Review: Erykah Badu is mesmerizing, magical in St. Paul concert

Erykah Badu has been known to keep her fans waiting. The high priestess of neo-soul has not released a proper studio album since 2010. She didn't headline a Twin Cities concert between 2001 and 2021.

When she returned to St. Paul on Friday night at Xcel Energy Center, her band played on and on for 15 minutes, waiting for her to join them onstage. Then, she made an entrance, of course. Badu is always a visual treat.

Shiny stove pipe hat with a witch's brim. Green-sequined floor-length coat, with 24-inch-long tubes of fur trim around her neck and knees. Wraparound glasses that lit up with different colors. And braids that fell to her feet. Green laser lights framed Badu as she sang "20 Feet Tall." And she certainly seemed larger than life.

A Badu concert is a cosmic experience, part jazzy hip-hop soul trip, part modern dance performance, part visual feast, part liberating spiritual awakening. She never ceases to take you on a trip through her mind and your own. Friday's concert was as mesmerizingly magical as her 2021 performance at the Armory in Minneapolis.

Like David Bowie and Prince before her, and Beyoncé and Janelle Monáe after her, Badu is one of pop music's marvelous visionaries. She comes with a well contemplated philosophy and an evolved concept for the sound, messages and visuals of her art.

In her 90 minutes onstage in St. Paul, the Dallas native offered several of her hits, including "On & On," "Bag Lady" and an abbreviated "Appletree." She even snuck in a taste of Ari Lennox's 2018 hit "Whipped Cream" during her own "Window Seat."

Badu delivered the autobiographical "Me," sharing her history (claiming she's 56 when most bios say 52) for the uninitiated, which seemed to be a significant portion of the sparse crowd of maybe 5,000.

The singer-actress-fashionista-entrepreneur-doula is calling her 2023 arena trek her Unfollow Me Tour because, she explained, "I don't want to be responsible for you. You can't go where I'm going. Follow your heart. Follow your ambitions. Follow your dreams. You ain't gotta be like nobody. I don't know what's right for you, and you don't know what's right for me."

For her performance, Badu had a giant video wall behind her, not for closeup shots of her performing live but rather for images of Egyptian objects and arty designs. Another visual was her outfits, which she peeled off in layers. After the long sequined coat, there was an oversized tie-dyed sweater, and eventually a black T-shirt and leotard. And a fuchsia stocking cap with a knot on top.

Not only does Badu have her own line of clothing, cannabis and lifestyle products, she is a model, a Met Gala regular and a Vogue cover subject, in March.

Dressed in all white including stocking caps, her band — seven musicians, three singers —grooved. Sometimes Badu, who played electronic percussion and briefly acoustic guitar, stuck to the arrangement, other times she improvised, conducting the musicians and riffing with her voice.

She showed an elastic voice, accomplished at hip-hop, soul and Billie Holiday-ish jazz. And, as she promised at the end of the night, she uncorked a spine-tingling scream that would have been equally at home in a sanctified setting or a heavy-metal concert.

Opening the evening was rapper Yasiin Bey, dressed in a Minnesota Wild jersey with his surname and numeral 0 on the back. Formerly known as Mos Def, he commanded the stage with old favorites like "Ms. Fat Booty" before dancing off to Milton Nascimento's "Tudo Que Você Podia Ser."