Schoolboy Q busted onstage with the gun-clapping “knock-knock” of “Gangsta,” the most sinister single from his major label debut. It’s only been 18 months since the L.A. rapper dropped Oxymoron, a compelling mix of soulful street narratives and heady weed anthems, but Q said he was ready to move on.
“This is my last show before I gear up for my second album, the last time I’m gonna perform these old-ass songs,” he promised Friday during his headlining set.
Q then rattled off a list of tracks he’s tired of, coincidentally all the hits his fans came to hear. Despite fighting off a cold and creative restlessness, the 29-year-old was fully engaged, flying high on “Collard Greens,” “Studio,” and “Hands on the Wheel.”
Sporting a colorful dashiki and felt hat, Schoolboy dressed true to the name of his Black Hippy brethren, a West Coast conglomerate of Q, Kendrick Lamar, Ab-Soul, and Jay Rock. He nodded to the crew’s megastar with a “m.A.A.d city” sing-along, another clue that Q’s more good kid, m.A.A.d city than To Pimp a Butterfly.
The crowd was relatively thin for the billing, but it was a progressive choice to close the night. FFF has rightly earned a reputation for nostalgia acts and reunions – Wu-Tang, De La Soul, Ice-T, Jurassic 5 – but old heads can only sustain a festival for so long. Schoolboy Q represents hip-hop’s here and now.
Schoolboy demonstrated supreme swagger on closer “Man of the Year” and gave his most compelling pitch on “Break the Bank.”
“I spit harder than concrete, surprised I got teeth.”
This article appears in November 6 • 2015.
