On Friday, March 23rd, The Soul Rebels played their second show of a 3-night run to a sold-out crowd at New York’s Brooklyn Bowl. The band, comprised of two cornet players, one sax, two trombones, one sousaphone, one drummer and one percussionist, also brought along a pair of very special guests for the show: rappers Curren$y and Smoke DZA.
The show opened with a shout-out to the late Prodigy during a cover of Mobb Deep’s “Quiet Storm.” From there, they gave the Bowl more of their NOLA-style brass and funk, with several of the horn section members adding in vocals. It’s hard not to get down when a band has the sousaphone performing the typical job of a bass guitar. During the course of the night, the audience was treated to covers and teases, including Nas’ “If I Ruled The World,” Lauryn Hill’s “Doo Wop (That Thing),” A Tribe Called Quest’s “Can I Kick It?”, Chaka Khan’s “Ain’t Nobody,” Chance The Rapper’s “No Problem.”
Special guests Smoke DZA and Curren$y were called up onstage to rhyme over the funky brass background. The two rappers were onstage together for a couple of songs, delighting the hip-hop fans in the crowd. Unfortunately, Wu-Tang Clan’s GZA never made his scheduled appearance on Friday, but the enthusiastic crowd was still thrilled and dancing throughout the energetic performance as Curren$y and Smoke DZA held down the hip-hop vibes.
Below, you can see a gallery of photos from the second of three shows by The Soul Rebels at Brooklyn Bowl this weekend courtesy of photographer Andrew Blackstein.
For a full list of The Soul Rebels’ upcoming tour dates, you can head over to the band’s website.