In the summer of 1990 I was about to go into seventh grade and was still living on Guns N’ Roses, Poison, Def Leppard and Motley Crue because “grunge” was not a thing yet. Along comes this dude rapping over the bassline to a Queen song and I just could not help but to gravitate towards it and proceed to learn every word. Looking back on this time I cannot help but laugh which is exactly why I thought it would be funny to go to a “90’s” package concert dubbed Downtown Throwdown with Vanilla Ice headlining.

This event represented “music for the masses” more so than every other concert I ever go to but that brought more people than usual out on a Saturday to hang out and have a good time. After Ingrid and I had sushi and many rounds of sake and beer at the nearby Sushi Deli we moseyed on over to Petco Park to meet up with our friends Easton, Jules, Parker, Janelle, Sam, Pearl, Calvin and Jane at the now permanent stage built for “smaller” acts on the other side of centerfield.

After grabbing a few overpriced beers first up was Young MC. His allotted amount of time on stage was literally only 15 minutes, which in all fairness was plenty of time to “Bust A Move.” In all seriousness he was actually a very impressive rapper. I had also completely forgotten that Flea was the one who had put down the bassline in “Bust A Move” until someone brought it up.

I was familiar with Color Me Badd because of the songs “I Wanna Sex You Up,” “All 4 Love” and “I Adore Mi Amor” but I would not say I was a fan. You just simply could not grow up when I did and avoid them much like Taylor Swift in this day and age. Their 20-minute set was more than ample time for them.

Next up was All-4-One who I could also give zero fucks about but the crowd really seemed to enjoy their biggest hit “I Swear“ during their 20-minute set.

When I think of Coolio I think of the video to “Fantastic Voyage” where an endless amount of people come out of the trunk of an Impala and his reworking of Stevie Wonder’s “Pastime Paradise” into “Gangsta’s Paradise.” His 20-minute set was also ample time.

I remember looking at the set times for all these artists beforehand and realizing each of them was only given 20 minutes or less except Vanilla Ice who was given a full hour. At first I thought okay he’s the headliner but then I thought this whole crowd (myself included) probably only knew one of his songs. I know he went through a phase after he became a superstar where he started experimenting with heavy metal and other genres of music but I had never heard it and honestly never cared to. By the time he came out I was pretty sauced but remember that he was actually entertaining and performed with confidence. My favorite part was the fact that he brought out all manner of character on the stage with him including all the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Transformers to dance around in the background while he performed. It’s not every day you get to see someone who had some sort of impact on your life almost 30 years later but today was that day.