Now I’m the guy that had a great big grudge about the last time Musiq Soulchild performed in London (you can read exactly what I thought of the whole thing on this very website). But as a fan of the man, I thought I really should head down to Camden for one of his five dates at the Jazz Cafe.

Musiq emerged a little later than expected (of course) and with the hype he clearly relishes to perform his first track BUDDY, which surprised me a bit – I would’ve thought he’d be saving his most recent ‘big’ track ‘til the end. That wouldn’t be the last time I was surprised on the evening.

The point I always raise when talking about Musiq Soulchild is how many good tracks he has under his belt. I mean it’s not like there are one or two gems on every album, we are talking about solid collections right the way through. Growers, non-skipables and tracks that make albums that stay in your CD player for months. His fourth album “Luvanmusiq” has now been in our ears for some time continuing his career spanning the naughties. He acted a little shocked when the crowd confirmed they wanted to hear tracks from this latest album but I’d say this was more ‘pre-planned shock’ if you get my drift.

It was the choice of cuts he performed from this album that was really refreshing, and coupled with his selection from Juslisen, Aijuswanaseing and Soulstar that really made this night special for so many.

He performed the records perfectly giving us a new edge to tracks that many (not me) count as ordinary. I was delighted to hear stuff I would’ve placed money on him not performing like “Thereason”, “Previouscats” and “SoulStar” (his encore track incidentally). I reckon he was pretty delighted to hear the crowd performing such ‘album tracks’ with him. That is exactly what made the night complete for me.