Busta Rhymes Surprised Harlemites Waiting To Vote With A Classic Street Performance

Busta Rhymes blessed New Yorkers with a surprise street performance in Harlem as they stood in line at the polls waiting to vote. Although Busta is a native of Long Island, the New York rap icon clearly wanted to share some love with the other boroughs, pulling up on 125th Street with a DJ and his hype man Spliff Star to promote his new album, Extinction Level Event 2: Wrath Of God and encourage voters. The scene was captured and posted on Twitter by local journalist Joyce Philippe.

The performance seems to have been put on by the Election Defenders action network’s Joy To The Polls initiative. The campaign has been putting on dance and musical performances to keep voters’ spirits high since October 24, as well as promoting a series of playlists on Spotify curated by the likes of Billie Joe Armstrong, Maggie Rogers, Swizz Beatz, and others.

Busta Rhymes is fresh off a television performance of “Yuuuu” with Anderson .Paak on The Tonight Show. The performance coincided with the release of E.L.E. 2, his first album in eight years, which features Kendrick Lamar on “Look Over Your Shoulder.” The next place Busta may turn up to perform his classics is the Verzuz set; he recently challenged T.I. to a hits battle. While the King of the South declined, Busta returned fire with some trash talk of his own which may light the competitive fire in T.I. to accept.

Watch Busta’s sidewalk performance above.