the night. Live percussion is always a favourite element of shows for me and he didn't disappoint.

If Cinematic did anything for Illy, it demonstrated a more layered and nuanced sense of lyricism and reinforced his position as a member of the Aussie hip-hop community who was able to successfully enjoy favouritism in both commercial and indie camps. There's an interesting amount of experimentation within hip-hop at the moment, a boldness artists are taking in speaking their mind through music, telling their stories without the brash aggression which could also act as a turn off as much as a drawcard. As a performer, he's way more confident than I've ever seen him and knows how to work his crowd. Like the Hoods and other acts like Thundamentals and Horrorshow, Illy has become one of these guys who has formed a career on going his own way, and this record was a fitting way of representing this chapter of creativity.

"Talk" is probably one of the best tracks on the record and seeing it done live was one of the highlights of the show, for me. Kira Puru's soul drenched vocals in the chorus are just wicked and the power behind the beats permeated right through the crowd. The popular album tracks in "Youngbloods", "On & On", "No Tomorrow" and "Tightrope" had chants being thrown back and forth, arms flailing and the Illy devoted sweating and singing through their emotions. "Cigarettes" sent two young girls behind me to tears, while the personal "Am Yours" brought things down a notch and the crowd gave it the respect it deserved.

A four song encore which touched on the recent Cinematic: Uncut release ("On a Star"), as well as Illy's popular Friday Flips, the second edition of which will be coming out early 2015, gave the crowd their second wind, but it was in the surprise appearance of Suffa and Pressure for the Hilltop Hoods collaboration "Coming Down" which made HQ wild. The volume of the crowd screams was piercing, while the performance on stage was brutal and a brilliant way to wrap up one's final show of 2014. While bringing an act like Hoods out may, in any other context, have taken the spotlight off the main name, this wasn't the case tonight - it was just a bonus. 2015 stands to be another large one for the Melbourne rapper, and it's not really presumptuous to say he's got some good shit still to come. He's managed to display this time and time again.


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