“A child of Palestinian immigrants to see that we could make something like this possible… thank y’all. This is really beautiful,” founder and resident DJ of Hardly, WASEEL, tells the packed crowd down Bay St. He then proceeds to drive the crowd back into dance by introducing the next song, “Imma take y’all back to my roots one time, come on let’s go!” Like the previous 3 hours of cha cha slides, grinds, and two-steps; the crowd continues to happily sweat through the Labor Day weekend.
Hardly Home and Play Hard’s Block Party brought the joyful body heat to the Labor Day weekend, and celebrated a year of parties with their biggest one yet. Diverse foods from wings to breakfast plates were sold at the event, and inside the venue was filled with brand installations from grillz to airbrushing. The Home Grown team was able to participate in Southeast L.A. clothing brand Menace’s airbrush installation.
On our arrival an hour from start time, the block was already at 50% capacity. At my surprise, the event is slated to last until midnight. The first performance we saw was with TDE’s Ray Vaughn performing a short set around 5pm, followed by Niyahbadass djing beginning the crowd build up and party foundation.
P-Lo brought the Bay Area energy and performed a 4-song set dedicated to everyone who came to dance with their best friend with the crowd chanting “Go P-Lo, go P-Lo, go!”. In between flipping burgers for “Breakfast for Dinner” at the vendors booth, Chuck Inglish stepped on stage and had the crowd doing the slide in the dead center of the crowd.
Buddy began celebrating his birthday on stage with collaborator and friend Huey Briss, backed by DJ Faucet. The crowd knew the same L.A. as they sang back “Trouble On Central”. A DJ set by Kazadi helped transition the crowd to 4Batz’s performance, and reminded me just how much of Nicki’s “Moment 4 Life” I know.
The Texas R&B singer 4Batz, stepped on stage with a black Nike sweatsuit and brought heartbreak melodies to the night. A set with a much slower tempo compared to the rest of the night. Lastly, the performer headliner was Compton’s versatile rapper Westside Boogie. The crowd sings back to Boogie “Silent Ride” as he swings left to right on the Sunday stage.
The last DJ set we were able to see was Kal Banx, with a packed stage. Kal brought out special guest, Smino to perform the song he produced, “No L’s”.
From 3pm until 12pm, the crowd danced, and accumulated the body heat that might have started the L.A. heatwave this first week of September.