Last Thursday, in honor of Black History Month, Carnegie Mellon Action Plan (CMAP) turned CMU's subculture haven, the Underground, into a venue of verbal expulsion. Organized by CMAP staff member Demetreus Darden, the spoken word/slam event invited slam artists to share their innermost thoughts in both tongue-twisting tirades and mellow, melodic prose.

Hosted by Hutch, the emcee for the Friday open mic set at Pittsburgh's Shadow Lounge, the evening got off on a comical good foot when Hutch had the audience participate in a call-and-response manner to welcome each slam artist to the stage.

Hutch would call out, “I gotta light skinned friend,” and the audience would respond, “Look like Michael Jackson.” Hutch would continue, “Gotta dark skinned friend,” and the audience would respond with, “Look like Michael Jackson,” a portion of Kanye West’s rap solo in Twista’s “Slow Jamz.”

Sound problems prevented the show from starting on time, most of the problems having to do with getting the mic to work properly for saxophonist/flautist Tim Clark of The Rain.

“Your mic is too loud already,” Hutch jokingly said to Clark.

Both CMU affiliates and guests were encouraged to sign up to perform before the start of the show. However, this proved not to be as easy a task as Hutch had anticipated. Hutch made his way around to each member of the audience in an attempt to get more people to sign up, but after his first round, he announced that only one “brave soul” had signed the roster. As the evening progressed, though, more people were inclined to sign up and express themselves on stage through prose and song.

Though some of the participants performed without musical accompaniment, The Rain, who provide sultry, mellow grooves for Shadow Lounge’s Friday Hip-Hop Café series, were at the Underground to support the syncopated oration of performers’ words. The Rain consists of Clark on saxophone and flute, Scott Simon on guitar, DJ Huggy on bass, “Deak” on drums, and Jim Barr on keyboard/synthesizer; excellent solo exploits were made by all members.

The featured artists of the night were Nathan James and Nicki Allen. Other notable performances were given by Ezra, Shadow Lounge’s owner Justin Strong, and Carnegie Mellon drama sophomore Pa'tina Miller, who wowed the audience with her powerful renditions of India Arie’s “Good Man” and “Miss Celie's Blues” from The Color Purple.