LL Cool J with Queens Borough President Donovan Richards at the 2023 Rock the Bells Festival.
Photo courtesy of the Queens Borough President’s Office
The 2023 Rock the Bells Festival took on a special meaning as it celebrated 50 years of hip-hop with a star-studded line-up at Forest Hills Stadium on Aug. 5.
Thousands attended the sold-out music festival as hip-hop royalty such as Methodman & Redman, Queen Latifah, MC Lyte, Salt-N-Pepa, Run DMC, Ludacris and LL Cool — among other starts — took the stage and performed their hit songs, proving once again why hip-hop has prevailed for 50 years.
It was the second year the hip-hop music festival took place on LL Cool J’s “home turf.” The Queens native founded Rock The Bells in 2018 as “the preeminent voice for classic and timeless Hip-Hop,” honoring the genre’s culture and core elements.
Many in the crowd felt nostalgic listening to yams from their favorite artists as they took a trip down memory lane.
Concertgoer Tara described the festival’s line-up as the “anatomy of black excellence” and looked forward to seeing Queen Latifah and MC Lyte.
“I’m originally from Brooklyn. But I live in East Brunswick now,” Tara said. “[Hip-hop] reminds me of growing up in Brooklyn, East Flatbush.”
Musician Mic El said Hip-Hop was his “era” and the music he grew up on.
“This is everything to me,” El said. “This is what gave me a voice and being able to reach out to people. Being here, it just touches my heart in a different way that we can have an event of this nature and music of this genre that lasts this long, and it’s just gone worldwide. It’s beautiful.”
Rapper Buckshot told QNS that the 50th anniversary of hip-hop was the “birth of the rebirth” and said the genre was going to outlast anything.
“We saw [hip-hop] born 50 years ago, and now we see the birth of an anniversary, which means that there’s a next one coming after this. So this will be 100 years. Hip-hop is…
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