Anytime you can see the likes of J-Bru, Quake Matthews, Hermit of da Woods, Three Sheet, Ambition and DJ IV next to up-and-coming talent like Psyc Tha Prince, Rellzinyagirl and City Natives you know you’re in for a treat.
But tonight wasn’t just anytime.
Not only did the kickoff for Hopscotch Celebration feature dozens of this city’s most talented MCs and DJs – it did so under the halcyon gaze of scaffolded graf artists as they brightened a group of small derelict buildings along the Dartmouth waterfront. A sea of iPhones captured the live art, rap and sporadic bouts of break dancing as bboys prepared to compete for a shot at $500.
Mixtape was there and managed to snap a few Instagram videos, reposted here for posterity.
A train breaks through during Kaleb Simmonds’s harmonized beatbox routine:
Hermit of da Woods during Cipher #3
Psyc tha Prince during Cipher #3
Quake Matthews during Cipher #3
Some beauty graf work
Bboys just warming up for the Bboy Cipher
Some sick beatboxing
(if anyone knows this guy’s name we’ll post that too):
More Cipher
And finally, Hermit of da Woods (aka Michael McGuire) stunned the crowd with a beautifully crafted, versed history of rap in Halifax:
Of note – Vanessa Furlong from Three Sheet busted out a pretty vicious set of verses during DJ IV’s set (the third of the night’s three rounds of ciphers). The reason it’s of note: she’s pretty pregnant right now and killed it harder than most of the guys.
We had a video of that, but Instagram decided to explode and we lost it. If anyone can point us to a short video of her performance, we’d love to post it. The organizers of Hopscotch will surely have one (they were collecting footage all night on much higher quality equipment than Instagram).
There’s a free show on the waterfront tomorrow featuring The Cool Kids, Kayo, Quake and more – did we mention it was free? Here’s the FB page.
The hashtag for the festival is #hopscotchhfx