On entrance to the indigO2 on Monday night (April 23), the stage was already graced by Birmingham’s very own rising star Lady Leshurr. Although the room hadn’t even filled to half capacity yet, Leshurr worked the stage as if it was a sold out, ram packed concert hall. Her energy and fast pace rapping set the tone for the night, her bouncing energy more than enough to engage the onlooking crowd that began to gather.
The second and final support act for the evening was Benny Banks, joined by Joe Black, and seemingly disappointed at the lack of crowd interaction, the lads still brought the heat with freestyles over Drake’s ‘The Motto’ and Tyga’s ‘Rack City.’
The room started to fill in anticipation of Atlanta rap star Young Jeezy’s presence. Anticipation soon turned to desperation as the soundtrack of the wait was strangely Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy album on shuffle. Disheartened that there was no warm up DJ to maintain the crowd’s momentum, fans jeered and sighed majority of the way through.
Then finally, show time. Jeezy energetically sprung onto the stage to the sounds of Akon-assisted “Soul Survivor” sporting a simple black t-shirt, and jeans, teamed with a heavy looking gold coin medallion chain, fur hooded jacket, matching brown fitted cap and backpack along with a pair of sunglasses, instantly welcoming roars of excitement.
For the next hour and a half, ‘The Snowman’ delivered hit after hit spanning his four album career – offering tracks from Let’s Get It Thug Motivation 101, The Inspiration, The Recession and most recent LP, 2011’s Thug Motivation, Hustlers Ambition 103. His seductively raspy undertone belted out a set list that had the crowd in awe, interacting to the fullest, rapping, jumping and dancing.
Whilst gritty street tracks like ‘Get Your Mind Right, ‘Ballin’, ‘Nothin’ and ‘OJ’ had the guys feeling like pimps and bosses, Jeezy didn’t neglect his female attendees with charming hits such as ‘I Love It’, ‘Leave You Alone’ [which features Ne-Yo] and the commercially welcomed ‘I Do’ [which features Drake and heavy weight Jay Z].
Throughout the show Jeezy was his own backing vocalist, hype man, and dancer, accompanied only by his DJ whom remained in his booth, pitching in with the occasional adlib. Nothing else was needed as time seemed to fly by; everyone was in the same element. Crafting a touching and reflective moment, in closing Jeezy gave a motivational speech; the crowd filled with wisdom as he declared that nobody should give up on dreams as they are to be lived as destined.
After saluting the crowd and running off after taking a bow, the crowd were prompted by the DJ to chant for one more song, and so it was done. As expected, Jeezy bounced back out onto the stage one last time to perform a few more album cuts and send the night on its way with the super sexy ‘Super Freak’, which usually features 2 Chainz. Leaving the stage on a high, Jeezy thanked everyone who came out to join him and give their time and energy to listen to what he had to say, such a gentleman.
As well as the great deliverance of his life stories, Jeezy managed to engage with seemingly all of those who were in attendance, from all areas and walks of life. This is not an easy challenge, so props where they are due; truly inspirational.