Juvenile gets UNCP students crunk

By Nicole Lord
Entertainment Editor

When rap artist Juvenile walked through the double doors into the gym Sept. 24, the UNCP crowd was fanatical.

Photo by Scott Ammons Juvenile gets the crowd riled up during his performance on Sept. 24 in the gym.

Throughout the show "We love you Juve" could be heard from all parts of the gym.

"The hospitality here is beautiful," he said.

Juvenile performed many of his songs, old and new, but the crowd favorites were "Back That Thang Up" and "Slow Motion."

Student Danielle Elmore was lucky enough to catch a towel thrown into the audience that Juvenile had been wiping his face with.

"I'm going to split it" with friends, said Elmore about her plans for the towel.

Freshman Alex Lord, who earlier in the month took the talent show audience by surprise, opened for Juvenile. Lord performed a hip-hop dance routine to R&B star Usher's "Caught Up." Lord was just as popular with the concert crowd as he was with the talent show crowd.

The second opening act was a group called Show Me the Money Entertainment, or SME. The group was the third place winners of the talent show. The group performed three original rap and R&B pieces, accompanied by female vocals.

Between acts, Juvenile talked backstage individually with several UNCP students.

Photo by Scott Ammons A member of Juvenile’s band poses with DJ K-Mak from the Foxy 99 radio station.

Juvenile, a New Orleans native has been raising money for Katrina victims, or what he calls his family.

"I consider the whole New Orleans my family," Juvenile said, "Basically everything that I do now is for that reason."

The rap star has been on his "H3 Rejuvenation tour" with other artists, and a few NBA players.

"We take all the funds that we made on this tour and do whatever we can to help," said Juvenile.

The rapper is even working on a new album, due out Dec. 4 entitled "Reality Check."

"It's really more focused to the Katrina thing," he said.

Juvenile is raising money because he says he doesn't feel like adequate help was given to the hurricane victims.

"I saw the reaction towards the tsunami and I feel like they didn't react the same way towards us," said Juvenile.

Photo by Scott Ammons Band members relax before performance.

On a similar topic, rapper Kayne West recently made a controversial comment about President Bush. Juvenile said about Bush, "I don't necessarily think he doesn't like black people, he's just not for the minority." "If you don't have it, then you won't have it," he said.

Other albums, not related to the hurricane but from Juvenile's groups are scheduled to be released this winter.

Partners in Crime, one of the groups, has an album due out in January titled "Club Bangers" and D Boys, another group is releasing "Get Money" in February.

MCs for the night, Jesse Dobbin III, and Erin Berry, public relations for the SGA, helped to hype the crowd.

"Ya'll should be jumping up and down, doing something," said Berry.

DJ K-Mak from the Foxy 99 radio station was also an MC for the concert, introducing Juvenile and company to the UNCP crowd.