Backstage view of T-Pain is doing his set.
Ms. Drama’s Summer Jam Experience
Summer Jam 2009 at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, highlighted some of the U.S. most notable hip-hop artists from this past year. In a nearly sold-out crowd, almost 50,000 concertgoers rocked out with the likes of Day 26, The Dream, Movado & Serani, Elephant Man, Mary J. Blidge, Young Jezzy, Jadakiss with D-Block, T- Pain and more. Hosted by Hot 97’s Angie Martinez and comedian/actor Tracey Morgan (30 Rock, SNL), the night was filled with laughter, surprises, unexpected cameos and a little drama.
As the opener, Day 26 sung to the ladies with the help of their fellow crooners, Pretty Rickey and Pleaser P. Not the anticipated favorites for the night, the show got off to a slow start for many, but was soon energized by the likes of Jamaican acts such as Serani, Movado and Elephant Man who amped the stadium up with their energy and theatrics. To keep the pace, The Dream came rocking the crowd with his certified hits and brought out surprise guest Fabolous. This helped to set the stage for the queen of R & B herself, Mary J. Blidge, to come up next and bring out hip-hop veterans Redman and Methodman to perform classic hits and songs off of their new album the Blackout 2.
Not to be outdone, Jadakiss came through with his set of surprises. Swiss Beats, Busta Rhymes, and Jeremiah all brought the crowd to their feet with their latest hits. While the crowd was still trying to digest what they had just witnessed from previous acts, Young Jezzy came out with the soon to be climax of that night. Starting off with his classics hits, Jezzy’s thrilled the crowd with the people’s favorite Drake, who sang his hit single, “Best I Ever Had”. Shortly after that, the crowd went into a complete standstill when Jay-Z touched the stage. Dressed in all black, Jay came out with the crowd’s approval and adoration offering his newly released single D.O.A. – Death of Auto-Tune. The 2-day old single that was released on Hot 97 and online was clearly seen and heard on the lips of the guests on stage and fans watching. With T-Pain by his side, sporting his “Big Ass Chain”, that single moment was definitely considered the crescendo of the night.
A hard act to follow for any artist, T-Pain finished the set off and brought out Lil Kim for their new single “Download”. Unfortunately for the fans that had been thrilled thus far, Summer Jam ended on a lackluster note. Harlem’s Dipset came out as the closing act minus Dipset founder Cam’ron Giles. Once the crowd got wind that it wasn’t going to be a Dipset reunion as promised, many left leaving the Dipset crooners onstage with their set of 50 plus people, looking very irrelevant, unimportant and silly.