Syston, UK-based singer Mahalia has been promoting her sophomore album, Love and Compromise, and she has improved and prioritized her sound as a singer-songwriter and developed her artistry in greater ways than what we have thought. She brought and mixed a variety of genres to captivate and give meaning to what her music is all about, and she delivers her unique personality from this project by working with artists like Ella Mai, Lucky Daye, and Burna Boy to mixing genres like indie rock, Afropop, and dancehall. When she announced her North American leg of her sophomore album tour, it was something that I needed to experience since I feel that she is one of the best female R&B singers that is currently trending now. Luckily for me, she brought the tour to Toronto, where she performed at the legendary Mod Club Theatre and brought JVCK James to open for her.

To start off the sold-out show, East London, UK-singer JVCK James warmed up the sold-out crowd with some of his latest tracks from his recent EP, DETOUR. He performed certain tracks such as “4 AM,” “On My Way,” “Full Speed” and “Friend of Mine.” His musical appeal and inner beauty brought the crowd on cloud nine as he performed with much charisma and raw emotion. To me, he actually seemed excited about performing and he tends to be very positive about his set and how he enjoys the crowd participation. He brought his guitarist to perform with him, which is something that I’ve never seen before during a show; as well, he performed two cover tracks of Usher’s most popular songs, “U Remind Me” and “My Boo.” The crowd thought that JVCK James was a great performer and a lot of the females thought that he was very attractive, physically and emotionally. When performing a part of his own track, “Extroverted Lover,” what I liked from that performance was how his vocals and distinct sound were very stellar and had a beautiful voice, when hitting range to range. Overall, his set was very great and he managed to sway everyone with his all-round skills.
Even though Sebastian Mikael (one of the openers) was supposed to perform his set, he had to cancel his set due to unforeseen circumstances and will be performing at the last show of the North American leg.

However, Mahalia came to the rescue with her astonishing headlining set by opening up the show with her popular track off her new album, “Hide Out.” She managed to actually sing very well even though she mentioned in the show that she was feeling under the weather. She brought a unique variety of sounds and performed with as much energy and confidence through tracks like “Simmer,” “Do Not Disturb,” “What Am I” and much more. She even did some dances and became the quirky, confident girl that she always was through her music. With her performing live, she delivered a great vocal presence when singing and astonished the crowd with her outstanding, all-time performance and she even brought that unique energy from her music to the show.

In conclusion, even with the minor difficulties that happened, it was still an all-around beautiful and vivid show, and Mahalia managed to perform and  act quite well above her standards. Mahalia will finish her North American leg of her Love and Compromise tour until October 23th, 2019 in Boston, Massachusetts, and start her European leg of the tour until December 19th, 2019 in Brussels, Belgium.

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Mahalia

JVCK James

By: Joshua Habtwold | Exclusively for @Music, Why Not!

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