Well that didn’t go according to plan at all unfortunately.

When word first started coming out that Ninjasonik was going to open for Drake at a free show at the seaport, I thought it was a joke. I heard it through one of their many twitter accounts and thought “OK, well this isn’t really happening, they’re just being funny.”

But it persisted in a way that viral news and real news happens. First one person, then exponentially more, so I told friends because the weird juxtaposition of the two acts was just too much.

“Somebody Gonna Get Pregnant” and “The Best I Ever Had?” Well, ok. Someone’s trying to make weird worlds collide, but fuck it, stranger things have happened, right?

Then the tweet came. Hanson. Ninjasonik, Drake and HANSON were all going to be at the seaport.

Yeah, right. Ninjasonik, please.

“Mmmmbop” Hanson? Saccharine Pop proto-Biebers? Those three hot girls (“oh god you mean those are guys?”) who were just not Rn’B enough to be a boy-band but way too young to be accepted with any sort of seriousness regardless of who helped produce their album are staging a comeback in NYC? This part is definitely a joke.

But then, it wasn’t. Paper magazine wrote about it, had a flyer made and started heavily promoting it. They were going to host a free Drake show the day his album came out in New York City. Regardless of all the venom spewed all over “Thank Me Later” by bearded rock bloggers, that’s a pretty big get.

I don’t hold much animosity against Drake or even Hanson (HANSON!) and I do love me some Ninjasonik and confused, bewildered audiences so I had to go. I had to see if this thing would happen and what it would look like when it went down.

I made it there around 5:45 and it was already packed. Way more packed than any show I’d seen there. Lots of young kids from all five boroughs. Girls looking to see Drake and boys looking to see girls. Families were out, and there were a handful of gawkers; tourists or people who didn’t have a clue. I think my favorite were the open top touring buses and amazed people taking photos of the crowds.

Getting near the stage would have been difficult, and I saw a lot of people with media badges just kind of milling around, like they weren’t even going to try.

A few fist fights broke out around me, people shoving trying to jockey for position, small gaps of visibility were being closed, I saw a few families decide that it wasn’t worth it, which was fine for the teens who packed in tighter.
There was music coming from the stage. Older anthems, crowd pleasers, songs featured in Wendy’s commercials, the occasional Doo Doo Beat track. When I could see the stage, I saw it wasn’t Teenwolf on the decks, but instead it was Roofeo, better known as a drummer for The Death Set.

Around 6:15 or so Jah Jah and Telli were on stage and and tried to start up the “Ninja fucking Sonik / we are sonic fucking ninjas” but instead of the crowd response you would get “We are Ninja Fucking Sonik” long pause. I couldn’t get close enough to the stage to hear if there was any response to the call response dynamic.

Telli said “In case you never seen us before, I talk a lot. It’s what I do” and then silence.

People had climbed onto the roofs of the kiosks on the waterfront to try and see. First a few and then more until there were about a dozen or so pulling people on.

At this point, there was a subtle change. The music had stopped, and someone got on stage calling for all available security to come to the front. It became its own chant, as people started shouting “we want Drake,” and the madness of crowds took over. “We can’t start the show until you get off the roof. We just want you to be safe!”

“Get off the roof, Get off the roof!”

More and more cops started to show up, ambulances and there wasn’t a tension, but more of a tangible impatience in the crowd. Drake hadn’t even shown up yet so there was no guarantee that this was going to even happen.

Edwina had shown up, and you just saw Fulton Street full of people making their way to the Seaport, and I knew this wasn’t going to happen. Too many people, too little security, this isn’t going to happen, so we left.

Later when we saw the YouTube footage of people going nuts and the TwitPics of crowds, you heard people were throwing glass bottles onto the crowd and you heard that police eventually were using mace to disperse crowds (probably not true).

So was it a good riot? Well it was the best I ever had.