Michael "5000" Watts Birthday Celebration & Swishahouse Reunion House of Blues June 9th, 2011
The premise was simple: bring together every Swishahouse artist, past to present, for a reunion concert, invite 2,000 of your closest friends, and profit.
Simple? Sure. Easy? Not quite. But if anyone in Houston can rally the troops to pull off this kind of momentous event, it would be the Northside rap label's founder and cornerstone, Mr. Michael "5000" Watts.
Walking into the venue just before 10 p.m., Aftermath was pleasantly surprised to see that the room was already almost to capacity. A trifecta of turntables was setup onstage, and DJ T-Gray, Watts, and DJ Mankind shook the crowd as MC Kane worked his magic.
The night shifted into gear when Treal Lee, Mr. Hit Dat Hoe himself, D-Town Boogie'd all over the stage. There was no hating on Dallas this night, as the crowd cheered Lee's enthusiasm just as much as every Jason Terry basket shown on the projector screens on each side of the stage. Lee shut it down in his own zone with the hit "Throwed Off."
Lil Keke hit the stage hard and ran through his classics such as "Still Pimpin Pens" and "Southside." Although hailing from the South, he signed with Swishahouse in 2005.
Watts then asked the crowd "Where my Latinos at?" and dropped the SPM classic "Merry-Go-Round." Lil Young, the first Mexican-American artist signed to Swishahouse, took the stage in a fresh white and black suit and shiny Stacy Adams. The Latino parade continued with the inclusion of Lucky Luciano and surprise guest Chingo Bling.
The R&B girl group Sophia Fresh then treated Watts to a soulful a cappella rendition of "Happy Birthday." It was a beautiful gesture that had Watts smiling ear to ear.
The ladies were treated to the sounds of Surreal, the only female on the Swishahouse roster. She performed her song "I Know' featuring DJ Chose, who put his uptempo bounce style into the mix. R&B singer Dallas Blocker gave the ladies even more reason to scream with "Rock Ya Body."
