Walking out in a glistening silver suit and eyes hidden behind a giant pair of pink lemonade-coloured aviators, R&B legend Usher opened a fourth consecutive night of Paris shows with so much charisma that it was easy to overlook the fact he was dressed like a cross between a human disco ball and a Miami Vice villain.
Rolling his shoulders, moon-walking, and doing pop and lock dance moves that not many 44-year-old men could ever get away with, Usher glided across the stage with the grace of Fred Astaire, moving perfectly in time with the booming, ascendent synths of his 2008 smash Love In This Club. With those trademark buttery smooth vocals, he cooed the words “I’ll set you free / Sexually, mentally, physically, emotionally” directly to a screaming 30-something woman in the front-row .
“Fellas, if you got your girl in the house, well, you better hold her tight!” Usher later half-joked to an adoring crowd (which included grinning U.S. comedian Dave Chappelle) before launching into the baby boom groove of intoxicating new single Boyfriend, somehow combining roller skating with a pirouetting high falsetto. A continuation of his Las Vegas residency, and perhaps a preview of what we can expect from Usher’s much-coveted, looming half-time performance at next year’s Super Bowl, this show doesn’t get everything right.
Surrounded by gyrating dancers, and with a futuristic stage that constantly morphed into a candy red strip club, a performance of I Don’t Mind felt over-produced and too much like something styled by Hugh Hefner. Although intended as a tribute to Atlanta’s inherent strip club culture (the song features the lyrics: “I don’t mind if you dance on a pole / that don’t make you a hoe”) the show was at its best when Usher wasn’t surrounded by hordes of co-dancers and could breathe a little.
And all the brilliant syrupy, neo soul-enthused floor fillers from Usher’s 1990s catalogue were too often reduced to fragments and bluntly superseded by the pop star’s move into slightly cheap, Jaeger bomb-inspiring EDM collaborations with David Guetta. Usher soared the highest when he wasn’t surrounded by so many glitzy, scantily-clad distractions.
Dripping with sweat and on an elevated smoky stage with just space for one, an intimate and mesmerising performance of Burn - a song about torching the memories of a doomed relationship – hasn’t made arson feel so alluring since the days of Guy Fawkes. It was easily the highlight of the night.
Despite more than three decades in the music industry, Usher seemed genuinely re-energised as both a singer, performer, and dancer, with the Black Casanova leanings that made his biggest album, 2004’s Confessions, such an enduring success on full display in the City of Love. If he can fine tune things a little then it’s hard to see how his Super Bowl appearance can possibly fail.
