Hip-hop icon Missy Elliott might have waited nearly 30 years to stage her first-ever headlining tour, but goodness gracious, when Missy finally does something, she really, really does it right.
Out of This World – The Experience landed at Crypto.com Arena on Thursday, July 11 for the first two nights in Los Angeles, and it absolutely is both of those things – an over-the-top spectacle and an experience unlike fans have seen from Elliott, or really, almost anyone else, before.
The show is a tightly packed 70 minutes, but it felt like a complete feast. Elliott’s main course was stuffed with visuals, stagecraft, costumes and choreography, after the opening bites of the night were served via sets from her longtime friends and frequent collaborators Timbaland, Busta Rhymes and Ciara.
The show was organized into four acts, each with about seven songs and a loose storyline that linked them as an intergalactic trip through a hip-hop galaxy. A jester-like emcee introduced each act, giving Elliott and the dancers a few minutes to change costumes.
Act I set the whole journey in motion, a touring spacecraft door rising to reveal Elliott and her dancing hip-hop-onauts descending a plank onto some funky foreign world. Maroon beams of light shot down from above to capture them – Elliott in a bejeweled, white-and-gold space helmet and jumpsuit, the dancers in shiny similar uniforms – and only after the transporter rays clicked off, and Missy and company collapsed in a heap, did the show fully begin.
Songs such as “Throw It Back,” “Cool Off,” and “4 My People” flew by before Elliott paused to greet the crowd.
“L.A., what’s up?!” she shouted, smiling widely. “Now we’re about to leave Earth, but we’ll bring you back!”
“Sock It 2 Me” followed, with a giant photorealistic Missy in the red-and-white Mega Man spacesuit she wore in the music video. After “I’m Really Hot,” for which the visuals shifted to dancing flames, Act 1 wrapped up 15 minutes after it opened.
Costume designer June Ambrose deserves a special mention before we continue. Ambrose, who has worked with the performer on outfits for music videos and performances since Elliott’s earliest days, has outdone herself with this tour. In a recent interview with Women’s Wear Daily, Ambrose described making nearly 250 different costumes for Elliott and her dancers.
On Thursday, the looks shifted with each act, from Elliott’s crystal-covered space wear of Act I to the all-black dominatrix-y style of Act II, which segued into a bit of Elliott’s trademark super-puffy outerwear at one point. Act III featured lime green sparkle and shine. Act IV delivered neon graffiti streetwear, Elliott in an oversized lime-green furry hat, her dancers in ballcaps with neon mohawks atop.
With eight different looks for Elliott, the tour will alternate entirely different costumes, and some different songs in the set, each night.
Act II opened with Kanec, the emcee, doing a “Singing in the Rain”-themed tap dance intro before Elliott arrived, now dressed in black, for “The Rain (Supa Dupa Fly),” from her 1997 debut album “Supa Dupa Fly.”
After she and two dancers boarded a large round platform and “flew” over the crowd during “Gossip Folks,” she disembarked to perform “Get Ur Freak On,” one of her signature hits, on a set that looked like a subterranean Mad Max Thunderdome with dancers writhing on a steel fence behind her as she sang.
I did mention this show was completely bonkers, didn’t I?
Act III felt like the calmest of a very not calm set with “One Minute Man,” “Beep Me 911,” and “Hot Boyz” among its standouts.
“I’ve been doing this for almost 30 years,” Elliott said at one point here. “If you came here tonight, you think out of the box and you’re special.”
The feeling is mutual, Ms. Elliott.
Act IV tied it all together as Missy and the crew of the Starship Out Of This World finally came home. “Ching-A-Ling” kicked off this final club-themed section. “Work It,” another of her classics, saw her work her way through the crowd on the floor of the arena, and even up the stairs a little at one point, as she sang and rapped its racing lyrics.
After “Pass That Dutch,” her friends and openers each came out for a song with Elliott – Timbaland for “Up Jumps Da Boogie,” Busta Rhymes for “Touch It,” and Ciara for “Lose Control.”
Elliott smiled widely as the show finally wrapped up – she’s truly got a wonderful smile – and you wonder how long it will be until she decides to tour again. You could easily see this show killing at Coachella, and she’s done a good number of festivals over the years even while avoiding an actual tour.
Her manager Mona Scott-Young told us last month that before Elliott decided to do this tour she’d been thinking of a Las Vegas residency. Here’s a thought: Put this in the Sphere where the immersive sound and visuals would blow people’s minds.
Whatever she wants, it’ll be out of this world.
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