Wu-Tang Clan Bring Da Ruckus to Austin on Father’s Day

Wu-Tang Forever: The Final Chamber Tour celebrates the legendary rap group’s endurance in music, hip hop, and pop culture at large. Texans from all over arrived in their yellow and black shirts and shoes, ready to party with one of the most influential groups in hop hop for what could be the last time.

And who better to join Wu-Tang Clan in honoring their legacy than supporting act and NYC/ATL-based superduo Run The Jewels?

Run The Jewels

“[Austin] is one of our favorite f***ing places in the world to perform… to be here with [Wu-Tang Clan] is incredible,” said rapper and producer El-P. The duo’s stage presence and subtle choreography, along with their intricate rap flows and lyrics, excited the audience during their brief but energetic 38-minute set.

“This is our new song, they’re playing it in spas and saunas…” said El-P playfully before launching into their hit song and penultimate set closer, “Close Your Eyes (And Count to F**k). “It’s kind of a meditative thing.” 

Murmurs and chants from the audience suggested that they wanted more Run The Jewels – many agreed that they thought they’d at least get a 50-minute set. 

But that just means that when Wu-Tang Clan took the stage at 9:15 p.m., the fans were warm and ready to go.

Wu-Tang Clan

Opening with “Bring Da Ruckus”, the show was spaced into 4 acts, or sets of songs. The end of each act was marked by the showcasing of upcoming movie and game trailers from prominent Wu-Tang members. 

Featured were 3 video trailers: Action film One Spoon of Chocolate, written, produced, and directed by RZA; co-op RPG video game Rise of the Deceiver from Ghostface Killah; and an upcoming documentary called The Purple Tape Files, focused on now-Dallas-native Raekwon’s highly influential 1995 album Only Built 4 Cuban Linx…

Wu-Tang grooved onstage complete with a full band. Soulful powerhouse singer Blue Raspberry even did a live rendition of Gladys Knight & the Pips’ “The Way We Were”, sampled in Wu-Tang’s “Can It Be All So Simple.”

The group performed Wu-Tang hits throughout the first and fourth acts, and individual members’ songs throughout the middle of the 1-hour and 45-minute set. Crowd favorites like “Wu-Tang Clan Ain’t Nuthing ta F’ Wit”, “C.R.E.A.M.”, and an Ol’ Dirty Bastard song, “Shimmy Shimmy Ya”, featuring the late rapper’s son Young Dirty Bastard, brought the audience to a roar.

“Ball your fist up and get out all that negative energy… pump your motherfucking fist like this!” shouted RZA toward the end of their set.

RZA also spoke a little bit about the current political climate – “A lot of people wanna regulate women and not guns…” – before closing the show with their song “Triumph”.

Many audience members left the show with plenty of yellow merch in hand, drained but ecstatic.

“We were in the front row! My parents listened to Wu-Tang, and that’s how I got into them. The visuals and the music were spectacular. It was a fun night,” said Jade Adams, 32, of Austin, TX.

One concertgoer even drove up from San Antonio to catch the show. 

“It was incredible!” says Lucio Aguilar, 27, of south San Antonio. “There’s always a great energy from the crowd every show I’ve seen here in Austin, and you can tell that fueled the Wu-Tang clan tonight. It was a blazing send-off to 30+ awesome years.”