Blu & Exile and Blu

Blue & Exile have made quite a name for themselves, especially in the underground hip-hop scene but also in the wider world of hip-hop music with their songs appealing to people with a wide range of musical tastes! They are a duo made up of the rapper Blu and the hip-hop producer Exile and seeing them live combines the best qualities of the two – great rap vocals with a strong musical undercurrent and beat. Their London performance in 2012 was a great experience: walking in, the room was very smoky and the atmosphere buzzing as everyone got more and more excited to see the duo. Their performance of the song ‘No Greater Love’ was particularly memorable: such a laidback, cool song but the energy in the room was electric – everyone was cheering them on and singing along to the chorus and the hard-core fans were chiming in for the whole thing.
Luckily for fans, or budding fans, Blu & Exile have two albums out: ‘Below the Heavens’ was released in 2007 and ‘Give Me My Flowers While I Can Smell Them’ was released in 2012. Unfortunately, as of this moment there are no upcoming tour dates but there are plenty of songs available online and live gig recordings on youtube to tide you over. So get watching and preparing for the next time they are visiting your city!

Johnson Bares, aka. Blu is one of the most talented rappers I’ve seen perform live. Usually, there’s at least one of two small mistakes in the lyrics, or with the diction of the performer, but Blu was flawless, with perfect diction and not one mistake throughout the set. With six full length albums under his belt, I had no idea how he was going to select his set list, but of course I knew it would be amazing regardless. His DJ was also incredible, making sure that he followed Blu perfectly, and when he did section of improvisation he manipulated the sound track to make sure that he was in time.
He opened the show with his track The Clean Hand, which went down really well, and had everyone singing along from the start. He encouraged the audience to sing along with him, and he held out the microphone to the audience so that we could join in. It was a great environment, and knowing that the artist is concerned with whether the audience are having a good time is awesome.
He would stop half way through tracks to ask us ‘how you all doing’, to which we’d all reply with huge cheers. It was the most fun, and a real display of talent.