While Kehlani’s latest tour is in honor of her latest self-titled album, the concert itself—The Kehlani World Tour—is far from a solo show. Kehlani has a number of rising and current R&B stars on tour with her, including Durand Bernarr, Isaia Huron, TheARTI$t, and DJ artist WASEEL. The concert is a celebration, curated by Kehlani herself, to honor the artists around her and her own journey.
Kehlani’s career began similarly to any teenage aspiring artist—SoundCloud. Next, she performed on America’s Got Talent in 2011, still just a teen. After that, her career really took off in 2014 with her album “Cloud 19.” In 2024, she continued to flourish upon releasing the album “Crash,” dedicated to her own queerness and sensual self-expression.
Her popularity has recently been punctuated by songs such as “After Hours” and “Folded,” before the release of her latest album, “Kehlani,” earlier this year.
The album itself is one entirely Kehlani’s own, displaying something so wholly herself. Vulnerable and genuine, it was released on April 24th, coinciding with the artist’s 31st birthday.
Not only was the concert itself an absolute marvel to witness, but it involved a few challenges as well.
While Kehlani’s lyrics express the individuality she put into the album, she additionally articulates these thoughts through the captions on her secondary Instagram account (sidequestshawtyyy) related to her introspection, spirituality, and mindset.
Just before this tour, Kehlani had surgery to correct her deviated septum, which had been worsening over the years and causing her to get multiple sinus infections, illnesses, and thus, cancel a number of concerts. In fact, the surgery didn’t go well, and she had to get a second emergency corrective surgery. Because of this emergency surgery, the artist even considered cancelling the tour because she was having issues with nasal splints and her revision. A few weeks later, she decided to go on the tour anyway.
Due to a few continued issues after the surgeries, she has received some backlash, especially after having to reschedule the DMV concert from its original date of August 27th. Kehlani herself has seemed to take this backlash as a sign to turn further inward and become even more private, which she has shown by posts on her secondary Instagram account, as well as in interviews:
Similar to the Kehlani World Tour itself, the album is a celebration of R&B and Kehlani’s journey with many features by a variety of artists: Lil Wayne, Clipse, Brandy, Missy Elliott, Usher, T-Pain, Lil Jon, Cardi B, Big Sean, and Leon Thomas. It features her most popular song right now, “Folded,” as well as other hits including “Sweet Nuthins (feat. Leon Thomas),” and “Oooh.”
As someone brand new to the DMV area, I was a little uneasy about attending my first concert here. However, seeing Kehlani at Merriweather Post Pavilion erased all my worries about attending concerts in the DMV. The concert was held at the outdoor venue Merriweather Post Pavilion, which also happens to be the same location as the upcoming DC All Things Go music festival, and has been since 2021.
The venue was huge, with lots of areas to take pictures, walk around, and grab a bite to eat. Merch lines weren’t long and went very smoothly, and there was a variety of options for stadium-style adjacent food. It was a bit pricey, so if you plan on attending a concert at Merriweather Post or even All Things Go, try to prepare for that.
Kehlani came on around 8:40 and performed until 10:30, with 2-3 DJ breaks in between. The show was amazing; not only was it a chance to listen to her discography live, but the setlist was broken down into groups of songs according to a certain theme, and towards the middle of the concert they began to align with a night out on the town for Kehlani and her friends, from “Back and Forth” (Song 5) to “After Hours” (Song 14) as they got ready, walked to the club, and then danced in the club.
The first challenge of the night was one Kehlani herself acknowledged within the first few songs, saying, “Maryland, if you keep up this energy you might get first place,” in reference to the Loudest Crowd Competition of this tour. On her social media, Kehlani had been documenting the loudest crowds periodically by adding sleeping masks to a corkboard with the positions 1-5.
The second challenge, however, involved a specific moment in the show. During “Folded,” Kehlani’s last song of the night, there’s a specific lyric: “I know it’s getting cold out, but it’s not frozen.” At this point, the audience is supposed to freeze in place, silently, while the music pauses and Kehlani herself assumes some kind of silly position.
Overall, the concert was amazing, especially as someone who has had Kehlani as one of my top artists for the past 4 years. It can only be described as a story within a performance, and a tribute to R&B as a whole.
The show ended with Kehlani and her openers coming back out onto the stage to serenade “Unlearn,” a song that summarizes the past few years of Kehlani’s journey to self-love and positive routines, before finishing on record-holding hit “Folded,” a song about ending chapters to start healing.
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