Bryan Ferry
SEC Armadillo, Glasgow Touring until Friday
Like Bob Dylan, whose songs he sings so well, Bryan Ferry has gone from being a bit of a recluse to an unstoppable old trouper. At 74, he is on the road for the eighth year in a row.
In an interview promoting this tour, Ferry made two interesting points. He mentioned that he was a fan of Prince – now that’s a covers album waiting to happen. And he said there are songs of his that would no longer be heard if he didn’t play them.
Aha, I thought, he’s going to shake things up.
Like Bob Dylan, whose songs he sings so well, Bryan Ferry has gone from being a bit of a recluse to an unstoppable old trouper. At 74, he is on the road for the eighth year in a row
And he has. The first 14 tracks he played at the Albert Hall last June are all back on the shelf, and the cull even extends to Slave To Love and Jealous Guy. Do The Strand is done for now; Don’t Stop The Dance is sitting this one out.
In what may be a first, the show is influenced by a live recording from four decades ago: Live At The Royal Albert Hall 1974, released last month. Ferry begins in that era, with Roxy Music’s The Thrill Of It All and nips back later with tasters of the live album, from the kitsch of I Love How You Love Me to the apocalyptic euphoria of A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall.
When he returns to the Albert Hall this week, older fans will be in heaven.
The rock snobs tend to have Ferry down as the art-rocker who went soft, but here he shows that there was softness even in early Roxy (Casanova, Just Like You), and grit amid the later lushness (Limbo, Your Painted Smile).
Old rockers have to be curators now, and Ferry, with his art-school training, is good at it.
His 11-piece band, big on percussion and backing vocals, are having a ball. The spotlight keeps landing on the saxophonist Jorja Chalmers, who plays like a demon and dresses like a gentleman thief.
In the middle, when many concerts sag, things get even better. Ferry revives Neil Young’s epic Like A Hurricane, a spine-tingler on Roxy’s 1982 tour, and then goes suddenly intimate with a Dylan double whammy: the sting of Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right, followed by the balm of Make You Feel My Love.
There are still plenty of hits: a majestic More Than This, a sublime Avalon, a slinky Love Is The Drug, a rollicking Let’s Stick Together. A packed house of Glasgow pensioners goes politely crazy.
At one point something flies on to the stage, looking suspiciously like a large pair of knickers. Ferry himself is so relaxed, he almost takes off his jacket.
An Evening With Whitney
SEC Armadillo, Glasgow Touring until Tuesday
Rating: 
A hologram tour raises unexpected quandaries. ‘Is he real?’ asks one audience member, pointing at support act Rob Green. Green is indeed here in person, but the headline act couldn’t make it, having been dead since 2012.
Like Roy Orbison and Buddy Holly, Whitney Houston has been plucked from the choir celestial to return in virtual form, courtesy of VFX firm Base Hologram. Reborn as a strangely elongated Amazonian, for 75 minutes she struts her stuff in three dimensions, singing, dancing and chatting, with a live band and eight dancers.
Technically, the show is impressive. Emotionally it’s an empty experience. The hologram’s attempts at interaction are particularly grim, not least the statement that Houston is appearing ‘very much live!’
Reborn as a strangely elongated Amazonian, for 75 minutes Whitney Houston struts her stuff in three dimensions, singing, dancing and chatting, with a live band and eight dancers
Once the novelty has worn off, the night settles into a mix of overpriced karaoke and big-screen concert movie.
A set heavy on weapons-grade balladry is punctuated by dance numbers such as How Will I Know and I Wanna Dance With Somebody. Run To You is sung from within sheets of rain, but otherwise theatrics are kept to a minimum.
‘Let us pray for peace,’ Whitney says, launching into a grandstanding I Will Always Love You. Fat chance. The audience is here to party, filling every pause with whoops and increasing amounts of chatter.
It’s all rather tawdry. Living artists might consider adding a hologram clause to their contracts to prevent such ghoulishness being inflicted on them in the virtual afterlife.
Graeme Thomson
THIS WEEK’S CD RELEASES
By Adam Woods
The Boomtown Rats Citizens Of Boomtown Out Friday
Rating: 
This is the Rats’ first album since the year of Band Aid (1984). These ten decent songs mostly labour in the shadow of Ziggy-era Bowie and other glittery Seventies staples, chugging and pouting but only truly hanging around with the Perfect Day-style lament of Passing Through
Deacon Blue City Of Love Out now
Rating: 
This has the feel of an alternately melancholy and uplifting soundtrack to Glasgow, torn between hometown pride and a yearning for escape. Ricky Ross’s songs remain sturdy and vivid, from the surging, eponymous opener to the romantic, halfspoken closer On Love
Cornershop England Is A Garden Out now
Rating:
Since 1997’s No 1, Brimful Of Asha, Cornershop have returned every few years, dragging a sack of T. Rex and Velvet Underground riffs, lovely Indian pop sounds and cheerfully biting opinions. They sound better than ever, like a ramshackle parallel world you’re glad exists
Nadia Reid Out Of My Province Out now
Rating:
Out Of My Province brings a fresh timelessness, and a warmer, more relaxed feel to New Zealander Reid’s intense, ethereal folk songs: the spring-heeled pop of Other Side Of The Wheel, the languorous, spacious All Of My Love or the Nick Drake-ish, string-accompanied hush of Heart To Ride