Despite their roughly javelin-like construction, joints, blunts, spliffs, and other various forms of rolled “drugs” — as Action Bronson prefers to refer to them, simply “drugs” — do not actually fly particularly well. On their way to the stage, some turn end over end, others pinwheel drunkenly, and a precious few actually roughly mimic the parabolic arc of a spear. Bronson does not smoke these items on stage so much as anoint them; he lights the ends — either of his own accord or by the hand of some lucky audience member — issues a few opaque clouds, then passes them out to the audience, newly blessed, which proceeds to smoke them with impunity so that the duration of his show has the sickly sweet smell of an art school student’s parka.

When last I saw Action Bronson, one could smell his weed butter-laced blunts before they could see him, and he was riding high off of the critically acclaimed Blue Chips, his Party Supplies collaboration adored as much for its raw nakedness — the sound of a Mac’s volume being turned up in the operatic “Hookers at the Point”; the forever abridged, forever perfect “Dreamer,” whose beat cuts out after only 50 seconds, leaving its last lines, “smidgen of its own ink,” floating perfectly in space — as for its precision delivery of rococo bars.

Which, in the end, is really the essence of Action Bronson, more so than the food references, more so than the lushly detailed lyricism; those are but the mere products of what drives him, namely, the combination of laser scalpel precision and the ability to use that skill in (at least seemingly) fluid situations. He is an ad-hoc surgeon.

“Pouches of Tuna” is a prime example. On Blue Chips, Bronson chops short his opening bar, stating his disapproval, before going back in again. When performed at Reggie’s, he breaks off the bars, as he does on record, but this time to light a joint (which he did in that previously mentioned Chicago show above, albeit to light a blunt). The point is, he is flexible enough to nip a song in the bud and leave it on the record — and if it were merely a piece of acting, something scripted, then it was a masterful piece of acting, and this entire review takes a hit — but precise enough to replicate that seemingly organic feature in multiple shows.

“Pouches of Tuna,” aside from being my thesis statement, also highlights what is so special about seeing Bronson live. The song’s delicate strings and decadent content is tailor-made for his live show, which consists of Bronson, a hot mic, and his beats. Rapping sans backing tracks allows gossamer cuts like “Pouches” to excel live, while also proving Bronson’s formidable abilities, further highlighted by his penchant for a cappella verses.

Cuts from the Alchemist-produced Rare Chandeliers and Blue Chips comprised the majority of the set, from opener “Steve Wynn,” to parting shot “The Symbol.” Standouts are difficult to isolate, as Bronson has a tendency to tear into one rap song after another — that is another Bronsonism, that all of his pieces are specifically referred to as “rap songs” — and all are treated with the same straight ahead, neck-in-the-guillotine approach highlighted above; what changes most is the crowd’s response, which ebbs and flows depending predominantly on the depth of their knowledge of his canon, with the deeper cuts becoming nod-alongs and the more popular pieces whipping the audience into hand waving, lyric mirroring acolytes.

No song inspired such a passionate response as “Bird on a Wire.” The track was an outlier, of sorts, when it first made the rounds, with Bronson’s delivery turning viscous over Harry Fraud’s mellifluous, smoky production; the slightly screwed flow would end up reappearing on other tracks, but “Bird” went a long way in proving Bronson’s versatility. The piece materialized in the Reggie’s gloam, all slow burn and thoracic cavity-heaving bass, and Bronson proceeded to ooze his lines before rapping Riff Raff’s verse, arms tucked in tight to his chest, eyes closed, and voice pitched up a half octave, to raucous approval.

Bronson is of the Rick Ross school of stage control, which is to say that, with minimal movement — one would be hard pressed to call anything he does “dancing” — he still manages to draw all eyes to him with ease. Whereas Ross accomplishes the feat through sheer size, bombast, and brilliant jewelry that still appears quite magnificent, I can tell you from experience, when worn in the outfield and seen from the third base line in an abandoned Atlantic City baseball stadium, Bronson, while too utilizing the size, relies on the power of nuance, found both in his flows, which are being reproduced for you solely from his own mouth, and in the various little expressions and motions he makes, including pinched, squished-eye smiles and billowing smoke exhalations, all of which he can perform from within a writing circle of audience members.

Tethered to his mic, Bronson did not get the chance to wade into the crowd and perform at Reggies’, which is not to say that he failed to connect. Aside from the gifting of precious drugs, the light bombardment it provoked in return, and the getting said drugs lit, Bronson bantered, including offering a brief Q&A, managing to roughly replicate the intimate feel that marks his performances despite not being able to intermingle with the crowd.

That intimacy is, in the end, what makes Action Bronson the best rapper alive to see live, a hyperbolic title I feel completely comfortable bestowing upon him having both seen him on multiple occasions and numerous peers of his in the flesh. Precision is best appreciated when one can watch the scalpel being manipulated in real time, and there is no better place to understand Action Bronson than in the surgical gallery.

—

B. David Zarley is a freelance writer based in Chicago. You can find him on Twitter @BDavidZarley.