SAN FRANCISCO — “This is a very nice club here in San Francisco — and we’re going to burn this motherf— to the ground.”
That was Killer Mike’s way of saying hello as the clock struck midnight at Run the Jewels' show at Mezzanine in San Francisco, where hip-hop’s self-proclaimed “top tag team of two summers” justified taking the stage to Queen’s “We Are the Champions.”
In over a year, Run the Jewels went from nonexistence to supernova, becoming one of hip-hop’s biggest rising stars. Their meteoric rise feels well-deserved, with Atlanta’s Killer Mike and Brooklyn’s El-P activating their Wonder Twin powers to rise to heights neither achieved on his own as both approach 40 years old.
That knowledge gives their shows a celebratory vibe, two MCs who know what it’s like to grind in the game and not have a legion of fans holding the group's signature gun-and-fist hand gesture to the sky as it did Saturday morning. After the crowd chanted the group’s name in the middle of the show, El-P gave effusive thanks, a man who knows what a rich find he’s struck with Run the Jewels.
The celebratory vibe also comes from riding two of the best hip-hop albums of the past two years, both given away for free via the Internet. The records range in lyrical content from personal to exuberant, from dead serious to comedy. The crowd met them at every emotional turn, dancing and rapping along, some even knowing every word of the three-weeks-old Run the Jewels 2.
Although Killer Mike’s voice was raspy from a barnstorming touring schedule that made this the duo’s ninth gig in the past 10 days, El-P picked up the slack, finishing Mike’s bars for him in a few instances. That magnified the pair’s electrifying chemistry, present both in their material as well as their banter between songs.
Mike’s banter included praising San Francisco for letting its freak flag fly and joking about going with his wife to a nearby adult video store after the gig.
The 75-minute set covered material from both of the group’s albums as well as a take on “Tougher Colder Killer” from El-P’s 2012 solo effort, Cancer 4 Cure. Despot, a Queens-born MC who opened the show along with Manhattan’s Ratking, returned to the stage to lay down his verse on the track.
Despot received the warmer reception of the two openers. The crowd embraced him with such warmth that the artist, who's been working on his debut album since before Facebook was invented, seemed surprised.
“You guys know the words to the songs. You’ve been to a Despot rap show before. Do y’all have jobs?” he joked.
The show marked speedy returns to the Bay for both Run the Jewels and Ratking. RTJ played August’s Outside Lands Music Festival while Ratking performed less than a month ago at the Treasure Island Music Festival.
Setlist
01. Run the Jewels
02. Oh My Darling Don’t Cry
03. Blockbuster Night Pt. 1
04. Close Your Eyes (And Count to F—)
05. All Due Respect
06. Banana Clipper
07. 36” Chain
08. DDFH
09. Sea Legs
10. Pew Pew Pew
11. Tougher Colder Killer (with Despot)
12. Lie, Cheat, Steal
13. Early
14. Love Again (Akinyele Back)
15. Get It
16. A Christmas F—ing Miracle
Encore
17. Angel Duster