Corinne Bailey Rae

Royal Concert Hall, Glasgow
Projected to stardom with a memorable Jools Holland appearance and a stunning single, ‘Put Your Records On’, 2006 seemed to mark the emergence of a global superstar in Corinne Bailey Rae.

However, this concert, rescheduled from last October, is an underwhelming spectacle, as much a result of recording industry’s star-making regime than the artist herself.

There is no question that Bailey Rae is a likeable and modest performer, with a great voice and some interesting, genre-crossing ideas. Yet everything about this presentation, from the production to the execution, seems hurried and somehow incomplete. The eight piece band is polished and proficient but often superfluous. Though her voice is soulful in a Roberta Flack fashion, it is not particularly powerful and works best when less rather than more instrumentation is applied.

A case in point is one of the better songs, ‘No Love Child’ which starts as a pretty piano based ballad before turning into a messy gospel crescendo with backing vocalists, brass and drums all competing for attention.

The pacing of the set is also unfathomable. With a shortage of great songs and a surplus of filler, it makes for a run of mediocre, mid-tempo material, punctuated by a dreadful cover of Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Long Summer’ before she finally reaches the Isley Brothers inspired ‘Like a Star’, ‘Put Your Records On’ and “Choux Pastry Heart’, the three highlights of her debut album.

There is also hope in that the new songs sound more intriguing than many of the album tracks, but a strategic rethink is surely required. For now, Bailey Rae appears both phased by and uncomfortable with the perhaps unexpected demands and scale of touring a three million selling record.