‘End of the weak’ is a weekly open mic night at a small, low down venue called Pyramid in Manhattan’s East Village. This event has been going on every Sunday for more than a year.
And every now and then they put on a MC Challenge.

The place slowly packed in until a crowd of about a 100 underground heads filled the rather small venue. Spotted a lot of MC’s in the like C Rayz Walz, PackFM, AceLover, probably most of the cats there were rappers… The night started off with a preliminary round for all MC’s in the house, who got the chance to fill in an open spot in the challenge. About 10 MC’s stepped up and ripped the mic for about 30 seconds. The crowd decided on Mad Vex who then joined the already selected line up of; Pumpkin Head, Jin, Stretch, Substantial and Skandal, who had to compete in the 5 disciplines: ’60 sec. writtens’, ‘freestyles-out-the-bag’, ‘beat juggling’, ‘acapella’ and 4-bars-cipher-session’.

The show was hosted by the 3 regular hosts/MC’s: Big Zoo, Vice Verses and Prolific Wone, who spend the time in between acts rhyming, either off the top or E O Dub anthems.

First off, the 6 MC’s was very versatile, each of them with their own style and strength, but I might as well admit that I was feeling this Asian kid, Jin, the most. He was able to rock the most on point freestyle punchlines I’ve ever heard. He was also the one who impressed me the most in the first round of written raps, dropping punchline after punchline.
Next up the MC’s had about a minute to rhyme about 5 items they pulled out of a bag, which they all did pretty well. But once again Jin stole the show with lines like: “ask your girl, my dick is hard as a brick”, pulling out a brick.

Pumpkin Head seems mostly to be there to promote his new album (he kinda looked like a cross between our own Preacherman and Grand Pupa, w. braids). Skandal was kinda like the white, aggressive type of rapper (and I wasn’t really feeling him). Substantial ripped it steadily (representing E-Famm and the Plague), but didn’t stand too much out. Mad Vex was more of a conscious cat, who managed to pack a little knowledge into his freestyles, even this round of out-the-bag-freestyles, with a steady and powerful delivery.

In the beat juggling round the MC’s had to rhyme while the DJ (Scram Jones) changed the beat and adapt their flow to the rhythm. And this tall Somali looking rapper, Strecth, definitely took this round, he was fucking around and battling the DJ and came out on top!

Substantial set off the acapella round with no mic, had the crowd all quiet. PH came off pretty well too. They all did, actually, but as I said they were all very different.
The last round had a competitor rhyming in a cipher with 2 of the hosts going 4 bars each, about 3 rounds. Which they all did well too but Jin ripped it with lines like “Those BNDP t-shirts is really fly/ I’ll take one, even though I’m just a little guy” pointing on Big Zoo’s BDNP t-shirt [Big Niggas Don’t Play].

[Winner of the night would enter the EOW champion hall of fame, enter the yearly Challenge of the Champions, get a showcase at SoB’s, a $100 AND a EOW t-shirt!]

After these lyrical exercises a few underground acts took to the stage (Headnodders, 3rd Eye something, High Society) before the winners was annouced:
3rd: Pumpkin Head, 2nd: Jin, 1st: Stretch.

Photos by Johan Spanner
see more picture in large format her: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 & 7.

visit: www.endoftheweak.com
or see more pics click here

End Of the Weak MC Challenge at Pyramid, East Village, New York – November 4, 2001
performance:	Steady MCs, good hosts and good rules made a nice evening.	the OnPoint factor: E O dub was mad nice!
entertaintment value:	plenty of styles and dope punchlines.
venue:	nothing special, underground steez.
atmosphere:	it was all good regular NY underground crowd, and nice hosts.
street cred.:	nuff real MCs in the house to fuck up all fake studio thugs.	set af: Bo Pee

sådan læser du karaktergivning: 7 x = On Point! 3 x = Nice Shot

6 x = Almost Bulls Eye 2 x = Target Practice

5 x = Heavy Hitter 1 x = Not Even Close

4 x = Hit Potential 1 x = Greatest Miss

Skrevet af Bo Pee 04.11.2001 arkiveret under LiveSpot |