ROCK THE BELLS - NEW YORK 2010

so this has been my second rock the bells experience, and it is surely not my last!
rock the bells was at governor's island this year, and our ticket included our ferry ride over. the ferry was literally packed with people. you couldn't move. there was this one girl standing next to me who talked loudly about dudes she's banged, and her outrageous weekends, and how basically she was just like omg like like, like, the coolest girl like, EVER. so i was kind of nervous at how the crowd would be.
the weather was extremely hot, and when alex and i got to governor's island, there were two stages, and they were about a fifteen minute walk from each other. a 25 minute walk when you're thrown on an island with over tens of thousands of hip hop goers.. i was disappointed at that, because i had heard ny was the only location where all acts would be at one stage.. so womp! you had to choose which acts you wanted to see. unfortunately, i didn't take a lot of pics. my camera kept on dying and it was hard to maneuver in any way.
snoop brought back almost everyone from doggystyle, which was awesome.. and was the one who stuck to "doggystyle" almost completely.. but after hearing hits and other bangers that weren't on your favorite artist's most classic albums.. you really didn't care.
waiting for lauryn hill was brutal. it was stupid hot and the sun was beaming. lex and i had front row positioning and if we left, there was no way we were going to get it back. the dj just kept on shouting out "IS QUEENS IN THE HOUSE?! IS BROOKLYN IN THE HOUSE?! THE BRONX IN THE HOUSE?! IS NEW YORK IN THE HOUSE!?" etc. before reaching the front i had this asian guy in front of me, standing on the baricade with his ass sticking out. to make matters worse, he had a fro. he wasn't rocking out, and was spitting out the wrong lyrics, and every time i touched him he would mean mug me. DUDE, this is a hip hop show, fuck outta here. i was so glad when he left. i was standing next to two fifteen year old lesbians. one was drunk off her ass, and the other held her up from behind while kissing her neck every once in a while. to my right, i had two girls from staten island, they kept booing every location that wasn't staten island when the dj screamed it out.. however, when i told alex "someone's gum smells so good right now".. it turned out being them, and they gave me a piece. which helped me keep spit in my mouth during desert mouth conditions.
when lauryn came out, she had her back up singers in full adidas track suits.. which i found to be adorable. she started out with lost ones, which was fucking ape shit. a big tune, and she belted it out from the top of her lungs.. but she was kind of all over the place. i wasn't sure if she was forgetting words or too excited. i think it might have been a mixture of both lol.. her voice in her entire perofrmance, cracked a few times.. she kept on getting feedback because she'd always be near a speaker.. but she ran all over the stage and raged like crazy. i'm cutting her slack because she hasn't performed in a long ass time.. and she's lauryn hill, she's one of my favs. didn't feel much effort though, if any.
she also brought out jay-z, beyonce, mary j blige, swizz beats, chris rock, and john legend. jay-z was crazy mother fucking tall man! beyonce is drop dead gorgeous, and so is alicia keys the homewrecker. she also took the time to just bring out her kids to do some ad-libbed vocal rifts and "oh's". which was okay, i mean, we really didn't get full songs. we got like, a couple lines lol.. wtf lauryn?! she loudly screamed at us, "SEE! i haven't been CRAZY! i haven't been on VACATION! i've been workin! believe me these kids are WORK!". i'll believe her, she clearly wasn't singing hahaha. that was a lot of fucking kids man!
this was my second time seeing tribe, and they definitely didn't disappoint. q-tip ALWAYS, ALWAYS, goes ape shit! i'm surprised dude doesn't have eight pack abs with the way he works the stage.. & phife surprised me.. he kept up! both had an epic fun time on stage and you could feel it in their performance.. and when busta rhymes came out belting "OH MY GOSH!" it picked up their energy even more.
