The Beats Rhymes & Rice Tour kicked off last night in style! Thank you UCF, we had a blast.

Yeah, there were some wrinkles here and there, but overall, I think we gave them a pretty bomb set. We held stage for about an hour and 15 minutes – a little longer than we had planned – but everyone was having a good time, and for real, I think the raw raw rawness of our first EVAR Beats Rhymes & Rice show was a very special feeling.

Also something that was unique to the first show was having Diasporatic on the turns. For those who are scratching their goatees, he was the cat who produced some of the illest beats you’ve heard Kiwi spit on over the past few, including “Drowning” off the Native Guns Barrel Men CD. Dude is a native Floridian, so he and his boy Gerard swung through and it was dope to have additional support for the show. In fact, the first Kiwi track I ever heard was Imagine, which was also produced by Diasporatic, and hearing that song spurred me to contact Kiwi just to introduce myself. So the fact that Beats Rhymes & Rice is even going down is partially due to D. (By the way, if you haven’t heard that song, head over to Kiwi’s myspace to peep it.)

I get the feeling that every show is gonna be different, because that spontaneity was energizing, and if we get over-rehearsed, we’ll start just going through the motions and not giving our best effort on the mic. So if you happen to be in the same town as the BRR tour more than once, just know that you won’t be seeing the same show twice. Well…parts of it will be the same…but you know, not all of it.

We also had a very minor confrontation with a white dude on some ignorant comment he made when we went to eat dinner. Bao – who is very articulate – did most of the talking for the group, which was fun. The guy turned very swiftly from obnoxious drunk to apologetic drunk. By a strange stroke of luck, he was actually staying at the same hotel we were, and when he saw me in the hallway, he apologized again profusely, said what he did was “fucked up,” and I just had to laugh, because he was probably thinking, “Shit! These dudes followed me to my hotel! Asians do not play!”

As is their custom, UCF folks showed us a good time last night, even though they’re in the middle of exams right now. That is love; we mad appreciated how welcoming everyone was. Also true to form, the show started half an hour late because Asian people can’t show up on time for a damn thing. Folks were apologetic, but that’s how every Asian event is everywhere. It would probably feel weird to start at the stated starting time. Keep it real yo.

All in all, I don’t think our first EVAR Beats Rhymes and Rice show could have gone any better.

Photo courtesy of Bao Damn Phi of some Florida folks - Nayo, Cuong, and Sachi.

BTW – I noticed Angry Asian Man shouted us out! We didn’t even ask him to either. We’re happy that folks think that news of Beats Rhymes and Rice is worth passing on.