Review: Krept and Konan receive a mixed reaction at the O2 Institute
- Critically acclaimed rap duo Krept and Konan tour in support of their debut album
- They failed to fully engage the crowd in places, highlighting their weaknesses and their strengths
The replica of a London Underground tube carriage is hurriedly assembled on stage as recent cuts from Drake’s If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late mixtape play over a sold out crowd filming Snapchats of themselves singing along. The South London duo Krept & Konan are taking their trademark take on their own experiences of London life to the rest of the UK on a headline tour.
2015 has been the year that Krept & Konan achieved that break-through success that so many home-grown grime artists strive to get a taste of here in the UK. The duo rose to prominence through a series of viral remixes of popular R’N’B chart hits and releases of their own mixtapes. Cut to 2015 and they are scooping up MOBO Awards for best hip-hop act and best album for their debut The Long Way Home.
Tonight’s crowd is most probably evenly split between attendees hoping to party along to break-through single ‘Freak Of The Week’ and those who want to emote to the rest of the more serious cuts of The Long Way Home. Despite Krept & Konan making a name for themselves with British humour and a knowledgable grasp of trends in R’N’B from the States; their debut album was an indulgence in self-congratulatory story-telling.
Krept & Konan know how to put on a good show. They keep the set up simple performing alongside a backing DJ and little else. The set is littered with surprise appearances from guest MCs, scantily-clad female dancers and live musicians who all enter the stage via the giant tube carriage. Despite the interesting visuals, the music fails to resonate. The success of their debut album surely would mean they play the whole darn thing but they still fall back on doing remixes of other people’s songs.
When cuts from the debut album do surface; the slower more contemplative numbers are met with people deciding to check their Whatsapp messages over watching the show. The more club-friendly tunes showcase what Krept & Konan do best; ‘Do It For The Gang’ marries tongue-in-cheek and rather suggestive lyricisms to a back beat that leans heavily on influences from modern American pop-rap.
They don’t particularly cast a very forward-thinking image for themselves through their music; the lyrical content is made of stereotypical references to the objectifying of women, the making of money and the escape from rough backgrounds. But no one here is standing their stroking their chins and pondering the lyrical content; they are too busying shouting the choruses back at the duo who play off each other perfectly on stage.
The bouncy ‘Freak Of The Week’ receives the best response tonight. Hopefully Krept & Konan will gauge the reactions of the crowd tonight and no doubt on the other dates of the tour and realise that people prefer them when they are playing dirty rather than when they revel in a self-obsessed world of their own. Having said that; the crowd are happy to revel in worlds of their own through their camera-phones so perhaps Krept & Konan are the perfect soundtrack.
