Rakim and CL Smooth Perform at Annual Peace Concert

By: Yves Erwin Salomon

Rakim, CL Smooth, Nice & Smooth and several local acts participated in the annual Peace Boston concert at the City Hall Plaza. The concert had additional significance this year as gun-related crimes have been on the rise in Boston this summer. Prior to the concert, Rakim told the Boston Globe, "It's we the people. Conscious people have to do something. I mean, we've got Bloods and Crips in New York! That's ridiculous, that's 1979. But you know where they get it from? They get it from television, and from rap records. It's a deep situation. It's going to take brothers like me... our generation, to start change. Because it's senseless. We have to show them the right way."

At the concert, several people echoed the rapper's sentiments. Tina Giaccarini of Roxbury, Boston told the Boston Herald, "There's shootings every night. It's nice to see the positive instead of the negative."

Lamary Taylor of Cambridge, Massachusetts, added, "I'm out here with my family watching these old-school rappers. I want my kids to experience the good music instead of that garbage rap that's out now."

The concert was just one of the events in the Peace Boston 2006 Hip Hop Showcase. The weeklong series, which was endorsed and put together by Boston's Mayor Thomas Menino, will also feature a Hip Hop Roundtable, an educational forum, and break dancing performances.