Events

[POP] Janet Jackson made a bold move, releasing Unbreakable on her own two years ago. Other aging pop stars have threatened to go it alone and release new music without a major label deal, but few (have any?) actually followed through. At a time in her career when she was looking to reconnect with fans following an eight year hiatus between albums (Discipline came out in 2007), she made an even bolder move by cancelling her 2016 tour midway to have a baby… and get divorced. This worked out well for Buffalo fans, however, since the previous trek only came as close to Rochester. This time through, she’s at the Key Bank Center on Saturday, November 4. The tour, re-concepted as her State of the World Tour to reflect the increased political unrest since the pre-election release of Unbreakable, includes a number of tunes that she hasn’t performed live since the 1990’s along with a sizable chunk of the new material, and is said to feature new costumes. The material has been selected to highlight socially conscious messages from throughout her career. Peppered throughout are medleys of hits set to choreography so as to ensure that she also covers her biggest sellers.

In releasing her indie debut, Jackson reunited with the production team of Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis—former members of The Time and pioneers of the sound that sold her millions of records—and made her best album since 2005’s underrated Damita Jo. Unbreakable has yet to go gold in this country, let alone reach the worldwide multiplatinum status of Control (10 million, 1987) Rhythm Nation 1814 (12 million, 1989) or Janet (14 million, 1993), but it has sold quite respectably for an indie release, debuting at #1 on the Billboard Top 200, and spawning a single that topped their Adult R&B Songs chart. More importantly, though, the 17-song, 65 minute opus displays Jackson’s ability to morph between contemporary R&B and various other pop idioms within a largely spiritual framework; Unbreakable is mostly about faith — not surprising, given that Jackson supposedly became Muslim during the course of her now-defunct five year marriage to Qatar business mogul Wissam Al Mana. Themes of the afterlife are woven throughout and serve as a platform for dealing with the loss of her brother, Michael, which gets referenced numerous times through both pleasant childhood memories and references to the darker, more recent struggles he faced. On “The Great Forever,” her vocal is actually pitched down to sound like a blend of their voices — equally creepy and powerful. The slow-burn R&B of 1993’s “That’s the Way Love Goes” gets reprised with lead single “No Sleeep,” but Unbreakable also finds Jackson experimenting with something vaguely reminiscent of country-pop (“Well Traveled,” “Lessons Learned”), bits of psychedelia, and even arena balladry, while weaving elements of EDM and trap bass to update her classic Jam and Lewis sound on the more straightforward dance-pop material. The album is much more than retread and shows off her ability to get comfortable in a variety of musical idioms provided she has the support of producers that know how to properly tailor the environments to suit her. Jackson is nothing if not a consummate stage performer — it’s hard to imagine she’ll be anything less than dazzling, despite the sorry “State of the World.”