“Everybody needs to bring their A-game,” Dave, a.k.a Plug Two, a.k.a Trugoy the Dove from De La Soul, hollered into his microphone during the news conference Tuesday in Claremont for Rock the Bells.
He was referring to the all-star lineup, representing the so-called golden age of hip-hop that will anchor this year’s annual concert.

Fans of that era, (late ’80s to the early ’90s) will no doubt be reminded of yesteryear when the South L.A. quartet the Pharcyde takes the stage this summer, consisting of MCs Fat Lip, Slim Kid Tre, Bootie Brown and Imani. The group, which split in the mid-’90s, only released two albums that yielded a handful of classics, including “Drop” and “Passing Me By.”

“We’ve always been doing music [since the breakup], but to do it up here,” says Imani, raising his hands up in the air, “as the Pharcyde, we haven’t done it in a while.”

When asked about the convergence of young and old that will see relative newcomers such as Washington, D.C.’s Wale and New Orleans’ Jay Electronica (for whom Erykah Badu created a record label solely to release his upcoming album), A Tribe Called Quest DJ and producer Ali Shaheed Muhammad said: “Lyrically, they’re carrying the same flag we picked up … in bringing something that’s positive and uplifting. We all from the same root.”

– Camilo Smith

P.S. Also filling out the bill, which was rapped in a freestyle by MC Supernatural, are:
Co-host B-Real of Cypress Hill
Kid Sister
Flosstradamus
Amanda Blank
Kidz in the Hall
B.O.B
Santogold
Cool Kids
Dead Prez
Spank Rock
Immortal Technique
Ghostface Killah and Raekwon the Chef
Redman and Method Man
Rakim
Nas
Mos Def