Urban Beatz, Inc

NEW YORK (Billboard) – If Lil Wayne is from Mars, then Erykah Badu is the high priestess of Venus. It's a cosmic bummer that the syrup-soaked rapper and the future-funk diva hadn't thought to pair up before Badu's new single, "Jump in the Air."

Intended as a cut from her upcoming "New Amerykah Part Two: Return of the Ankh" album, the duo's collaboration leaked and subsequently was released as a Web-only track, accompanied by one acid trip of a music video, in which Wayne's and Badu's heads float and multiply. (Badu describes it as an "Erykahleidoscope.") Wayne raps about going "nuts like a danish" and vanishing into thin air while Badu howls and ululates, beckoning the listener to "come fly with us" over a sample of Parliament Funkadelic's "Hydraulic Pump." Viral music videos don't get any weirder -- or really, more ingenious -- than this.

"No one can say anything negative about it, because it's just fun," Badu says of the song. "That's all it's meant to be."

"Jump in the Air" (now retitled "Jump Up in the Air and Stay There") is no longer on "New Amerykah Part Two" because Badu is a woman of her word. In December, she gathered with Universal Motown president Sylvia Rhone, Jay Electronica (her longtime boyfriend and the father of her third child, Mars Merkaba) and select journalists for an album listening party at New York's Chung King Studios. Over candlelight, she unveiled each track like it was sacred text and threatened to toss the album altogether if it leaked before the official street date.

Badu hasn't performed any of the unreleased material live, either, instead performing catalog tracks and a take on Snoop Dogg's raunchiest party anthem, "Ain't No Fun," on a string of recent West Coast dates. When she explains her reasoning behind this to Billboard, she has just returned home to Dallas, where she raises her children: 12-year-old son Seven Sirius, 5-year-old daughter Puma Sabti and 1-year-old Mars.

"The Age of Aquarius is a whirlwind, baby," Badu says. "I can say, 'No pictures, no video,' but everything is a video camera now. Because of the kind of artist I am, I don't want to lose the boutiqueness or the exclusivity of the music. The element of surprise is a true element for an artist, just like earth, wind, fire and water."

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CHANGING IT UP

Due March 30, "New Amerykah Part Two" is Badu's fifth studio album and first since 2008's "New Amerykah Part One: 4th World War," which found Badu riffing on politics, drawing from jazz, hip-hop and funk and sticking with mostly electronic production, to freer and freakier effect than on her 2003 release, "Worldwide Underground."

"New Amerykah Part One" landed on many music critics' year-end lists and sold 360,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan -- the lowest total of Badu's career. Her 1997 breakout debut, "Baduizm," remains her best-selling album, with 2.6 million copies sold. What's helped the singer maintain her relevance -- namely, her uncompromising far-outness -- through the years could also be why longtime fans occasionally have had trouble keeping up.

"We got flak over 'New Amerykah Part Two' because it wasn't a traditional Badu album," says Kay K Rosemond, an A&R (artists and repertoire) executive at Universal Motown who's worked closely with Badu on all of her studio albums. "The thought was, 'Why wouldn't we give fans a classic Badu album now? We're going to lose them.' But ultimately, there's a piece of art for every season."

Badu originally planned to release her "New Amerykah" projects as a double album -- she describes "Part One" as the left side of her brain and "Part Two" as the right -- but split the work with the release of "Part One" in 2008. She kept working on "Part Two" with a host of underground musicians and producers, from Madlib, Shafiq Husayn and 9th Wonder to Karieem Riggins, Georgia Ann Muldrow and the Roots' James Poyser, who produced the lead single, "Window Seat."

"As long as I have time to keep working on the album, that's as long as I'm going to be working on it," Badu says. "I'm always finishing until the last minute."

FLIGHT CONTROL

More than any of her other releases, "Part Two" recalls the spirit of "Baduizm." Musically, it's as progressive as "Part One," but Badu sings less about politics and more about romance; she sounds vulnerable. On the rapturous "Fall in Love," Badu warns: "You don't want to fall in love with me/There's gonna be a lot of slow singing and flower bringing, if my burglar alarm starts ringing," in a nod to a lyric by late rapper the Notorious B.I.G. (Traces of Biggie also appear on "Get Money," named after the Junior Mafia song of the same name but more directly harking back to its original sample, Sylvia Strippling's soul classic "Can't Turn Me Away.")

On "Window Seat," Badu sings, "I just want a chance to fly, a chance to cry, and a long bye-bye/But I need you to want me," over an earthy stomp and slinking piano melody. The track entered Billboard's Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart at No. 47, the best debut of the year so far and Badu's second-best career start. Delta Airlines has signed on to use the song as the boarding music for its flights.

Aside from "Window Seat," "Jump" is the main piece of content that Badu is using to entice fans to buy her new album. Different versions of the song are being recorded and rolled out one by one through March 30. Each features a different MC, and the list of names is enough hype on its own: Raekwon, Big Boi, David Banner, Redman, stic.man of Dead Prez, Snoop Dogg, Mos Def and Jay Electronica. Like the original "Jump," these versions will live online only, and such top hip-hop blogs as Okayplayer.com and NahRight.com will premiere each one exclusively.

"The Internet has afforded us with a way to not limit ourselves to the album project," Badu says. "There are so many ways to put out music now without having it just being a part of an album."

Badu worked with Xavier Jernigan, senior director of digital and traditional marketing at Universal Motown, to devise the album's marketing campaign. Dubbed