What was that heat wave that passed through South St in Philadelphia last Thursday?…Oh, that was only the Heineken Red Star Access concert series at the TLA with Wale as the headlining act. With lines in front of the theatre all night, there was a buzz about the surprise concert that was only announced a few days before the show. Tickets were distributed for FREE on a very limited basis with local streetwear boutique UBIQ co-sponsoring the event with Heineken and giving tickets away through Twitter and Facebook. (Make sure to follow them.) Heineken has been providing free concerts all summer all over the country with the hottest names in hip-hop, rap, and R& B.
Upon entering, they had the Heineken "green" carpet for those wanting to get their paparazzi on, along with everything else in that familiar color. The green continued as the sponsor provided free Heineken's all night long. Doors opened at 9 pm and DJ Nice provided a great set of old school jams with current hits for a couple hours as the crowd anxiously waited for Wale to hit the stage. Eventually, he erupted on the stage a little after 11 and the party then officially started. Click below for more.
With a catalog of mixtape classics, a major album solo release and now with his recent Self Made group album as part of MMG, Wale has plenty of material to give to his loyal fan base. Wale has definitely crafted his own lane of intellectual, metaphorical, lyric filled hip hop that has the ladies love him as much as the hardcore hip hop heads. He's become one of my favorites as his music definitely makes you think and process the message. He delivered this through renditions of 90210, Diary, Pretty Girls, 600 Benz and That Way. Many were anticipating a guest appearance with fellow MMG teammate Meek Mills, but he was in NYC. That didn't stop Wale and the crowd in a full throat rendition of Meeks' I'm A Boss in tribute of Philly's hottest rapper. (Meek and Wale took fans to the movies in Philly the next day). He did bring two guests out, one being his protege Black Cobain and the other being Philly's own Young Chris to the delight of the crowd.
Wale kept the energy high all night with the crowd giving the energy right back in the small theatre. He dove into the crowd a couple of times and had to take off the Tony Gwynn 1997 Mitchell & Ness throwback to cool off. He's also known as a major sneaker head as he matched the jersey with Lebron VII Low "Christ the King" editions.
Overall, it was really a fantastic event with UBIQ and Heineken really doing a professional job in giving fans a great experience to remember. It's what we've come to expect from both as previous events have been just as good and I look forward to more in the future, along with looking forward to Wale's next mixtape ElevenonEleven and his next major release, Ambition, in the fall. Sneaker News has great pics of the event at this link.
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