DJ Premier and Pete Rock at Cervantes' Masterpiece Ballroom, 9/22/12

Antonio Valenzuela

Pete Rock and DJ Premier last night at Cervantes' Masterpiece Ballroom.

At the end of their set last night at Cervantes', DJ Premier's Houston Astro's hat was dripping with sweat, while Pete Rock appeared to have barely broken one. Over the course of their set, though, the two matched wits furiously playing through the genres before going into their signature songs and reminiscing over past artists and even breaking out some TV jingles. But their exchange had less of a battle feel and felt more like a big house party.

See also: DJ Premier on having a humble respect for the game and going back to using the old slang

Antonio Valenzuela

The legendary DJs started off with some familiar classic rock songs like "The Wall" and "Cold as Ice," basically warming up the crowd and going back and forth with each other, Premier playing "I Wanna Rock" and Pete Rock matching with "Start Me Up." Pete Rock seemed to grab the crowd throughout the night more than Premier, who went through his whole catalogue of Gang Starr songs, as well as songs he's produced like, "Nas is Like," and "Ain't None of Yall Better."

Antonio Valenzuela

The highlight of the evening came when the DJs gave a nod to famous sampled hip-hop songs by playing the original instead. Premier started with Leon Haywood's, "I Wanna Do Something Freaky to You," most famously interpolated on Dr. Dre's, "Ain't Nothing But a G Thang." Pete Rock countered with Monk Higgin's, "Little Green Apples," sending the crowd into a frenzy, it being one of Gang Starr's classics, "Code of the Streets."

Antonio Valenzuela

The duo later went into a set of songs that paid tribute to fallen rappers, starting with Biggie, going through Big L, and stopping the music to remember Heavy D, before playing a Premier-produced track with the rapper, "Yes Ya'll." Pete Rock's best moment was when he had the whole crowd singing the trumpet lead on he and CL Smooth's cut, "They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y.)"

Antonio Valenzuela

The show ended with Premier and Pete Rock going back and forth with a TV show theme song collage of sorts -- comprising tunes from shows like The Adam's Family, Different Strokes, The Twilight Zone, Night Court, and, of course, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air -- which was interesting for the first couple songs but ended up losing the crowd after a while.

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Cervantes' Masterpiece Ballroom

2637 Welton St., Denver, CO

Category: Music

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