With a powerful roster that included Lil Wayne, Rick Ross, and Chris Brown, hip-hop reigned supreme at ‘Summer Jam 2011’ last night, June 5. Before the main event, Big K.R.I.T., Big Sean, Pusha T and Ace Hood hit the stage to warm up the crowd.
Hot 97’s annual event had hits and a few misses this year, from Brown’s flawless choreography and wooing – a hit – to Waka Flocka Flame forgetting a few bars from his club hits – a miss. Check out the highlights, hits and misses of the night.
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HITS
MISSES
Waka Flocka Flame
Over the past year Waka Flocka has been inescapable with back-to-back club anthems that include “Hard in Da Paint”and “Grove St. Party.” But unfortunately, after last night’s peformance, it makes us wonder if those songs should stay in the club and off the stage. Waka stumbled around the stage aimlessly, forgot a few lyrics, and was outshined by Wale when he hopped on stage for “No Hands.” Waka’s smartest move of the night may have been excusing himself from Diddy and Rick Ross’ performance to “O Let’s Do It.”
A slew of surprise guests – Lloyd, Jeremih, Juelz Santana, Fabolous, Ryan Leslie, and Swizz Beatz – was overkill for Banks set. Fans stayed planted through Banks performance of “Fire” and “Warrior,” then bombrushed the stage when he brought out Prodigy. Unfortunately, Banks got lost in the shuffle of his all-star set.
Dipset, Dipset, Dipset! Olivia, Maino, Waka Flocka, Travis Porter, and an entourage of unknowns swallowed the stage when joining Dipset for their set. Since the mob – which appeared to be comprised of at least 50 people – was puzzling and distracting it was difficult to enjoy Cam’ron and Vado‘s performance of “Hey Muma” or Jim Jones‘ “We Fly High.”
The biggest hit of the night was the representation of NYC by Fabolous, Dipset and Lloyd Banks, as opposed to last year’s Southern takeover. The biggest miss of the night was the lack of female stage presence. The female emcee who currently holds a strong voice in the game, Nicki Minaj, was presenting at the 2011 MTV Movie Awards.