“That girl’s been outside watching us this whole time,” Nao exclaimed towards the end of Thursday night’s set, still processing the notion of onlookers waiting avidly outside her first sold out show in Boston.
“Don’t stare! Can we just let her in?”, she asked. The East London-based singer’s speaking voice is as chirpy, but commanding as the entire room swiveled around to Brighton Music Hall’s back doors to the onlooker’s surprise. Within moments, security was outside, ushering the lurking fan in to rapturous applause.
Extending an invitation to the window-shopping fans towards the end of a set is not unheard of, but Nao’s request felt as casual as letting a locked out friend into a party and as unstoppably buoyant as the last block party before the end of summer.
After Thursday night’s set, Nao should prepare for more stateside onlookers and far fewer questions about how to pronounce her name (which, in case you weren’t sure, is “nay-o”)
Her debut full-length, this summer’s For All We Know, is the culmination of two years’ worth of hype (which might’ve been precipitated by BBC Radio 1 catching on to her debut single the day it dropped) and blockbuster features for the likes of Mura Masa and Disclosure. Of course, detraction naturally follows mainstream hype; partnering with Disclosure only propped up the critique that Nao is sonically identical to AlunaGeorge’s Aluna Francis, albeit with shades of FKA Twigs thrown in to make her self-described “wonky funk” subgenre not seem unfounded.
Antoine
If anything though, Nao and her formidable backing band used those collagic influences across the R&B spectrum to her advantage. Preceded by local singer Antoine, who impressively dared to cover Prince’s “I Wanna Be Your Lover” in a delivery landing closer to Shamir than the Purple One’s, Nao continued the party by opening with the one-two punch of “Happy” and “Get To Know Ya”. The set was largely a celebration of For All We Know’s biggest potential pop crossovers, but slower songs from her initial EPs like “Apple Cherry” and first single “So Good” were welcome inclusions on the strength of Nao’s effortless falsetto.
Still, her strength as a hitmaker in the making was hard to avoid, sending the crowd home belting the slow-burning hit “Bad Blood” before closing with the inescapably catchy Mura Masa collaboration “Firefly”. With the hope that this is only the start of a very promising (and yes, slightly wonky) career ahead of her, there’s sure to be quite a few gatecrashers when Nao makes the assured jump to affable festival headliner in a matter of years.
