Show Review: Janelle Monae

Messiah's Homecoming Dance this year featured a little something new: a live performance by Outkast protege Janelle Monae. After a hits-packed opening DJ set from my friends Steve Harpine (SAB concert executive and member of Pompeii & the Ashes) and Justin Colavita (Frantic Colatitude) that devolved into a dual laptop crossfade mix when Miss Monae wasn't ready to perform at her scheduled time, she took the stage clad in a tuxedo, backed by a full band.

Her performance was at once fascinating and disconcerting, juxtaposing early rock-and-roll sounds with abstract futuristic lyrics and blowing the audience away with consistently impressive vocal stylings. Her songs ran the gamut from lengthy ballad (performed standing on a stool with just one soloing guitarist as accompaniment), to funk, to a driving closer that could have found a home in any Warped Tour mosh pit. Her hysterical theatrics ranged from painting while singing onstage and throwing the finished product into the audience where it spattered expensive apparel with paint, to stage diving directly on my face and crowd surfing during the final song. In the immortal words of King Arthur: "What an eccentric performance!"
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The remainder of the night was ably handled by my friend Nate Norman's set of deep house and trance jams, closing a dance many Messiah students are not likely to forget.

For more about Janelle Monae, please check out the SAB blog here.