Brian Slattery Photo
Indie hip hop artist Sammus had a cannon for an arm. Earlier in her set, she’d mentioned that she realized she was dressed like video game character Firepower Mario. But the real firepower came from her words, her mind, from the minute she took the stage at Cafe Nine on Saturday night. In the wake of a divisive presidential campaign that created a divisive president-elect, she was the headliner of a night that brought people together.
The evening began with a surprise appearance by Mooncha, who leapt on and off the stage microphone in hand, delivering laughs and contemplation in equal measure. She ended her short, explosive set by inviting fellow MC Chef the Chef onstage for a rowdy rendition of their song “Sorry,” which had the audience singing along to the chorus by the end.
After Mooncha came Qusharia Perry, who, alone with an acoustic guitar, performed a set of intimate originals with a disarming emotional directness that came through in both the singing and the playing. The people talking in the rear third of the bar might have missed it, but everyone from the stage to several feet back was quiet for her, and cheered at the end of every song. “You got it girl!” someone yelled from the crowd as she introduced her final song, “Lynette,” about her mother, who had died last year.
“Qusharia, y’all,” said Hartford-based hip hop artist Joey Batts, who served as host for the evening, at the end of Perry’s set. The audience broke into robust applause. “Keep it going,” Batts said. The crowd did.
New Haven stalwarts Laundry Day filled the place with their particular brand of rock ‘n’ roll, somehow laid-back and strutting at the same time, their casual motions on stage belying the energy they were throwing off.
Then Sammus hooked the entire place from her first song. Self described — with a healthy dose of humor — Ph.D student by day and rap superhero by night, the Ithaca, N.Y.-based artist made New Haven a stop on a short tour that included Providence, Brooklyn, and points west of Ithaca in upstate New York. She found New Haven’s audience not only highly receptive, but familiar already with her records, including her latest, Pieces in Space.
“Oh my God, I can’t believe you know my songs,” she said after the crowd cheered right from the opening.
“Run for president!” someone shouted.
“Not of this country,” she said, to laughs.
Sammus takes her name from a long-running armored, helmeted videogame character who, famously, reveals herself to he a woman at the end of her first adventure. Much of the producer and MC’s material likewise dealt with the difficulties of having to keep some aspects of her identity hidden as she navigated academia and society at large.
But she didn’t have to hide anything at Cafe Nine. As she looked out over the crowd with obvious appreciation, the crowd showed it right back.
“This is salvation,” she said. “This is how we grow.”
She ended her set by abandoning microphone and stage to head out into the middle of the floor, among the people who’d come to see her, shouting out bars at the top of her lungs while the audience clapped along.
Ceschi and Anonymous, Inc. closed out the night with the kind of blistering set that keeps Ceschi on the road as a touring musician for the better part of the year, and that keeps his local fans coming out again and again to see him and Anonymous Inc. perform. Just before jumping into a raw version of “This Won’t Last Forever,” he talked about the recent election.
“Now is the time for us to build our community stronger than ever,” he said. If the vibe from the crowd all night at Cafe Nine was any indication, New Haven is already off to a good start.