Raphael Saadiq

Raphael Saadiq is a soulful R&B throwback who plays his music with integrity — nobody’s getting rich with an eight-piece band like he brought to Bumbershoot — and without bitterness or nostalgia. He may sound like he just stepped off a plane that flew in from Detroit circa 1970, but he’s not preaching, nor is he trying to preserve an endangered songbook like an embittered swing star of yesteryear. He’s playing new songs with an old-school feel that are completely relevant for today, and hit so hard they’ll make you sick. “I gave my mind and body to the music,” he told SW’s Brian J. Barr earlier this year. “I wasn’t really thinking about the label’s reaction or if the TV bookers will get it or concert promoters or fans or whoever.” Can’t argue with that. With Anjulie. CHRIS KORNELIS

Mon., Nov. 16, 8 p.m., 2009