Woke up at the end of the live, so distraught to have missed it I’ve spent two hours scrolling and reading. I am a bonafide longtime neo-soul heaux. I’ve been singing Ms Badu and Ms Scott from before I was even confident like that, before I could match experience to lyric

I once depped for a singer at the jazz bar in Edinburgh and sang Golden, Appletree, Getting in the Way, Back in the Day, in the 12-3am slot. I was 19, this was exactly 1 week after having sex for the 1st time, and I felt that I was not grown enough to be singing this WOMAN music.

I wasn’t really old enough. I sang Erykah Badu’s 10 minute masterpiece, Green Eyes, in this very white city, and probably no one in the audience could have known what it meant to me, to be able to do that. Also took home my first ever groupie, I think my idols would be proud

I’ve seen D’angelo, Bilal, Jill Scott, Erykah Badu in concert, twice. The first time I saw Badu, I road tripped from LA to Montreal, convincing a man I met the day before the concert to drive me from Toronto to Montreal.

I waited in a resale queue an hour before it started and snagged the very last ticket. I stood at the back of that concert hall, alone because my friends had walked up and down the line with signs and unanimously decided the one ticket was for ME, and sobbed throughout.

Oh I’ve been a neo-soul fan for a lifetime! Bilal’s ‘First Born Second’ is a religious experience, that has played on loop on every long car journey I’ve taken with my family. One of those ones where I automatically sing my assigned part in the family harmony instead of the tune.

I’m going to watch the whole clash on YouTube tomorrow with @WalcottMaia. We’re so disappointed to have missed it live. Going to sleep on some nostalgia now, hope I write and sing some pretty things soon.