I don't normally listen to hip-hop, but for the sake of musical diversity, I covered K'Naan and Shad at Forwell Hall on September 5.

The show was free and it was all ages, to bad neither of these factors could bring in a decent crowd to watch the amazing showing both of these artists put on. Doors opened at 9p.m. but I rolled in around 10:30 in time to watch Shad kick-out some crazy beats with his band, including solo's from both the bass player and DJ.

Shad finished up around 11:00 which gave me plenty of time to watch the drunken spectacle around me, and that's just what it was by that time. Most of the crowd began to get pretty antsy around this time and began to filter out.

By the time K'Naan hit the stage it was midnight and the crowd was mostly drunk, which was unfortunate because the Somalia-born artist has a strong politically driven message about peace and also the hardships of his people. The last song I saw performed was entitled “What's Hardcore,” which talked about the lives of the Somolian people with lyrics, such as “You can't go two blocks without a roadblock.”

K'Naan put on a great show and had a strong message but it was all wasted on poor turn out and a mostly intoxicated crowd. But for anyone who is actually interested in checking out K'Naan, his website is www.thedustyfoot.com.

In the future I hope all Fanshawe students could try to be a little more supportive of their school and the artists who come out.