This post has been corrected. Please see note at bottom for details.
Soul singer D'Angelo returned to L.A. on Wednesday night with a sweat-drenched set before a sold-out crowd at the House of Blues, a set notable not only for its remarkable series of musical epiphanies but also for the one song he did not play.
The Richmond, Va., phenomenon's performance was the first in L.A. since 2000, when he supported his now-classic soul/hip-hop/funk/rock/blues/jazz classic "Voodoo" and its mega-hit single, "Untitled (How Does It Feel)," with nine different Los Angeles concerts over the course of the year ' including a five-night run at the House of Blues.
Wednesday's set was so tight that it could have been the sixth night. Like meticulous craftsmen, the artist and his band stitched together bits and pieces of his work both old and new. D'Angelo directed his 10-piece group ' multiple guitarists, keyboardists, percussionists, vocalists and a bassist ' through early songs tightly reworked for maximum power on the stage, and he delivered drool-worthy teasers from his forthcoming album, with the working title of "James River," due out this fall.
PHOTOS: D'Angelo, now and then
But as the show reached a conclusion and the 38-year-old singer, whose last decade has been spent struggling with a vicious combo of writer's block, substance-abuse issues and legal entanglements, held his fist in the air and his band hit the last, perfectly round note of "Brown Sugar" (mixed in with the Ohio Players' "Skin Tight"), a crowd member captured one lingering question mark.
"How can he leave without playing 'How Does It Feel?'" the fan queried.
He can. And he did, and within that omission lies an entire worldview, one that artists interested in creative expansion and evolution have struggled with since there's been such a thing as a "hit song." How to please the audience without becoming beholden to it, or living in the past.
Wednesday's show was defiantly in the here and now. Even if it took many of its cues from 1970s-era sounds, the set presented an artist who looks revived and alive, who's retained the sweet Al Green falsetto that makes knees wobble but whose James Brown barks and Sam Cooke wails are as explosive as ever. Like the most magnetic performers, D'Angelo seems to belong onstage.
PHOTOS: D'Angelo, now and then
It's tough to be objective when it comes to his work, at least for me. In the 12 years since "Voodoo" came out, it has gracefully, gradually entangled itself within my musical life like creeping ivy, and it has done so in ways that few records have. Its tone, warm and relaxed but not lazy, coupled with its expansive scope, offers a perfect balance of rhythm, melody and emotion. Along with Erykah Badu, the Roots and a few other performers, he understands how to scratch a particular itch that funk heads need scratched ' live, contemporary-sounding music that explores the thread that connects Brown, Otis Redding, Shuggie Otis, Sly & the Family Stone, Miles Davis, Parliament/Funkadelic, Prince and the Roots.
So for me, the countless bursts of fireworks outside the House of Blues that were lighting up the Fourth of July sky across the L.A. basin were celebrating D'Angelo's arrival.
It was, as they say, all that. The set featured both extended versions of his old work, including a one-two punch of "Devil's Pie" and "Chicken Grease," both from "Voodoo," as well as a piano-driven medley that included pieces of "Brown Sugar," "Higher," "One Mo' Gin" and "Send It On." And although D'Angelo and his band have played only a few European shows as a unit, they're an incredibly dynamic bunch of players.
How dynamic? As disciplined as Brown's backing band the JBs, but with the looseness of Sly & the Family Stone's post-Summer of Love comedown album, "There's a Riot Goin' On." Over and over again, the artists onstage created tension with peaks that broke into extended instrumental breakdowns. Each band member got a solo ' but after completion, each wound his way back into the groove.
Twelve years is a long time in an artist's creative life. If it's true that a lot of musicians hit their creative peak in their 20s and 30s, anyone with a sense of history would have been right to worry whether, at 38, D'Angelo had lost his touch. He hasn't. On the contrary: That touch is as deft, precise and rhythmic as ever.
[For the Record, 2:15 p.m. July 5: An earlier version of this post said D'Angelo was from Atlanta, instead of Richmond, Va. Also, the piece stated that the title of his forthcoming album is "James River," but that is the working title.
randall.roberts@latimes.com
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