Camae Ayewa leaned into her microphone closely and uttered evocative, devastating, prophetic poetry as video of a raging fireball was projected behind her.

The electronic soundscape coming from her laptop built to a series of shrill, greasy explosions, and Ms. Ayewa — who performs under the name Moor Mother — addressed the audience in a stern voice. “We want our realities back,” she seethed. “We want our futures back.”

Later, adopting a rap cadence, she chanted: “I just want to make it clear — revolution’s everywhere.”

This was 2017, at Pioneer Works in Brooklyn, and she was opening for the rock band A Place to Bury Strangers. Much of the audience seemed unready for the intensity of her set, but Ms. Ayewa leaned in, berating the crowd — not performatively, not playfully, but dead-serious — demanding that people engage. In the end, they had no choice.