Clipse emerged onto The Bomb Factory stage in a cloud of smoke as they started the show with the biggest hit from their new album, “Chains & Whips.” The crowd exploded when the duo dropped their verses. As the heavy smoke dissipated, we got a glimpse of Pusha T and Malice, the deadliest brotherly duo hip-hop has ever seen. They walked out of the smoke sporting expensive designer street wear and huge diamond encrusted chains that would make any jeweler faint.
Before their grand entrance, Clipse started their show with an ominous and fast-paced slideshow of images that range from political history, to old photos from their heyday. The visuals ended with the flashing phrase “THIS IS CULTURALLY INAPPROPRIATE,” which is the slogan sprinkled all throughout the new album through clever sound bites.
Pusha T and Malice made it incredibly apparent that this would be an all killer no filler concert. Besides a handful of moments for banter, throughout the concert Clipse would jump into the next song seamlessly without missing a beat; a way of performing that I hadn’t seen at a hip-hop show before.
After a performance of the fan favorite track, “Popular Demand (Popeyes)”, the duo took their Michael Jackson halftime moment, akin to when the King of Pop came out for the halftime show at Super Bowl XXVII and stood there for two minutes as fans cheered and fainted. Clipse felt the need to bask in the glory of their return. They know their legend status and they love it. They each stood at opposite ends of the stage and looked out into the crowd while the fans screamed like they were at a Taylor Swift concert. After soaking it all in, Pusha exclaimed “Album of the year easy! EASY!” The crowd erupted in agreeing cheers.
Following a fiery performance of Clipse’s respective verses on “What Happened To That Boy” by Birdman, which absolutely pumps the crowd up, they jumped into “M.T.B.T.T.F.”, which stands for “Mike Tyson blow to the face,” adding another feather in Pusha and Malice’s cap of unparalleled cocaine references. The visuals for the song were quick flashes of Mike Tyson highlight knock outs which overlay well with the aggressive demeanor of the track. As Pusha delivers his verse from the song, he raps out into the crowd with potency, sending hand signals for each bar as if he is giving us a sign language lesson on his rhymes. He maintains this hand delivery for the whole show.
An aspect that made watching Clipse so entertaining was how the brothers supported each other on stage. While Pusha T was rapping, Malice would hype his brother up by rapping the last word of a bar not dissimilar to how the Beastie Boys operate. Pusha T would do the same when it was his older brother’s turn to jump on the mic.
As fantastic as the new album is, the duo did not want to leave out their classic material, so they fed the diehard fans with a three song blitz of “Momma I’m So Sorry,” “Keys Open Doors,” and “Mr. Me Too.” Their performances really made you feel like they never left. Each bar rapped held the weight of the heavy kilos of cocaine they reference in their tracks. Their breath control and aggressiveness on the microphone is felt from the front row, all the way to the merch bar.
Proceeding “Mr. Me Too,” they jumped into one of the most important songs in hip-hop history, “Grindin’”. There was not a louder moment from the crowd than the fans hearing the unmistakable drum beat from Pharrell, and erupting into screaming cries. A beat so famous that it transcends hip-hop itself. The opening bars for Pusha’s iconic verse received the most crowd participation of the whole show, “From ghetto to ghetto, to backyard to yard I sell it whipped or un-whipped-,” could be heard in Austin. My only complaint is that they didn’t play their superb second verses from the hit song.
After an exhilarating performance of the lead single for their new album, “Ace Trumpets,” Clipse slows it down with one of the most heartbreaking hip-hop songs ever recorded. “The Birds Don’t Sing” opens the album up, so it seems fitting to have the concert close on it. The song is a tribute to their parents, who died a few months apart from each other. Their mother died in November 2021, and their father in March 2022. An aspect that made the Clipse’s reunion feel so noteworthy was that they didn’t just come back with the same “coke bars” from 2006, which would have been easy for them to do. They decided to come back with a newfound sense of maturity and thoughtfulness, evident all throughout their new album. The emotions in that room were palpable. While Pusha and Malice made us all cry, they overlaid their performance with a slideshow of their parents’ history together as a couple. You could feel every single word that they were rapping. It was a room unified through love, which was refreshing to feel in today’s day and age. After their performance they turn their backs on us and look at the images of their parents being presented on screen. Absolute silence. They wanted us to feel it, and they succeeded.
Before the show started, I arrived 30 minutes before the doors opened and the line was already 300 people long. As the doors open, I rush immediately to the merch line to pick up a memento for the occasion. The merch designs were excellent and certainly in line with the high fashion aesthetic that Pusha T has carried in his art direction for the last few years in his solo career, which he expertly weaved into the art direction for the reunion.
When it came time for the opener to come out, EARTHGANG made their presence known with some great crowd work. Their energy was so infectious, it swept me up in the fun even though I am not initiated in their catalogue.
During their set they did not shy away from drawing attention to societal issues. They had a moment during a bit of crowd work where they had the audience join in on a ‘f*ck ICE’ chant. For the rest of the show the crowd was rarely louder than during that chant.
EARTHGANG successfully brings the vital Atlanta sound into the modern day with a trap-centric formula that works very well. I don’t think I have enjoyed a rap opener as much as EARTHGANG. They were fantastic and despite being uninitiated with their music, I had an absolute blast.
After the heartbreaking “The Birds Don’t Sing,” Clipse came out for an encore and played a couple more tracks before calling it a night. The Encore featured “Cot Damn,” “Virginia,” and “So Far Ahead.”
Clipse proves that age is not a factor when it comes to making forward thinking, vital and addicting hip-hop. In a musical culture like hip-hop, that believes everybody over the age of 30 is old, Clipse takes that expectation and knocks its teeth out with a Mike Tyson blow to the face, giving us one of the best albums of the decade, and what will go down in history as the greatest comeback hip-hop has ever had the pleasure of witnessing. No one is doing rap concerts in today’s day and age like Clipse.
Setlist:
Chains & Whips
P.O.V.
Popular Demand (Popeyes)
What Happened to That Boy
M.T.B.T.T.F.
Inglorious Bastards
Momma I’m So Sorry
Keys Open Doors
Mr. Me Too
Grindin’
F.I.C.O.
So Be It
Ace Trumpets
The Birds Don’t Sing
