Alicia Keys unveiled her new album live in front of a sold-out crowd at the Dubai World Trade Center on Friday, delivering a dynamic pop concert full of soaring vocals and piano solos.
“We can live on the air,” she sang from beneath a fortified stage ringed by enthralled — and COVID-19 vaccinated — fans jumping, swaying, and nodding to the beat at Dubai’s Expo. “Baby, baby, we’re going to rock forever,” says the band.
Keys, 40, strutted onto the stage in a glistening gold bodysuit, her hair in a tight bun, and confidently performed songs from her eighth studio album as well as old favorites.
“Tonight, I want you to let go, let go, and come with me on this journey,” she said to the crowd. “I don’t want this night to come to an end.”
As the mild winter night hung over the Persian Gulf, her jazzy melodies under the dome’s projected starry sky, set to percussive crosscurrents and piano arpeggios, created a kind of endless, dreamlike surge around the Expo grounds. The piano keys spun, grooved, and sat alone at moments, hitting high notes.
“KEYS,” the 15-time Grammy Award-winning singer’s mammoth double album, has two versions of each song: “Originals,” produced by Keys, and “Unlocked,” produced by Keys and Mike Will Made-It.
“Originals” has piano-driven emotional, intimate soul ballads flowing with love and desire, while “Unlocked” features energetic, clubby pop versions of the same tracks.
On Friday night, she experimented with the crowd by presenting the album’s premise.
“Tell me which version you like,” she urged before singing two very different versions of the same song, one swooning and the other synthetic, and asking the audience to vote with their cheers.
Hits like “Girl on Fire,” “Empire State of Mind,” and “New Day” were also featured in her Dubai set, rousing anthems to which the audience enthusiastically danced and chanted along.
Her distinctive R&B backbone and themes of soul-searching, passion, and devotion can be found in many of the new material. The “Unlocked” tunes, on the other hand, have a surprising distinct and stylized twist.
Keys’ last album, “Alicia,” was published in the midst of the pandemic last year, and featured sensitive confessions and references to virus-ravaged health professionals and everyday people’s efforts to get by.
Keys has previously stated that the new songs gave her more confidence and clarity, describing the album as feeling “comfortable in my skin.”
Keys has become a global pop and R&B phenomenon, as well as a bestselling memoir author, actress, activist, entrepreneur, Grammy host, philanthropist, and the pioneer of the #nomakeupinpublic trend, in the dizzying past two decades of her career. She’s also a mother, as she reminded the audience when she brought her two young sons to the stage to get flowers and kisses.
She left the spellbound audience with a final inspirational message from the piano bench before singing her closing crowd-pleasing classic, “If I Ain’t Got You.”
She advised, “Don’t wait to tell the ones you love that you love them.” “This is a gift to you.” “I’m in love with you.”