JAMIE CULLUM | LIVE REVIEW
Thurs 31 Oct, St David’s Hall, Cardiff
Jamie Cullum is like a little bottle of pop on stage. Fizzing with energy, this diminutive and slightly dishevelled purveyor of jazz-pop crossover is truly buzzing at this Halloween night gig in Cardiff, with plenty of treats as well as tricks up his unbuttoned sleeves. Say what you like about Jamie, but one thing you can’t say is he’s not versatile. During this two-hour show he shifts at some speed between piano, percussion and guitar.
He opens his set not at the piano, but standing hitting a snare drum to The Same Things, the first track on his latest album Momentum. Was it an indication of things to come? Not really. Cullum switched between mellow jazz and full blown anthemic pop. At times I wondered whether I was at a Coldplay gig – thankfully, that feeling didn’t last long – before Cullum started ripping up the musical rulebook again with a meandering dubstep version of Cole Porter’s Love For Sale. During this interesting unravelling of the much-loved Broadway classic, Cullum jumped off the stage and went walkabout amongst the mostly middle-aged St David’s Hall crowd, crooning while climbing chairs. At one point I found myself facing the seat of his pants as he somehow managed to balance on the back of the chair in front of me.
Beyond the hijinx, though, it has to be said that Cullum is fearless in selection of cover versions. Take Rhianna’s Don’t Stop The Music, which he manages to fill with a musical subtlety and nuance that renders the original as stale as an uncooked crouton. Further highlights came in the form of his tender cover of Pure Imagination, the Antony Newley song made famous in the film of Charlie And The Chocolate Factory. His set finished with the crowd-pleasing Mixtape, in which, as is tradition it seems, he demanded that the crowd start jumping in time. The tempo was slowed right down to a gentler pace during his encore, with a sublime rendition of Gran Torino. Just Cullum and his beloved Yamaha grand – nothing more, nothing less.
words CLAIRE MAHONEY