Marianne Gunn's verdict: five stars
You know you're having a musical moment when your cabinet becomes filled with Grammy and Brit prizes in just one short awards season. The fact Sam Smith - due to his Comic Relief offering with John Legend - has kept Madonna off her 12th number one album spot suggests the 22-year-old from London may have heavyweight champion power as well as star quality.
His last Glasgow gig, in the much smaller O2 ABC sister venue, was a perfectly short and sweet showcase for his multi-platinum album In the Lonely Hour. This time, however, he returned to the city for two nights, with the smile of a conquering hero, resplendent with accolades from both sides of the Atlantic - and, not forgetting, a snazzy new shirt.
After an opening number with a few too many digital tweaks, the soul funk vibe of the evening was introduced with Together. Leave Your Lover then epitomised the heartbreak explored in his album, before I'm Not the Only One was the first big hitter of the night. Clap-along Like I Can showcased the vocal talents of his trio of backing singers (and was perhaps one of the best testaments to his songwriting ability).
Jazz-inspired Reuben James provided keyboard piano accompaniment for a more stripped-back sound for Good Thing, offering one of the more intimate moments before a storming rendition of Smith's current number one single Lay Me Down. Sultry cover My Funny Valentine was followed by a sing-along La La La and anti-industry toe-tapper Money on My Mind.
Encore tracks Latch, Make It To Me and Stay With Me really managed to capture the versatility of Smith's unique vocals (from dance-inspired track to love letter to uber hit without a hitch) and with a set like that he just might have the charts sewn up for a few years yet. Sorry, Madge.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article