I once interviewed Meshell Ndegeocello‘s former backing vocalist Sy Smith, whose Sometimes a Rose Will Grow in Concrete is a devastatingly good record. Smith extolled Ndegeocello’s ability to “craft a mood” and demand that the audience “either be with it, or leave.” Indeed, the Grammy-winning and fiercely outspoken artist operates entirely on her own terms, briskly taking to the stage at Ronnie Scott’s with her band without a hint of pomp or pretention. There was work to do. Likely not feeling the need to pander with fan favourites, she only touched briefly on her seminal debut Plantation Lullabies (1993), delivering “I’m Diggin You (Like an Old Soul Record)”, nodding also to her Ventriloquism album of ’80s/’90s covers with Al B. Sure!’s “Nite and Day”. However, the set drew primarily from her most recent release The Omnichord Real Book, released on Blue Note Records. Only uttering a few words to her audience, what the concert may have lacked in authority and showmanship was compensated with some virtuosic musicianship, from the whirring funk of opener “Clear Water”, the jazz fusion odyssey “Virgo”, and the meditative “The 5th Dimension”. Ndegeocello remains a cool, commanding presence on stage, switching from breathy highs to conversational lows, her vocals augmented by Justin Hicks honeyed tenor and Abe Rounds’ falsettos.