Janelle Monáe

Diddy may have taken her under his wing, but don’t lump Janelle Monáe in with his litter of Making The Band runts. For one thing, she has more in common stylistically with eccentric hip-hop dandy André 3000. For another, she’s an android. Rather, her alter ego, Cindi Mayweather, is. The mechanical, pompadour-and-saddle-shoes-sporting entertainer stars in Monáe’s ongoing four-part concept-album series, which began with Metropolis Suite 1: The Chase and continued last year on the panoramic sci-fi odyssey The ArchAndroid (Suites II And III).Speaking volumes about Monáe’s crossover appeal, she’s comfortably toured with Erykah Badu and Of Montreal, and now she opens for Bruno Mars, the stone-soul crooner behind the Van Gogh-channeling hit “Grenade.”

Updated 04/20/2011