LIVE FROM BADUBOTRON: HIP-HOP & ERYKAH BADU

Erykah Badu transformed Denver’s Ball Arena into Badubotron on 6/26 as part of her Unfollow Me Tour, featuring Yasiin Bey (better known as Mos Def).

Though widely considered a neo-soul singer, Badu can also be construed as a hip-hop artist; weaving traditional 808 beats and funky, electro-style keys into her amalgam of jazz, soul and R&B, she's never far from hip-hop’s roots. At one point during the show, Badu proudly proclaimed, “Hip-hop is 50!” before launching into the 2002 hit “Love of My Life (Ode to Hip-Hop)” f/Common. Her respect and love for the culture bounced off the rafters.

Bringing Bey along for the ride was a natural choice. “Yasiin and I are comrades in this beautiful struggle called music,” Badu tells us. “We use music in the same way, as a platform to tell our stories and to document our history. I think we have that in common with our whole tribe. Hip-hop is 50 this year. There’s no other MC I would come out with that can anoint the stage in a way I feel necessary this year than Yasiin, so I convinced him to come out.”

A Dallas native raised by a single mother, Badu hit the scene in 1997 with her lauded debut album, Baduizm. Songs like “On & On,” “Apple Tree” and “Otherside of the Game”—which she performed early in her set Monday—quickly established her as the “Queen of Neo-Soul.” Mama’s Gun, released five years later, employed the production of The Roots’ James Poyser and renowned beat magician J Dilla, lending the project even richer sonic depth. The hip-hop references became more pronounced on ensuing albums like 2003’s Worldwide Underground, 2008’s New Amerykah, Pt. 1 (4th World War) and 2015’s Cain’t Use My Phone. As she chants on “The Healer,” from New Amerykah, “Hip-hop is bigger than the government,” something she truly believes.

Badu's first two albums have gotten the lion's share of attention, but Cain’t Use My Phone, touted as a mixtape, is one of her favorite bodies of work. The song “Dial A’freaq,” inspired by West Coast electro/hip-hop pioneer Egyptian Lover, rattles with bass, while “Mr. Telephone Man” draws from the New Edition song of the same name. The record demonstrates just how deep Badu’s knowledge of hip-hop and R&B goes. She says of Phone, "Most people only talk about the other albums. I made this one, too. I’m standing here with all my children and everybody keeps complimenting one, so it feels like your ugly child. But it’s my child!”

She admits that the project initially started off as a joke, explaining, “I was only joking about putting something on SoundCloud called Cain’t Use My Phone. But people were asking about it, so I decided to make a quick mixtape, a labor of love. It was just a fun project, but I'm so happy I did that.”

While it’s been eight years since Badu has put out new music, she did have another project, called This $hit Too Easy, ready to go around the same time she was working on Cain’t Use My Phone. When pressed, she ventures, “This $hit Too Easy might come out soon. We will see.”

The fact that Badu is even talking to the press is a surprise. In 2018, Vulture ran a story she felt grossly misinterpreted what she'd said. She appeared to shy away from interviews completely following the ensuing social media uproar. Now that she’s talking again, she's learned to take everything with a grain of salt, including social media.

“Those people don’t know us, nor do the people at home,” she says. “When you have this attention and platform, you want to sell your shit. ‘I’m sorry for saying blah blah blah blah—and buy my album for $9.99.’ That’s how I approach it.”

Badu’s resilience has kept her going for decades. Now in her fifties, she's more comfortable in her skin.

“I accept the fact that I work very, very hard and earn money," she offers. "I accept that, so you can’t Lamborghini-shame me. I accept the fact that I was blessed with a certain type of genes that are beneficial in this country. I accept the fact that you can’t pretty-shame me. I accept that I am 52 years old in a society that does not respect wisdom and age. I accept that, but you still can’t 52-year-old-shame me. None of those things have anything to do with me. We are all trying to work toward something. My journey is mine and your opinion is yours.”

Part of that journey has been enduring cancel culture, thus the name of the Unfollow Me Tour. “We all lost,” she explains. “Following me would be a waste of your time. Follow your own path, your own heart. You’re quite capable of creating. If we on social media and you don’t like what I’m saying, unfollow me.”

Photo (Badu in white hat): Aurore Marechal/ABACA