written by Crystal-Angelee Burrell
“Have I changed? You are healthy and mindful of me.” With ambient vocals conjuring Nina Simone and soulful hums like ocean waves in reverb, Justin Hicks reminds us about good love—how it washes over us in ebbs and flows, encouraging us to grow. Aptly titled Invocation, the evening’s first piece felt meditative like Tibetan singing bowls and was as full-bodied as a prayer. Accompanying Justin Hicks at Joe’s Pub @ The Public Theater on July 13, 2022 was a band of tight funk, rock and blues musicians (Alexis Marcelo, piano; wife Kenita Miller-Hicks on vocals; Chris Bruce, guitar; Meshell Ndegeocello, bass).
Justin Hicks. Photographed by Kenita Miller-Hicks.
Justin Hicks’ deeply personal performance saw an artist laying himself bare. He expounded on flying to Indiana in March 2020 to visit his father as he lay dying; surviving carbon monoxide poisoning in his South Bronx apartment, then confiding in the audience that he hasn’t been quite right ever since; and welcoming a super girl named Nova with his wife and collaborator, Kenita).
Manhood and, more precisely, fatherhood was one of the ongoing themes throughout the 16-piece set. Crossover maps the roads Hicks’ father took coming to religion with the musician’s mother in America where “beginnings are fragile and tender.” He frames What Did I Do? as a lucid response to James Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time and asks his inextricable oppressor, “What would you do if we [read as: the oppressed] became you?” (feat. Meshell on bass and Chris on guitar). Conversationally to the audience, Hicks admitted that he had to “get born again in a different way” than he’d been born before becoming a father to Nova. That ecclesiastic metaphor flowed beautifully into Evergreen, his ode to finding bliss in Kenita:
“Love soft as an easy chair,
Love fresh as the mountain air.
Love that is shared by two,
Love I have found in you.
Like a rose found in the April snow,
I was certain that our love would grow.
Love ageless and evergreen
seldom seen by two.
You and I must make each night the first,
Every day a beginning.
Spirits rise and they will invite us,
Because we have the brightest love.”
Alexis Marcelo on piano; Justin Hicks on lead vocals; Kenita Miller-Hicks on vocals; Chris Bruce on guitar (left to right).
Hicks’ drumbeat cadence seasons his spoken word with layers of vulnerability, while his courage to interrogate systems of power strive may agitate accountability. What was even more remarkable than the musician’s candor was his willingness to offer love as a solution—on healing from grief, against injustice, and for fatherhood’s sake. A warm glow radiated from the stage on this night, and is certain to return the next time Justin Hicks leads his band in funkadelic meditation.