Bone Thugs N Harmony
November 20, 2015
Concrete Street Amphitheater- Corpus Christi, TX
The day began slow & sorrowful as I waited for the e-mail granting me credentials to cover this amazingly phenomenal show featuring some of the most influential minds from the hip-hop side of the music industry. These minds included Bone Thugs – n – Harmony, B-Real of Cypress Hill & Scarface – Brothermob… So as you can imagine when dinnertime rolled around and I hadn’t received my e-mail; I began to feel a little down. As I decided to stop playing Fallout 4 for the evening & cook dinner. My cellphone rings. I grab my phone checking the number, noticing the area code was from Los Angeles I got excited, but before answering Cell #1 the call ended and cell #2 began ringing with the same number…
This confirmed my suspicions as my composed e-mails contain all 3 of my phone numbers in the sign off. Without wasting time, I answered cell #2 & it was Bone Thugs – n – Harmony’s PR asking if I was still interested in covering the show. In shock this seasoned photojournalist answered like a “wet-behind-the-ears” newbie-greenhorn. “YES! I AM!” “Great” the PR answered politely & continued by telling me she will be adding us to the list. Checking the time, I agreed quickly & 
skipped out the door with my partner-in-crime to cover one of the biggest shows to hit Corpus Christi, Tx since Pitbull & Enrique Iglesias…
Entering Corpus Christi, Texas, Cell #1 rings again, it’s a different number but same Los Angeles area code… “Hello?” I said in my deep dark voice. Flesh – n – Bone replies from the other end “Jared? I just wanted to thank you for covering tonight’s event. I’d like for you to cover the whole set and maybe a couple photos after the show of me (Flesh) and the rest of the group after the set. We’ll have you a V.I.P. ticket at the will-call window & this should be just as good as “All Access” for you” … I replied: “Uh, yeah! thank you, Brother! Ummm, just to be clear here; “All Access” as in I’m shooting from the stage correct?” “Yes” Flesh answered. “Awesome“ I said as my voice cracked like a 15 old on his first date… Hanging up the phone I began screaming like a giddy little girl; in shock that Flesh just called & offered me “All Access” to cover tonight’s show. Looking to my other half “Holy Shit!” I exclaimed loud & brashly “I grew up to these guys!” She replied with utter excitement.
Pulling into the famous Concrete Street Amphitheater there were absolutely no places left to park for this sold out show… Except at the Brewster Street Icehouse, another familiarly famous venue just a mile down the road. Running to the venue as fast as my feet could carry me I began to feel the bass percussion reverberate in my ribcage the closer I got. With five blocks E.T.A & seeing the ass we were hauling with a bag full of gear to cover an extraordinarily outstanding event the venue’s Transit bus stops to pick us up making our jaunt a little less stressful & a lot easier with less distance to cover…
Arriving at the will-call window, my favorite ticket processing engineers greeted yours truly with beautiful smiles and V.I.P. pass. Left to my vices, the Marketing Manager of the Cities most amazing concert venue walks up and extends his hand for a friendly shake & led me backstage to set up my gear and take my place on stage to shoot the amazing performances as they came out…
Climbing up the backstage stairs, you heard the unmistakable piano sample from Roberta Flack and Danny Hathaway’s 1971 hit Be Real Black for Me looping as Scarface, was already deep into his hit My Block… My Block was released off the Def Jam (South) in 2002 as the lead single off Scarface’s 7th studio album The Fix. The Track reached #46 on Billboard’s Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs & garnering a remix featuring the Late, Great, Writer, Rapper, Actor Tupac Shakur the same year… Scarface continued this monumental night playing every top single he had in his repertoire including Smile, Mary Jane; Diary of a Madman; Fuck Faces; No Tears & ending his amazing set with a blast from-the-past and kicked it ol’ school with Mind Playin’ Tricks & Damn it Feels Good to be a Gangsta. 
Driving the crowd wild by leaving the fans screaming for more. Scarface left the stage to a Texas sized crowd of screaming heads & came back out on stage, walked to the front and gave a big thumb up to screaming, adoring fans, showing he appreciates the crowd’s appreciation. “WOW!” he said turning around to take a selfie with the crowd, finally walking off stage for one final time.
Sitting backstage listening to the amazing hype man do his job. He, the Corpus Christ fans & The Texas Takeover connected to Paris France briefly. To show fans from over the pond our condolences after the terrorist tragedy that struck the country just a couple days before. It wasn’t long til’ B-Real of Cypress Hill was lead out of the dressing room by his manager & entourage. Pausing briefly B-Real stood by stage left, texting on his phone with a large blunt in one hand while a member of his entourage recorded everything for B-Real TV.
B-Real & his people continued on to the back entrance of the stage while I made way up stage left, briefly bumping into Slipknot’s Sid Wilson. Sid taps my shoulder & asks politely to borrow a lighter. Reaching into my pocket (stoic but silently screaming) I handed it to him so that he may light up his monster size blunt that smelt as if God, Blessed it himself. Pretty soon B-Real passed by lighting his blunt making his way to the stage as the opening bagpipes looped the unmistakable note to I Wanna get High… I Wanna Get High was the first track off the 1993 chart topping album Black Sunday. Black Sunday debuted at #1 on Billboard’s Top 200 selling 261,000 copies in the first week & went Triple Platinum in the U.S. with 3.4 million units sold. B-Real continued his lyrical onslaught with a plethora of hits from the Cypress Hill Catalog. Including Insane in the Brain, I Aint Goin’ Out Like That; When The Shit Goes Down; How I Could Just Kill a Man; Dr. Greenthumb & I Love You Mary Jane… B-Real tore up the stage lyrically and intellectually every minute he spent on that hot & humid South Texas stage. No time passed at all between B-Real climbing off the stage & Bone Thugs – n – Harmony taking to the stage.
Bone Thugs – n – Harmony kicked off their set hard with Thuggish Ruggish Bone, the group’s debut single off their debut EP Creepin on ah Come Up. Thuggish Ruggish Bone, peaked at #2 on Billboard’s Hot Rap Songs in 1994 & went certified Platinum a year later on March 31st 1995. The multiplatinum selling group pushed through the night pumping magazine after magazine of hits into the Texas sized Corpus Christi crowd. All that could be seen was a sea of heads bobbing beneath waves of billowy smoke as the group performed their hits like Bud Smokers Only; Buddah Lovas; Mo Murda; Days of our Livez; If I could Teach the World; Tha Crossroads; 1st of the Month & Thug Luv off the Art of War WW III album and ending the evening with a 3 song encore that included their cover of Phil Collins Take Me Home & paying homage to the first artist to sign the multiplatinum group by covering Boys-n-the-Hood by the late, great, Easy-E & ending this phenomenally prodigious evening with Foe the Love of $ featuring Eazy-E; while Z-Ro & Slim Thug joined Bone Thugs -n- Harmony onstage to help knock the chart topping track outta the park…
Do not miss any of these iconic artists as they roll into your city & state in the near future. It is more than safe to say it will be the best time of your life & one of the best shows you will attend thus-far bar-none. True artists who don’t need Auto-tune nor studio engineering to fix their already well-trained voices. True artists who write their own lyrics and don’t need anyone to express how they feel. Real people with a lot of lyrically intellectual knowledge to drop on the masses, voices of a generation for over 20 years strong! This tour gets a 10/10!
Review by: Jared Wingate
B-Real
Bone Thugs-N-Harmony
Scarface
