He’s Nuts!

The Block Party
DMX, 50 cent, Foxy Brown, Jaheim, Eve, Clipse
Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, New York
February 25, 2003


“What makes you think that I won’t run up on you with a 9?” 50 Cent leers at a sold-out crowd that’s chanting along to “Wanksta,” his breakout single of last summer.

With almost any other rapper, you could dismiss this as an empty threat. But coming from 50 Cent — a crack dealer–turned–rap megastar who’s taken more bullets than a tin can in Kid Rock’s backyard — you might think twice before waving it off. Behind him, 40-odd men swarm the stage, fists pumping, each with a bulletproof vest strapped to his chest. At the head of the mob, 50 makes the shape of a gun with his hand, while the Kevlar models mimic the sounds of gunshots: “Blo! Blo! Blo!”

The values cherished at tonight’s hip-hop gala — boasting an A-list of urban hitmakers and sponsored by New York radio station Hot 97 — are greed, decadence and, above all, bleak and bloody survivalism: It’s like a hip-hop version of Joe Millionaire. Murky morals pervade 50 Cent’s Get Rich or Die Tryin’, which filters Tupac Shakur’s fatalism through an irresistible, syrupy chuckle and blew away even his label’s expectations by selling more than 2.1 million copies in three weeks (the last rapper to post comparable sales was 50’s “favorite white boy” and label head, Eminem). In his first public performance since that stunning chart debut, the stone-faced MC from Queens, New York, born Curtis Jackson, proves that after a dormant stretch, gangsta rap is alive and packing.

At the start of his 40-minute set, a smaller group of men wait to escort 50 like Secret Service agents cocooning the president. He emerges wearing jeans and a white T-shirt that looks especially bulky, even for his bodybuilder’s frame. The crowd’s roar doubles as he strips off the shirt to reveal his signature fashion statement, a navy blue bulletproof vest. Soon the Kevlar is gone, too, and the only thing between 50 Cent and 17,000 fans is a jewel-riddled pendant the size of Rosie O’Donnell’s head.

He launches into “U Not Like Me,” a song about the shooting that sent him to the hospital in 2000, which scared Columbia Records execs into tearing up his first contract. Demonstrating his curious habit of flashing a cavalier grin in the face of the violently unfunny (in a recent MTV interview, he smiled faintly while mentioning the murder of his mother), 50 distills the moral of his story into a poppy, singsong hook: “If you get shot and run to the cops, you not like me.”

The audience sings along with him on the obscure mix-tape track “G-Unit Anthem” and the crossover hit “In da Club” alike — which is a tricky feat, because the atrocious sound mix buries 50’s hypnotic drawl and inspired one-liners in fuzzed-out mush. And that’s when he chooses to rap at all: It’s disappointing that the man Eminem recently heralded as “the illest motherfucker alive” sings along to a prerecorded vocal track and lets overloud hypemen do his job for bars on end.

With 50 Cent, though, rhyming skills are only a fraction of the package; his renown comes from his death-defying back story and unlikely charisma — the way he observes violence with the amused detachment of a Roman emperor watching lions tear apart some unlucky Christians. Tonight, the mere sight of him sends chants of “50-50-50!” through the arena — the mic, like the bulletproof vest, is merely an accessory.

Street-corner themes turn out to be the order of the evening. In an earlier set, Jaheim struggles through his sensitive-thug slow jams. On record, he sings in a velvety voice reminiscent of ’70s soul men, but here he stalks around like a zombie, letting loose painfully flat notes with particularly bland accompaniment from a wah-wah addicted soft-funk band.

Foxy Brown and Philly rapstress Eve fill their short sets with tomboy boasts and sex demands. Foxy spends her performance introducing us to the lower half of her ass; her tiny hot pants could pass for a Barbie doll’s belt.

Opening duo Clipse bring out their patron saint, producer Pharrell Williams of the Neptunes, and Dirty South mastermind Baby to assist with their bouncy, cocaine-laced narratives. Their version of the stomping hit “Grindin’ ” storms through the stadium like a breakbeat “We Will Rock You.”

Uniondale, New York, is a far cry from the South Bronx, but the audience does its best to make the Block Party live up to its name. At one point, Blender spots six blunts being rolled within a 10-foot radius, and fans clog the steps as though they’re apartment stoops.

Security is surprisingly laid-back, but the relaxed atmosphere claims a victim: The show runs hours off schedule and, according to a statement DMX issues the next day, the growling headliner is forbidden to play by promoters worried about incurring late fees. After 50 Cent, the lights switch on, and fans who paid upward of $90 for their seats are ushered out without explanation — making the concert organizers the coldest hustlers of the evening.