Nora Jones

Manchester Apollo, Tuesday 20th April 2004

When you see a Man with a jumper draped over his shoulders heading for the front row of a gig, you certainly know that you haven’t purchased tickets for Motorhead.

If you were looking for someone to blame for the current crop of jazz-lite artists currently clogging up the charts, non-entities such as Jamie Callum and Katie Melua Nora Jones is an easy target. Her success has brought a deluge of similarly jazz crossover acts.

Though not my artist of choice – I was very much the plus one equation in the purchase of these tickets, an Evening with Nora Jones is not too arduous a task as I thought it might be.

In the quite expansive arena that is the Manchester Apollo the feel of the show, is that of a bar room band playing in a smoky saloon bar.

Nora Jones cuts a somewhat down to earth presence as she kicks off her shoes to open the proceedings with ’Cold Cold Heart’. The set features many of the tracks from her two successful albums, plus the odd other song thrown in for good effect, including a country version of AC/DC’S ‘Ride on me’.

She was equally at home on her own at the piano or backed by her band and she carried the songs though the night. The pace of the set was good, but perhaps a little too similar throughout. One criticism that people level at her is that live she sounds no different than she does on record. Where as on record it makes perfect background music or something relaxing, live it needs to be a bit more panoramic to catch the attention.

It certainly was a pleasant enough experience, but not one that gets me rushing out to buy the records or witness her next gig.