Shad tilts the Mod Club

After a short visit to the CASBY awards at the Kool Haus, it was generally agreed that going to the Mod Club to see Shad would be much more exciting than watching Edge 102.1 DJ's humiliate their physically-challenged interns. So we ditched the low-brow scene for intelligent rap and brilliant live performances by MC Shad and his band.
The Mod Club was packed when we arrived. We were just slightly too late to see Grand Analog's set, which is unfortunate because I was looking forward to hearing live versions of their upbeat flowing melodies from their album, Calligraffiti. But the crowd was buzzing with energy when Shad took the stage in a signature Burger King crown. Known for his insightful and humerous freestyles, Shad took no time at all getting his audience's hands up and bodies rocking out to funky drum beats, slippery bass lines and unbelievable trumpet solos. Have you ever heard a trumpet channelled through a wawa pedal? It's like Tom Morello meets Dizzy Gillespie; vibrant, sporatic and powerful. With a DJ on the one's and two's and some freestyle beatboxing, the sound was full but not overpowering or dominated by a single voice.
Taking it down in tempo near the end of the set, Shad plucked an acoustic and poetically navigated his way through a track for his family, who have recently returned to Ethiopia. Although initially a solo performance, violins, trumpet and bass slowly crept in and carried the melody to higher grounds of excitement. Following this, Shad dropped a freestyle accompanied by beatboxing and let his band carry the sound before making his exedous from the stage.
A great show by a great MC. Shad has the potential to take Canadian hip hop in new directions and last nights performace was just one showcase of that.