Always the charmer, Action Bronson won over a capacity crowd at Scoot Inn hours before stepping on stage.
The gourmet chef-turned-rapper tapped his skill set to provide an endless supply of Texas-style brisket poutine for the blunted masses. The Queens-born, crimson-bearded, 300-pound Albanian rapper dished out a pantry-full of punchlines and delicious non sequiturs, salivating over “spicy coconut curry from the Thai spot” on “Terry.”
The culinary crowing continued on “Actin Crazy,” a single from his major label debut Mr. Wonderful, due next week: “All I do is eat oysters and speak six languages in three voices.” Breakup song “Baby Blue” crushed even though Chance the Rapper, who was headlining the Fader Fort a block away, didn’t pop over to dish out his guest verse.
Bronson rode his Harley into the sunset on closer “Easy Rider”: “We took acid for 10 days straight up in the mountains, started running with the stallions.” By the end of the night, 1,000 plates of gravy-laden poutine had been devoured. Thankfully Bronson was the only one to utter, “I feel so alive I think I shit myself.”
Before the main course, Def Jux prodigal sons Cannibal Ox sharpened Blade of the Ronin, the impossibly overdue follow-up to 2001 classic The Cold Vein. Doing little to promote new solo venture Eat Pray Thug, Heems of Das Racist was either doing an elaborate piece of performance art or was too fucked up to string together coherent thoughts. At one point, he just played Bell Biv DeVoe through his iPhone.
His only applause line: “This is my last song.”
“King Kong ain’t got shit on me,” Curren$y boasted as he floated onstage. With cell phones dotting the sky and every track a sing-along, the New Orleans cloud rapper carried as much cachet as Bronson.
“I’m independent, fuck your system, I get paid without it,” he spit on “Famous” before teaching how to “take 10 Gs and make 20 more Gs with that.” It was a lesson in music biz economics more relevant than anything you’ll hear at a panel.
Complete SXSW Music coverage at austinchronicle.com/sxsw/music
This article appears in March 13 • 2015.
