Sweaty in Portland: The Leather Blvd Tour
On Aug. 15th, I saw Pink Siifu + Awhlee (who perform together as B. Cool-Aid) in Portland, Oregon... this is my story.
Interrupting a week-long trip to the West Coast (the big pit stops being LA for four days, and Tacoma, WA for two nights and two days) to see friends and family, I decided to swing by Portland, Oregon, for a B. Cool-Aid night show at the Doug Fir Lounge. Their latest album, Leather Blvd, was interesting to me; the first single, “Cnt Go Back,” unfortunately set my expectations higher than the album could deliver on—the LP is largely neo-soul revivalist fare, attempting to restore the feeling that Dilla, ?uestlove, and D’Angelo brought to the marketplace…and it’s worth noting here that neo-soul is itself an attempted revivalist movement, calling on the ghosts of Sly Stone, Parliament, Roberta Flack, and Donny Hathaway… so I guess this project could be considered neo-neo-soul? Or “classic” neo-soul—and I’m not sure how worthwhile such an endeavor into the past ultimately is. It’s sort of like songs that sample a song that samples a song; we’re beyond the point of retreading, and now entering deadbeat horse territory, or however that idiom goes. I did enjoy the album on some level and I wouldn’t say it’s bad (a 6.7-7.5/10 on the Fantano scale), so my intellectual and personal tastes maybe differ in this regard.
I had shit-all to do during the day besides wait at my nearby AirBnB, so an iced matcha latté and recently purchased paint markers kept me company as I passed the time trekking 100-degree wet-heat and illicitly making my name known in what I later learned was the white side of town; what a time to be alive. A Tesla commandeered by Ali the Somali brought me to the venue, which was cool—lounge-y in a sense, perhaps more enjoyable if I’d been there with company but my solo adventure was barely rewarding—and tickets were only $15. Two songs by D’Angelo (both on Voodoo: “The Root” and “Africa”), two songs by Slum Village (“Players” and “Go Ladies” from Fan-Tas-Tic Vol. 2), two songs by Knxwledge (one I couldn’t fully make out from the NxWorries album, and “So[rt]”, sampled for Kendrick Lamar’s “Momma”), plus one song from Dwele floated over the PA and filled the time after the opener exited stage-left. I’m not sure that this was ultimately a good move: these tracks definitely set the mood, but were also better than anything we’d hear in the following hour.
All the black people I’d been missing all day populated the downstairs bar and seating and about half of them were in interracial relationships, which, let he who is without sin cast the first stone and all that jazz, but that felt very Portland nevertheless. Pink Siifu, a rapper and punk-rocker with an underground-eclipsing seminal release in his last album (a veritable Gumbo, or maybe decoupage, of black music history), carried most of the vocal and physical performing with his Badu-inflected attitude and slim body-rocking—points go to him for committing to the bit in his donnage of a full leather outfit (vest, pants, and crocodile-patterned loafers). Awhlee’s main contribution to the show ended up being his laptop with the tracks pre-loaded on it (and he hid behind said laptop for much of the show—I only realized halfway through that he was actually also singing). The highlights: “Cnt Go Back” (of course), their humorous crowd banter between songs (memorable quotes: from the audience, “it’s like strip clubs for vegans out here”; from Siifu, “if you conceive a child tonight, let us know. I’m tryna get niggas right!”), and Awhlee closing the show with a sophomoric + endearing unreleased track dedicated to chasing ass. A few numbers did surprise me, sounding better live than recorded; Siifu’s croaky intonation on “Streets Got Pages” crackled the in-house PA system, while “Neems (Naima)” softly rocked us with Stevie Wonder-like harmonica lines.
“Cnt go back” live!!!
Awhlee’s ditty to bid us adieu
A down-to-earth young designer who ~curated~ B. Cool-Aid’s tour tees (whatever that means) politicked with me for a few minutes about “the hustle” towards the end of the show; smoking a square outside during the let-out, I overheard a middle-aged white woman from St. Louis make a pass at him and a new friend of his. So it goes.