Horace Andy

Horace Andy

O2ABC, Glasgow

Dave Prater

LEGEND is an epithet used casually these days, but we were privileged to bear witness on Monday night as Horace Andy, the man they nickname Sleepy, turned in a positively animated performance in a rare Glasgow visit.

With a career spanning almost 50 years, Andy initially made his name in Jamaica, recording at Coxonne Dodd's Studio One before a long and successful collaboration with Bunny Lee in the mid-70s.

It was songs from this era that formed the backbone of his Easter Monday set; a lively, surefooted dancefloor friendly collection of feelgood numbers.

Blessed with the sweetest voice this side of Marvin Gaye (witness a sublime take of Skylarking) Horace Andy's mainstream success came with Massive Attack often reworking tunes from his 1970s canon. Angel, Spying Glass and Hymn of the Big Wheel, the latter he cited as one of his favourite tunes, were all present and correct.

Ably warmed up and then supported by the five-piece Dub Asanti, a workman-like, yet intuitive band, something of a storm was whipped up with a steady stream of classics including Money, Fever and Man Next Door.

Throughout, his rich falsetto never faltered.

Indeed, if anything, it gained strength as the set progressed.

As if to prove that you can't get enough of a good thing; a full show was followed by perhaps the longest encore ever, in which more honey-dipped classics and a cover of Bill Withers' Ain't No Sunshine left the crowd cheering for even more.