as soon as we heard the field
marshal was bringing baby cham to town for his birthday bash, we knew we had to be
there. chicagoreggae crew arrived on the scene at joe's at 1253am. we
found parley, slacky j, martin and vip chilling in the vip lounge(make sure you click the
pics for the bigger version and press "back" to return to this page) looking
dapper as usual.  princess was in the house. 
we had just missed the chicago acts and we had mixed feelings about that, but we
were just in time because the crowd was vibing to the early juggling from field marshal.
  just as the pepperseed riddim that
had the crowd bubbling ready to boil was wearing off at 221AM, field marshal took to the
stage to introduce frankie sly. the crowd, who had up until that point
stayed back from the stage in bashment-circle formation, quickly moved to the front of the
stage...
 the band came onstage at 225am with some
wicked riddim warm ups. frankie
entered at 228 am had the crowd jumping with some early wifey tunes, "haters
anthem", "bun fassyhole" and "ambulance" among many other hot
tunes. "gal wawawawawant everyting!"   chico entered at
244am and gave us an excellent show. with a command of the stage that far outweighed
his little size, 26 year old chico charmed the ladies with tune after tune
"especially for my ladies", "some gal get gruuuuuudgeful!" but, unfortunately for some, we learned chico
still, "nuh stoop lowowow"  the crowd watched intently as baby cham comes
onstage at 302 am to the bruk out riddim djing his controversial lyrics "which
gal a which gal a say she nuh... right now dat run the cut". the 24 year old
cham has a voice that booms with a low pitch similar to bounty and merciless...
   
"kiss my ras, bumboclaat! " the crowd sings along  showtime riddim's"gallong now gyal ya
a live comfortable", "many many", "joy ride", "can i get
a"...      cham makes the crowd yell "wowow"
for more tunes like the bug's "ghetto pledge" and the clone's
"another level". the chicagoreggae crew was afraid we'd be treated to a
boring, medley, top speed 20 minute performance when cham first came out at a fever pitch,
but he let us all know that he was going to give us a good show and he wasn't in for the
"speed performance and run offa the stage" business.
      cham taught the crowd several new dances
including the "lock it down" and spoke on the recent violence in jamaica, noting
that jamaicans are a very peaceful crowd. some of the crowd agreed, and others shook
their heads in protest. cham then told all jamaicans to raise their hands and then
began to sing the jamaican national anthem with most of the crowd joining in.
     cham told a couple of stories- one about the
gay parade and how he couldn't believe that "police in chicago actually stop traffic
for battymen" and a story about how the police stopped him on the way from detroit
that segued in to his most current hit "babylon bwoy" all hands were in
the air as he went into "man and man" and took us all the way up to 4am.
  fooooooooorward!
the chicagoreggae crew rode home into the sunrise. the chicagoreggae.com crew gives
this one a thumbs up. one thing though, kardinal ofishall was billed as the opener
on the flyer and he was absent. we almost forgot that though, because the other acts
were so good. he only had one song we wanted to hear anyways...
chicagoreggae crew wishes to express special gratitude and nuff respeck to field
marshal for extending exclusive press privileges to the crew and for bringing yet another
top shotta's show to chicgao! |
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