(That dip, by the way, has ultimately made people love him more: how did we forget about Usher?!) It’s the people who work with him every day who make you feel how much he is loved-his manager and bodyguard and assistants who sit you down and tell you what a good guy he is the Dolby theater ushers who work the show three nights a week, joyfully singing along to all of the songs the other R&B superstars who turned up as surprise acts (Nas, Jermaine Dupri, Teyana Taylor, Keyshia Cole, Anita Baker) the boldface names who turned up just to turn up (LeBron James, Zendaya and Tom Holland, various Kardashians, Jennifer Lopez, Doja Cat, Issa Rae, Keke Palmer). Usher has dedicated, dyed-in-the-wool fans-though not quite enough of them to save him from a mid-career dip in the late aughts, around the time his fifth album underperformed and it felt like music en masse was moving away from his brand of R&B. And plenty of them behave badly and retain deep banks of parasocial fan armies to rise to their defense. Sure, you’re probably thinking, lots of big stars are loved. Not a soul alive wants to see Usher fall.

He knelt and fixed it, crooning with the same grin as before. (He allowed it for a few bars with a kind “okaaay,” before gently removing himself.) Seven months later, at a show in October, a few songs after one audience member leapt into the aisle in an attempt to grind (another kind “okaaay”), a woman in the front row alerted him, nursery-school-teacher-style, that one of his shoes had come untied. When I attended the show in March, during one of Usher’s crowd-work sections, a demure-looking audience member attached herself to Usher’s chest, seat-belt-style, from behind, locking her hands across his sternum until her eyeglasses got misty. Everyone wants to love him down, but they also want to love him up. At his Vegas shows, the energy inside the (typically 85 percent female) audience is probably best described as affectionately feral. I mean in the larger sense-the global sense. I don’t even mean just at home, though his partner of four years, Jenn Goicoechea, and their two children, Sire and Sovereign, as well as his Atlanta-based teenage sons from a prior marriage, Usher “Cinco” V and Naviyd Ely, certainly have that covered. And I don’t just mean in his music, though love is more often than not its subject. Jenn is the Vice President of A&R at Epic Records.You have never met someone so loved as Usher. Usher never confirmed his romance with Jenn, or the baby news. They divorced in 2009 after two years of marriage. and Naviyd from Usher’s previous relationship with ex-wife Tameka Foster. Their child will join big brothers Usher Jr. On Augnews broke that the couple is expecting their first child after photos surfaced of Jenn sporting a baby bump while outside of a production studio in Los Angeles with Usher. Usher moved on with Jenn after his 2018 split from ex-wife Grace Miguel. After that, the couple went on to attend the Vanity Fair Oscar Party as a couple in February of 2020, among other Hollywood events. Usher and Jenn Goicoechea were spotted flirting at the Hollywood Bowl in 2019 and at the time, photographer Jennifer Johnson shared a photo of the pair kissing backstage at the annual event. Usher and Jenn Goicoechea have been dating since October of 2019, after they were spotted flirting at the Hollywood Bowl and you can see their best photos, here.

Usher and his new girlfriend