CityLife

De La Soul

HIP-hop hyperbole is full of colourful metaphors like the "cooking up of beats", but I've never seen it ACTUALLY done live on stage before.

De La Soul MC Posdnuos is wearing a full set of chef whites while he assists similarly attired sometime collaborator and special guest, Prince Paul, in an info-mercial styled food preparation demonstration.

They throw some beats into a bowl - the speakers come alive with thuds and claps.

It's followed by some fibre - the bass kicks in.

Some spices - the lip-smacking shake of percussion.

And finally - a GI Joe doll and a number 3.

Give it a stir and if you hadn't already guessed, it's The Magic Number... and another De La Soul classic gets underway.

Part of the Manchester International Festival, this riotous night is meant to be a celebration of 20 years of De La Soul making music together and the release of their seminal "Daisy Age" album, 3ft High And Rising.

Resonated

It's an album which resonated alongside the Madchester sound and it looks as though there are as many people here from "back in the day" as there are contemporary fans.

It's more than just a night about 3ft High And Rising - the chance to look back across 10 albums and celebrate a career which is still going strong.

But 3ft is still the star of the show, with all the favourites - Eye Know, Potholes In My Lawn, Buddy and Me, Myself And I - all woven around the rest of the night's proceedings.

It's raining outside The Ritz but warm Stateside sunshine flows from the stage as soon as Pos - AKA Plug 1 - arrives centre stage with the Apple Mac lap-top which these days take the place of a record box.

It's frenetic and fantastic fun from the moment we're implored to wave our "Threes" in the air - three fingers that is - and Plug 2 (Trugoy The Dove) and 3 P.A. (Pasemaster Mase) take up their positions.

Funkadelic

De La have famously sampled nearly all of their influences - everyone from Funkadelic to Frank Sinatra - but we're honoured tonight to have a 10-piece band playing alongside the MC's beats and scratches.

Pos - an overgrown jelly baby of a guy - is absolutely charming to watch, and there's clearly a great affinity between him and his De La soul-mates.

There are edgier moments from the album De La Soul is dead, but De La Soul generally get by without expletives and gangsta references

Their Gorrilaz collaboration, Feel Good Inc., the song which last earned them mass recognition - not to mention their ticket to MIF - shows how much they remain a vital force as they head into their forties.

It sums up the night too!

I've never had so much fun alongside live music and it really is refreshing to spend time with an act who, 20 years on from the debut, have clearly enjoyed it just as much as their audience.

De La Soul: 20 Years High and Rising is at The Ritz, Whitworth Street, Manchester, on Friday, July 17. 8pm Tickets: £35 (£15 concessions).

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