Technicolor Under the Shell, Lauren Halsey Builds a Funk Opera for Erykah Badu

For one night the Hollywood Bowl stopped looking like the Hollywood Bowl. On September 29 the South Central artist Lauren Halsey staged emajendat, a one-night takeover that turned the grounds into a playground and the stage into a stepped pyramid of stacked box modules, each one holding its own small scene.

Halsey described the night as a funk opera inspired by the productions Parliament-Funkadelic mounted in the 1970s. “There’s no dead space,” she said. “All of it is super rich in every single minute.”

Erykah Badu and The Alchemist headlined with music from their collaborative album Before the World Blows, the final date of their joint September tour. The bill also carried Anderson .Paak spinning as DJ Pee .Wee, Flea, and the Charles Gaines Collective with Black Nile and Devin Daniels.

The surprises arrived on cue. Earl Sweatshirt came out for “I Know That Man,” DRAM joined for “Valentine,” and Flea picked up a trumpet for “Black Box.” Before any of it, the grounds opened at 6 p.m. with ping pong, double dutch, mini golf, face painting, airbrushing and Hot Shot Hoops.

The night even had a uniform. AGOLDE sold a limited Halsey capsule of one tee and two sweatshirts at its Melrose Place flagship. Halsey’s work already sits in the collections of MOCA, the Guggenheim and the Whitney, and for one evening it sat under the most famous shell in the city.