We really hope you brought the tortilla chips: Juicy J’s fans did their best to turn Marathon Music Works into a hot box, and The Spin still has the munchies. All stoned philosophizing aside, Sunday night’s show delivered the prime-time hip-hop extravaganza we needed to close out our weekend, with the old-school Memphis MC showing that his grip on the contemporary game is rock solid.
The security line was half a block long when The Spin strolled up at 8:45, but was nonetheless quick and efficient, with no Tyler, The Creator-style drama from a diverse 18+ crowd that was generally on its best behavior. We were still bummed to miss late-added opener Jung Youth, though we saw him just a couple of weeks ago. He didn’t exactly blow us away that time, but he’s got some solid raw material and a strong hustler spirit, evident in the stack of CDs left at every cash register on the bar. We’ll definitely be watching for more from him.
We were honestly surprised when Project Pat went on at 9 p.m., almost on the dot. Three 6 Mafia helped put the South on the map as a hip-hop hub! They were the first rap group to win an Oscar! Along with Juicy and the rest of Three 6, Pat helped make the genre what it is today, and he’s going on at 9 o’clock? Our questions aside, he had no need to show off. Buff as hell, the veteran MC stalked out, cool as could be, and owned the place, tearing up a 30-minute set that wrapped with “Chicken Head.”
Just as the changeover before Travi$ Scott’s set began to drag, the lights went purple, plumes of weed smoke went up, and hypeman Chaz began to work the crowd. Scott dropped his debut mixtape just over a year ago, but he’s been working hard on his aggressive, turnt-up post-crunk style under the wings of some heavy hitters — OK, so his biggest credit so far is on Jay Z’s Magna Carta ... Holy Grail, and about the only figure in contemporary hip-hop who wasn’t part of that record is Pharrell’s hat, but make no mistake, Scott goes hard. From his rhymes to his beats to his stage presence, Scott was supremely athletic, never standing still, launching himself into the crowd during the first song. Knowing full well that the second set is often an excuse to buy drinks before the headliner, Scott made it a point to jump on every bar in the room and introduce himself to the folks in line before his time was up.
Despite hip-hop’s respect for the OGs, it’s still a game that moves at the speed of pop culture, and trying to keep up can wear an MC out. Juicy J has the contemporary sound on lock, but like his older brother, Project Pat, J’s presence is a bit more nuanced, relying on well-honed old-school chops. If Travi$ Scott’s set was a sprint, the Three 6 co-founder set himself up for a long run: His intensity ebbed and flowed, and when he ramped up the energy, we felt it in our gut.
Playing to his new-found millennial audience, J started with a slew of tunes from Stay Trippy, bringing out his recent hit “Bandz a Make Her Dance” early in the set. Lately, he’s been traveling the inner circles of contemporary pop, working with Dr. Luke and supplying guest verses for The Weeknd and Katy Perry, whose “Dark Horse” he dropped during this set. Multiple times, he stopped to take selfies and pour champagne for everyone in the front row, careful to check hand stamps and not give it to the underage fans. He’s already given out his genius “twerking scholarship,” but he still brought a bunch of girls and one dude onstage for some dance-team deflowering. Maybe the scene wasn’t as rowdy as A$AP Rocky, but it got respectably wild for a school night.
We felt like the crowd held a little something back during the first half of the set, but then came a Three 6 medley that took the energy in the room to another level. “How many of y’all grew up on this shit?” J asked before firing off verses from “Sippin’ on Some Syrup,” “Stay Fly,” “Tear Da Club Up” and “Slob on My Knob,” to which the crowd promptly lost it. The numbers tell us that Tennessee takes special pride in Juicy J — not that he’s the most-played artist in the state, but that we have a disproportionately large amount of love for him — but he and the Nashville crowd proved it beyond the shadow of a doubt. Thanks for the fuzzy memories. We’re going to go find some sunglasses and Alka-Seltzer.