wu-tang was REEEDIC. by this time, i had finished two bottles of water, but was madly de-hydrated. during the entire rock the bells gong show, people were passing out left and right.. (when lex got his haircut, he asked the barber why he didnt go to rtb, and the barber replied, "man i dont have the stamina for that shit" lol).. it was pretty reminiscent of my last rtb experience.. but here they were more prepared. mini-golf kart type ambulances would deplete through the crowd to carry the fainters away. i feared becoming one of them. i was dizzy and kept blacking in and out, but alex held me up because wu-tang can't be missed. odb's son is as crazy as odb.. he wore a beater the same way as his daddy and his braids just so.. method man acted as a leader to make sure only who was rapping was at the front of the stage while everyone else fed energy until their turn. what was up with boy jones not finishing shimmy ya though?! saddened me. weed smoke was all you could see both on stage and off.. and a dude behind me was smoking the rankiest cigars which did not contribute to me holding my composure.
shout out to scarborough for literally half carrying me to the bathroom and for feeding me. i felt like a fucking zombie, but i would not miss snoop for the life of me. i'd have to say his performance was the most organized. he had a mascot dog on stage rocking a crips bandana, and a picnic table set up. so many of his buddies were at this table, drinking 40's like they were in snoops backyard. snoop was wearing a onsie jumpsuit that was bandana material? hahaha only you snoop. taking a look at the big screen showed his mic said, "snoop dogg". when you have that kinda money, must be nice. he had video snippets, similar to what he had in the up in smoke tour, which were hilarious! dr dre made an appearance to say "waddup rock the bells", and pharrell as well. lady of rage (who i mistook for da brat at first, whoops), warren g, kurupt, rbx, and daz dillinger all made it on stage with snoop and each one was amazing. by far an amazing performance from snoop, that chilled as mother fucker.. at one point someone asked snoop if he could buy a 40 for $20 (they had snoops picture on them) and snoop responded with "sell you a 40?! you're tryna get me a lawsuit right now!" and had the crowd dying of laughter.. but what was even funnier was that snoop did give it to him and said "i'ma take the $20 though, shit, gotta put my kids through school".. AND HE ACTUALLY KEPT THE $20 hahahahahha.
black moon, krs-one, jedi mind tricks were also great. krs dissed hot 97, which was hilarious. but of course, the preacher that he is, couldn't refrain from telling us "THIS IS EDUCATION RIGHT NOW! you're learning.. about REAL HIP HOP".. one too many times.. but hearing him shout out "WHOOP WHOOP DATS DA SOUND OF DA POLICE!!" had me jumping with joy.
upon leaving the show, the entire island was covered with cups and beer cans. you could not step without stepping on garbage.. imagine thousands of people trying to catch a ferry at 1 in the morning. it was redic. literally every time we would get to a ferry, we would be told "this ferry's full, walk to the next port". a bunch of zombies trying to get home is what it felt like. i was dead. one guy next to me, after about twenty minutes of walking shouted "seriously. what is this right now. we are cows. this is a cow's life. we are cows".. and i could not stop laughing.. a guy next to lex was complaining drastically "WHY ARE WE NOT SPEED WALKING!? LETS GO PEOPLE!" when this big boss looking dude who we thought would fuck him up, said calmly, "you know on black friday, that wal-mart greeter got trampled to death son. that'd be a fucked up way to die. that's why we're moving like this, boy. relax. we'll get there". we did. after about 45 minutes of walking, we approached a port that took us (after about four ferrys being full *DRAG!). guess where it was?! right by the entrance. yes ladies and germs, we walked the entire island in a circle. my cardio for the week. no one on the ferry was standing. everyone was beat dead tired, and was either laying down or sitting.. but sitting on a ferry after a ridiculous hip hop show with manhattans skyline as your view, was completely blissful.. and the entire ferry let out a loud five minute applause as soon as the boat started moving.
so even with a few slight minor problems like passing out and mic feedback; rock the bells is officially my life. i will love it til the death of me. greatest. concert. ever. 10/10.