Erykah Badu Gets Booed By Audience For Defending R. Kelly At Concert In Chicago

It might be time for Erykah Badu to ‘call Tyrone,’ after leaving concertgoers up in arms over her comments about R. Kelly. 

Badu was performing at the Aragon Ballroom in Chicago where she criticized the current public condemnation of singer R. Kelly, following the Lifetime documentary “Surviving R. Kelly,” which details multiple allegations of sexual abuse and misconduct against him. 

Earlier this month, Dream Hampton, the documentary’s producer revealed that Badu was one of the many artists who declined to appear in the docuseries. 

While many artists and former collaborators of Kelly’s have since come forward to publicly denounce him and the allegations against him, Badu has continued to show thinly veiled support.

It was clear that Ms. Badu wanted the audience to keep their opinions to themselves. According to concertgoers, Badu told the audience: 

“What if one of the people who was assaulted by R. Kelly becomes an offender? We gonna crucify them too?” 

Despite having faced numerous accusations of sexual abuse and misconduct over the past two decades, Kelly has never been convicted and outright denies any wrongdoing. 

But since the airing of the documentary, the public outcry for some measure of justice for Kelly’s accusers has led to fallout for the disgraced singer.  His record company SONY/RCA has dropped him, and many touring opportunities have been canceled, as well as multiple law enforcement agencies looking into past and present allegations. 

Erykah’s commentary was met with boos from the audience, although some who attended the show took to Twitter in an attempt to clarify, saying the boos may have been for the mentioning of R. Kelly and not Erykah Badu directly. 

At any rate, this isn’t the first time that Erykah has shared a very unpopular opinion with her audience or followers, but given the current climate, time will tell if she gets told to pack her bags.