The head to the Wu-Tang Clan's Voltron, the GZA, graced Oxford with his presence at the 02 for a sadly rather pedestrian run-through of some of his classic solo and group work. Any fans of real hip-hop will know how important a rapper GZA is and there's no doubt that his second album, 1995's Liquid Swords, is one of the strongest in the Wu-Tang discography and indeed in the entire genre. That being said the GZA is not the greatest showman – he prefers to let his words do all of the acrobatics and as such classics like “Liquid Swords”, “Duel of the Iron Mic”, “Living in the World Today” and “I Gotcha Back” are shining examples of GZA's verbal dexterity and technical precision. And to his credit, the GZA did complete run-throughs of various of his most well-known songs as well as a few verses from Wu-Tang classics including his solo Wu-Tang cut “Clan in da Front.” And indeed the biggest response of the night seemed to come from his recital of dearly departed cousin and fellow Wu-Tang founder Ol' Dirty Bastard's “Brooklyn Zoo”, a performance that had the entire crowd rapping along and filling in the GZA's blanks.
However the show was let down by GZA spending the majority of the time in the photo/press pit which meant that most of the crowd couldn't see him, leaving his DJ and a preposterous goon standing on stage doing very little to entertain us. On top of that, GZA's performance felt cynical and lackadaisical with the rapper often lagging behind the beat, making occasional mistakes and leaving the crowd to fill in the blanks on numerous tracks. Besides a few comments the man was also pretty quiet between tracks too making the whole performance feel rather like a pay-cheque.
It was great to see such a legend in such a relatively intimate setting but if you came for the music you'd have been better off staying in to listen to the albums in the comfort of your own home.
[Originally published in Oxford Music Scene magazine, issue 17]
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