Manfiesto 11 Festival

This year’s Manifesto11 Festival took place at the RBC Echo Beach on an extremely hot Saturday afternoon, but that didn’t stop people from standing in sand and watching their favourite hip hop and r&b artists.

With a big lineup with artists like Tika, Isaiah Rashad, Sean Leon, Jidenna, The Internet, Majid Jordan and more, it’s no wonder why so many people couldn’t miss out on this show – because it was real good.

I managed to catch all of the acts, but the ones that stood out most to me were

Sean Leon’s performance had people dancing and letting loose that early in the day. Although his set was one of the shortest ones of the festival, Leon managed to get a bigger crowd to watch him. Leon took the opportunity to play some of his new music – which hasn’t even been released, and people were loving it. Although Leon was jumping, yelling and getting the crowd pumped up, he graciously took out the time to thank his band, his crew and his fans. I thought that was really cool on his part. In my opinion, Leon by far had one of the most energetic crowds of the festival.

Isaiah Rashad also gathered a big audience that sang every single song word for word. A crowd of teenagers and adults gathered to watch Rashad perform his simple set. The audience didn’t care about the weather or the crowd they were in. That didn’t stop them from shouting the words back and jumping in the hot summer sun. Rashad’s set was later on in the afternoon, which gave him and his DJ a great chance to pump up the crowd for the final two performances of the festival, The Internet and Majid Jordan.

Catching the Internet’s set was a big deal to many people, considering the fact that they haven’t been in Toronto for a while and the band is originally from Los Angeles, California. The crowd got a taste of the live performances from some of solo albums from the band members. This performance didn’t focus much on the bands original music, but more of what they all individually had to offer. The crowd came in bunches to sing and dance to every single word. It felt like you can hear the instruments more than Syd’s voice, but when you got to hear it, she sounded incredible. The stand out moment for me in this performance was when they performed ‘Girl’, which happens to be one of my favourite songs by them. Everyone was just bopping their heads and singing it out loud.

Last but not least, Toronto’s own, Majid Jordan took the stage and the crowd was bigger than ever. This duo had everyone watching and listening to them. From the fog, the screen, the lights and Majid’s beautiful voice, this was the performance to watch. If you were going to watch anyone, it would hands down be Majid Jordan’s. The duo were so humble and appreciative of the people that stayed back to watch them. Majid and Jordan had surprises up their sleeves with guest appearances by Roy Woods and Dvsn. Both artist had the chance to perform 2-3 songs individually and showcase their musical abilities. The crowd loved every second of it and so did I.

In conclusion, this year’s Manifesto11 Festival was great and it had it’s great moments and performances. Everyone did such a good job in the timeframe that they had. I very much enjoyed this show and would definitely recommend it to others for next year.

[Photo and review by Aluen Navarro Fenoy @aluennavarro]