Hip-hop stars at home inrap roles

Spencer Patterson

Monday, July 25, 2005 | 8:26 a.m.

Between sets at Sunday night's "Anger Management 3" tour stop at the Thomas & Mack Center, advertisements for a new video game were shown on video screens throughout the arena.

The trailer featured rapper 50 Cent -- one of the night's three featured acts -- shooting machine guns and fighting hand-to-hand until he'd killed or maimed a roomful of enemies.

Cartoonish as it might have been, the footage actually revealed a lot about the state of mainstream hip-hop today.

Rappers need to deliver radio-friendly hits, sure. But equally as important to each their success, it seems, are the characters they play.

Each star on Sunday's bill clearly recognized that long ago. Opener Lil' Jon is a crunk-loving clown, smiling often to show off his gold teeth and shouting "Whaaat?" and "Yeeaaah!" at every possible opportunity.

As the video game preview suggested, 50 Cent is a real-life gangster, a former drug dealer who once endured a nine-gunshot attack and lived to rap about it.

And headliner Eminem? As the crowd of about 7,900 was reminded in a short film during his set, the 32-year-old hip-hop mogul plays the role of the silly suicidalist, seesawing between deadly seriousness and mocking buffoonery with the strangest of ease.

The show, which lasted 4 1/2 hours, kicked off with a high-energy set by Lil' Jon & The East Side Boyz, though less than half the audience was in place to hear it.

Security outside the venue was surprisingly lax -- metal-detecting wands weren't even employed -- but entry lines were long and slow-moving, causing a group of Lil' Jon fans near one entrance to gripe loudly about the music they were missing.

In reality, they weren't missing much. The Atlanta crew's "Dirty South" tunes mostly blended together, save for a long remixed version of "Get Low" and a crowd-pleasing rendition of No. 1 hit "Lovers and Friends."

At least Lil' Jon finished what he started. The same couldn't be said for 50 Cent, who repeatedly cut his best-known songs short after just one verse and one chorus, if not sooner.

He did it to "In Da Club." And to "Wanksta." And to "21 Questions." And on and on and on.

On each occasion, 50 worked his fans into a tizzy, only to let them down a minute or so later. Maybe someone should teach the man how to construct a medley if he's going to insist on truncating his hits every night.

Joining 50 Cent at points during his set were other members of the G-Unit Records stable, including Lloyd Banks, Young Buck, Tony Yayo, Olivia and recent signees Mobb Deep.

None made a marked impact, nor did Steve-O of MTV's "Jackass," who opted against performing one of his famous extreme stunts in favor of standing around onstage and puffing on a joint.

Much of the crowd joined Steve-O in that activity, which might explain why they ate up 50 Cent's bass-heavy mix and the rather simplistic backbeats that accompanied his rhymes.

Eminem had no such problems, relying on lush -- sometimes even orchestral -- support music for most of his entertaining 90-minute set.

Still, his performance was not without issues. Eminem's trademark forceful lyrical delivery was lacking all night, as his collaborators -- and at times, what sounded distinctly like a backing vocal track -- overpowered his own voice.

Also disturbing was Eminem's heavy-handed film, which depicted the rapper (and father of a young daughter) handling a pistol and prescription drugs in preparation for a suicide attempt.

That somber imagery stood in sharp contrast to foolish skits mocking Mariah Carey and Michael Jackson, and Eminem's full-on mooning of the crowd as a response to recent published reports he is planning to retire at year's end.

Still, there's no denying the power and intensity of Eminem's best material, from the politically charged "Mosh" to the tale of obsessed fan "Stan" to his own saga of perseverance "Lose Yourself."

Loyal Eminem supporters throughout the arena spat out lyric after lyric to those songs and others, undeterred even when side group D12 joined the headliner for a few numbers.

The only truly forgettable moments of the final set came when Obie Trice and Stat Quo, two of Eminem's Shady Records mates, performed together while the show's star took a breather.

Neither their voices, nor their songs, left much of a lasting impression. Or maybe it was just that they haven't fully developed marketable characters so early in their careers.