Burna Boy
Wintrust Arena
2/21/2024
Writer: Sommer Thornton
Photographer: Shrithik Karthik
Styled-out and sexy fans packed the Wintrust Arena to see Burna Boy’s Chicago stop of his “I Told Them” tour.
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The African Giant hit Chicago’s Wintrust Arena for his “I Told Them,” Tour. The show kicked off with Burna Boy seated at the “City Boy Cutz” barber shop, part of an imaginative set with two tiers and a full band of over a dozen musicians. The top tier seemed to be an homage to his young adulthood in Ghana. As the lights came up, dancers dressed in white overalls were cleaning the windows to the beat, then Burna Boy emerged and immediately seized the crowd.
Burna Boy’s voice is flawless, and the energy in his vocals was on 10. Not many artists can move between singing and rapping at a fast pace seamlessly live, and Burna has mastered this. For this show, the African Giant brought us into the world this album was created in, where Burna shows how raw he is to his critics and whoever still doesn’t know his brilliance.
One song in, Burna sang the first line of his timeless hit, “Gbona,” and the crowd went crazy. Burna Boy and his band made the concert stellar. His rich satiny voice and the horn section that belted out these blissful bridges along with multiple keyboards, a guitar and a special all-female string quartet created an atmosphere that felt like we were being transported from a party in Johannesburg to laying on the beach in Negril, to a symphony in Egypt.
Burna Boy breezed through current hits from his new album like “Dey Play,” “Location,” and “On My Hand.” But it’s the classics “Anybody,” “On the Low,” and “Kilometre,” that sent the crowd to the next stratosphere.
Hit after hit after hit Burna Boy showed off his incredible vocals and amazing stamina teasing the crowd and playfully interacting with his all-female dancers who, dressed in painter’s overalls and doing very relatable choreography connected with the audience in a fresh way. It was like friends or cousins were up there doing the dances they practiced together that made everybody happy. When Burna sang the ballad, “If I’m Lying,” from his new album, he poured his heart out with the string quartet.
With this tour, Burna Boy has ascended to the helm of Afro Fusion with hard work, grit, and refined talent. He has forged his own lane. After over 10 years in the game, no other artist in this genre can touch him vocally and lyrically. On top of charisma, good looks, style, and incredible stage presence, Burna Boy uses the stage design, the wardrobe, even the musical accompaniment to show a deeper side of himself and his artistry. It’s like the lyrics in his song “I Told Them” say, he told them he would make it, he told them he was the flyest, they said he was crazy, self-confidence of a lion.
Saying that Burna Boy’s voice live is as flawlessly sweet as it sounds on the album is an understatement. Even when silent on stage, the Burna Boy show was captivating because he allowed his band to reinforce the vibe and the audience could sit – not recording, but really taking in the beautiful moment together and letting the music immerse us.
