“They’re a festival band”, a friend said. “That’s so true, they know exactly how to get a crowd going in less than a minute and keep ‘em going for nearly an hour; like one big party!” I said back. Though, what I really love about Run the Jewels is the ease with which one passes off the mic to the other. There’s no battle for who gets the spotlight more, they’re not worried about who is more of a frontman -- they’re having pure, unadulterated fun at every step. It’s infectious and the audience at the Capitol Hill Block Party on Friday night could feel it the moment the first lyric is dropped.
It doesn’t hurt that they’re just that good, but that’s not the only reason. At a talk sponsored by KEXP earlier this year at the Upstream Music Fest + Summit, I heard president Portia Sabin of record label Kill Rock Stars talk about the two men working on this project. “They didn’t charge fans to download either of the first two albums [or their third, but fans can purchase the albums if they feel compelled]. They are already successful in their individual careers, and this is a project they just really wanted to do. Profit wasn’t as important.” That says it all and I can’t wait to see them again.
Another year of Capitol Hill Block Party has arrived, bringing with it a sea of bro-tank tops, increased public intoxication, and a variety of local and national music acts. The music of Day 1 was quite good, with sets from Noname, Thundercat, and Katie Kate starting off the festival on an upbeat n…
Here's a piece of Capitol Hill Block Party trivia for you: Diplo is the only artist on the bill this weekend who has performed for 500,000 people at one time. At a free show in Havana, Cuba, in 2016, the first by an American artist since the US and Cuba re-established diplomatic relations in 2015, …
