These are complex times for Dallas's Erykah Badu, the woman who single-handedly invented nu-soul with her 1997 platinum debut album, Baduizm. Badu may have conceived the genre's stew of defiantly retro music and indulgent lyrical "positivity", but these days the kooky soul diva field has become crowded. Angie Stone, Jill Scott, India Arie - you can barely move for ethnic jewellery and long-winded expressions of spirituality.
Badu, however, is not going to relinquish her crown without a fight. She comes on stage barefoot, clutching a joss stick and wearing an afghan-coat-and-enormous-hat ensemble in which Starsky and Hutch's informer Huggy Bear would have felt overdressed. She lights a candle and tells the audience that she hopes "some day all the people in the world will be free enough to be themselves". She then gets them to express their diversity and individuality by chanting "Freedom!" in unison. Mother Earth-isms, 1970s stylings, a philosophy immune to irony - this is nu-soul in extremis.
One aspect of the show, however, does not conform to type: the music. Badu has clearly forgotten an unwritten rule of live nu-soul: all songs must be extended to within an inch of their lives. The audience's tolerance for scat singing must be tested to the full. Tonight, Cleva and On and On slink along in admirably concise fashion. Rather than gazing at the ceiling and wondering when the do-be-do-ing will cease, the crowd marvel at Badu's incredible voice. She is capable of unleashing a devastating scream - hair-raisingly primal, yet note perfect. Her sense of humour also distances her from the determinedly po-faced world of nu-soul. She follows a song condemning the music industry's materialism with a protracted anecdote about her new Cadillac.
Then Badu pulls out her trump card: interpretative dance. Exactly what she is interpreting remains shrouded in mystery. She writhes and pirouettes to a flute solo in the manner of community-centre dance classes the world over.
It is difficult to think of anything more embarrassing. The audience cannot contain their delight: not even Lauryn Hill did this. Badu is back on top. She has taken nu-soul to nu levels of self-indulgence.
