Macy Gray at IndigO2

Tonight was the turn of Macy Gray to amaze and amuse at the IndigO2 out in Greenwich and she was on truly stonking form! I saw her 3 - 4 years ago at Shepherds Bush so it was nice to have a reprise show. She was on promptly at 9pm and played a nicely paced and judged set for just over 1 1/2 hours, backed by a great five-piece band and two great backing singers in pink fringed go-go dresses. Macy was in a black trouser suit with sargeant stripes on on sleeve. I wanted her to wear something psychedelic but maybe that phase is in the past.

Macy is, of course, mad, but it's the madness of genius, the madness of a visionary, the madness of an artist. She told us we were beautiful. She told us to lean back our heads so we could scream at God. She told us to shake our collective booty (mine was wiggling in my seat). She gave us a lesson in screams - the scream when you're running away from someone, the scream when you're fucking and the scream when Macy Gray is on-stage. O yes. And when she wasn't enthralling us with her next tale (it's comforting to know that she didn't have the shits today) she enthralled us with her wonderfully expressive voice and her total control of her environment - the stage and the auditorium.

The setlist was carefully constructed to cover her career to date but it's what she did with the songs and how she mixed and matched them that really enhanced the show. She went down the reggae route on a few songs that I'd never thought of in the context of a reggae treatment. And how did she squeeze in a couple of verses of 'Do Ya Think I'm Sexy' (yes, the Rod Stewart classic), 'Groove Is In The Heart', and the best version I've ever heard of 'Creep', a heavy funk dup version (yes, even better than Amanda Palmer's version, but Amanda does it with ukelele and tutu and that gets additional presentational points).

Macy has her own collection of classics, of course, and these were well represented. My personal favourites were a massive, extended version of 'Demons', the marvellous 'Sexual Revolution' which is designed to get everyone's freak on, the madness of 'Oblivion' when the roadies came on with extra cymbals and lyrics on paper, and she closed with an extended 'I Try' (of course).

Macy is a very charming lady and gives good show. She only swore a few times (a mild disappointment), is witty and, of course, has *that* marvellous voice. I liked her glitter mic stand, I liked the two singers who gave it some serious welly and shimmied and shook all over the stage and I liked the band who filled that space with sound. If you haven't seen Macy live yet then you really ought to - she's a force of nature.


Oh, and apologies for the pics taken with my phone ...