Kate Tempest at 7th St Entry, Minneapolis (13 June 2015)

Tour Dates

We may know the odd song by the likes of The Streets, Dizzee Rascal, or Lady Sovereign, but nothing seems to have stuck, as rap and hip-hop seem to be a genuine American musical art form, even more so than jazz or country and western.

Even spoken word seems to be regulated to the likes of the beat poets, the wanna-be MCs, and those so angry to right society’s wrongs.  All of that may change with the emergence of UK playwright, novelist, poet, and now recording artist, Kate Tempest who brought all those talents to an often incendiary 70 min. performance at the 7^th Street Entry.

Kate Tempest then took stage in support of her Mercury Music Prize-nominated Everybody Down (on Big Dada Records), excited and knowing full well where she was – “The home of Prince! The home of Rhymesayers! The home of Purple Rain! The home of you!”, …and then proceeded to apologize.

“I want to say hello to you before we start, because when we start, I’m just gonna be doing my thing, so if I don’t talk to you, it’s not because I don’t love you” and with that, dove headlong into her flow, promising “I’ll see you on the other side”.

Flanked by a percussionist, keyboardist, and background singer, Tempest stalked about the stage, the 29 yr old recalling an urgency unlike vintage wordsmith Patti Smith, if Patti was born a quarter century later in working-class Southeast London.

Beats were somewhat primitive and a hybrid of dancehall, grime, dub, and electro, but served only as the place-setting to Tempest’s machine gun narrative lyrics of truth-telling, anti-consumerism and conformity, desperate street people, and good intentions gone bad.

‘Marshall Law’ spins a seedy tale about innocent Becky meeting a dubious video director, while the biting lyrics of ‘The Truth’ force you to face the life you were pretending to live – “it’s true if you believe it, the world is the world, but it’s all how you see it”.

Tempest looks like she could be Ed Sheeran’s sister… who should be so lucky, as Sheeran’s verses can’t hold a candle to Tempest’s Gatling gun delivery of verbal percussion.  ‘The Heist’ plays like it could be the soundtrack of a manic Guy Ritchie film, while ‘Circles’ is perhaps her most melodic song, yet still requires your full attention.

‘Happy End’ really wasn’t, as reoccurring protagonist Becky still finds herself in a very Thelma and Louise predicament while her a Capella ‘Poem’ plead with everyone to “hold your own”, in even the most dire of circumstances.

The chill ‘Hot Night Cold Spaceship’ ended the main set, its lyrics asking more questions than it answered and an encore reprise of ‘The Truth’ reminded everyone still mesmerized, that it’s all about perception- “One man’s flash of lightning ripping through the air, is another’s passing glare-  it’s hardly there.”  Truth.