After Two Grammy Wins, Kehlani Does a ‘Victory Lap’ at a Sold-Out San José Block Party

You would’ve thought Kehlani was hanging out with 10,000 of her besties from her laid-back, jokey mood at the sold-out Big Game Block Party at San José City Hall on Friday night.

“I’m always so grateful to be here when massive events get to happen in the Bay, and all these people come, and we get to host them, and they get to see how magical we are,” the Oakland-raised R&B star said breathlessly after opening her set with seven back-to-back anthems.

With long hair billowing behind her in the heavy fog, Kehlani belted the flirty “Distraction” and cinematic “Gangsta” with supreme breath control, no backing track, while delivering taut, early-2000s-inspired choreo alongside her crew of athletic dancers.

“’Cause for so long, only we knew how magical we were,” she continued with a grin amid massive applause. “Now you get these big-ass fuckin’ events, everyone comes here, and we’re like, ‘Yeah, we’re fuckin’ cool, fuck y’all. But welcome!’”

Repping the Bay during Super Bowl weekend wasn’t the only cause for celebration. Just five days ago, after 10 years of Billboard Hot 100 hits and five previous Grammy nominations, Kehlani finally won not one but two awards for “Folded.” It’s a smart, sexy and highly danceable single where she makes a bid for reconciliation with a love interest by offering to fold her clothes, flipping the old cliche of tossing them out on the lawn.

Last month, “Folded” reached No. 6 on Billboard — the biggest hit of Kehlani’s career so far, even after previous collaborations with mega-stars like Cardi B and Justin Bieber. Its organic success arrives after Kehlani went through some notable setbacks: Last year, her criticisms of Israel led several concert promoters to cancel a spate of shows. She received death threats and moved out of her house because of safety concerns, she revealed in a recent Breakfast Club interview.

Kehlani has arrived at a career apex without compromising her values. At last week’s Grammy Awards she implored her fellow artists to speak out against injustice and ended her acceptance speech for Best R&B Performance with a resounding “fuck ICE.”

In San José, however, Kehlani didn’t get into politics and leaned into the celebratory mood of the Super Bowl, which has Bay Area artists showing out at clubs, concerts and special events in the lead-up to Bad Bunny’s halftime show performance (as well as the face-off between the Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots).

“If y’all see me drunk, don’t say nothin’. It was AI,” she joked as she invited the audience to the afterparty at San Francisco’s 1015 Folsom.

After performing an intimate rendition of “Everything,” where she stood at the mic stand and let her voice drip with devotion, Kehlani teased a snippet of an unreleased song from her forthcoming album, another ode to all-consuming love with the refrain, “There’s no such thing as I love you too much.”

Along with the ballad “Out the Window,” whose music video shows Kehlani literally dropping to her knees in the rain, this section of the set highlighted how exquisitely her songwriting conveys the aching feeling of yearning. The thousands-deep crowd of mostly Latinas, Filipinas and Black women in stylish sportswear and Y2K glamour cathartically belted along to the hits and deep cuts alike.

Then came the moment everyone was waiting for. “I won two Grammys for a song that came out two months ago, and I have to say I love you so much,” Kehlani gushed. “This is like a victory lap, and I wanna sing it with you guys.”

As the opening violin chords played, friends hugged, couples swayed and thousands of phones lit up in the air as the audience erupted into a joyous chorus: “I’ll let your body decide / if this is good enough for ya / already folding it for ya.”