Ice Cube coasts on nostalgia at Eagles
With the revolutionary N.W.A. and as a solo artist, Ice Cube changed hip-hop forever. He turned his success into a major movie career, with lead roles in the “Barbershop” and “Friday” franchises, among other films. Those two worlds collided in 2015’s “Straight Outta Compton,” the critically acclaimed blockbuster N.W.A. biopic Ice Cube produced, with his son portraying him in the film. And in 2016, N.W.A. was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. So what else is there left for Ice Cube to prove? Based on his show at the Rave’s Eagles Ballroom Saturday, absolutely nothing. It’s been reported that Ice Cube’s first album in eight years will come out this year, but he didn’t do any new tunes at his 70-minute Milwaukee concert, saying there was too much history to unpack. Instead, accompanied by rapper WC, an off-stage DJ and old video clips, Ice Cube coasted on nostalgia, his set coming across like a checklist in pursuit of a check. About three decades and a world apart from his N.W.A. days, Ice Cube performed pieces of hits such as “Straight Outta Compton” and “(Expletive) Tha Police” with actorly command but short of the explosiveness and urgency that made those songs so striking in their time, and still relevant in today’s sociopolitical climate. His animated, audience-baiting efforts often lacked authenticity, frequently structured around lyrics set to appear in a subsequent song. Ahead of “Check Yo Self,” for instance, Ice Cube made a reference to not eating dinner with the president, which didn’t make much sense as out-of-the-blue, between song banter. During the song itself, a montage of absurd clips from Ice Cube action movies (complete with slowmo shootouts, car chases and Ice Cube using a taser on a man’s crotch) was more interesting than anything he was doing on stage. Most of his songs were accompanied by music videos, which offered suitable, uninspired visuals. In the case of “Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It,” though, the video was painfully dated, with visual references to Warren Jeffs, Michael Richards’ racist standup set outburst and Michael Vick’s dogfighting scandal going back to the mid-2000s. And Ice Cube and WC ticked off some minutes with that tired hip-hop show cliché in which they split up the crowd into sections for some call and response. It was especially annoying at this concert — because they did it on two separate occasions. Nevertheless, the fans at the packed, 3,500-person-capacity venue clearly were content to hear these old songs at a rare Ice Cube concert, and Ice Cube clearly loved that they loved him. In one of the night’s few seemingly spontaneous moments, during Westside Connection’s “Gangsta Nation,” Ice Cube seemed to startle WC when he tossed his mic at him to do a little strut across the stage. At this point, you could argue that Ice Cube has earned himself a victory lap. But it was still disheartening seeing a legend of his stature set such a low bar.