Ah! Here now is that part of the year when Seattleites get their rightful payoff for enduring a million gray days of vitamin D–deprived misery, as incredible, sun-splashed vistas of green vegetation, silver-blue mountains (or is that just my Coors Light?), and rippling water are all spread out like some godly buffet underneath a cloudless dome of blue. It’s easy to get lost in a haze of your choosing, too easy. Just last week, we celebrated our freedom (to eat or otherwise consume) as our government stalked us like The Cable Guy, hunting down the folks brave enough to tell us the truth. We saw George Zimmerman’s lawyer open up with a knock-knock joke, and the LAPD shot a man’s dog. Plus, we watched the latest in the unprecedented unrest, uprisings, and revolt happening everywhere—shouts to Egypt, Turkey, and Brazil, not to mention the civil war in Syria and a million other things. Plus: the BET Awards. Shit is real, dog—but it’s also surreal. (Not SeaReal, mind you, but shouts to Dub B anyway.)
Case in point: Macklemore & Ryan Lewis announced a 30-plus-date US tour with Talib Kweli and Big K.R.I.T. opening up. Appropriate to their pop-radio arena-rap, this is a real-deal arena tour. Their final show, here in Seattle at the 17K-capacity KeyArena, sold out in 15 minutes—the second show they added took about two hours. Just recently, the Supreme Court struck down the Defense of Marriage Act as unconstitutional. M&RL’s “Same Love”—the most explicitly pro-same-sex-marriage song ever—is undoubtedly the defining soundtrack of this historic decision. Does that mean a bunch of rappers, here and elsewhere, are going to try to tackle hammy issue-based songs, stunt in Goodwill furs, and have similarly ampersanded collaborative projects with government-name-using producers? Yes, definitely.
Also in “Yes, definitely” news: Kingdom Crumbs play Neumos on Thursday, July 11, with Kung Foo Grip, Nu Era, and Gift uh Gab, plus young hustlin’ DJ Same. Should you go? Yes, definitely. Is this a conflict of interest because I now comanage Kingdom Crumbs? Yes, definitely. (Sorry, just being transparent, like Kevin Bacon in that one movie.) You’ll be happy to know KC are working on the follow-up to their debut—presumably, Gift uh Gab is doing the same. But in the meantime, I hope you heard her outta-nowhere remix of the classic “Dead Wrong,” because she fuckin’ snapped on it.
Shabazz Palaces (literally right off the plane from touring Vietnam, Hong Kong, China, Korea, and Singapore)—along with a host of brilliant guitar bands—play the (free, outdoor) Sub Pop Silver Jubilee in Georgetown on July 13, my birthday, so there’s definitely that. Fake Four founder Ceschi, Onry Ozzborn (who is gearing Grayskul back up—check their “Come On” video), Graves33 (he’s got a new Jack Gaffle–featuring video for “Checklist Infinite”), and Macklemore phan Phreewil (see: his vintage underground MC vent session “None of Em”) all play Nectar the next night as well. There you go—good luck out there, because you’re probably gonna need it. 