"If you listen to my lyrics, you'll know I'm a soul baby," confesses Dennis Coles midway through a typically eccentric set. "And you've got to have soul to understand what I'm saying."
As Ghostface Killah, Coles has made his name as the most singular and idiosyncratic voice to have emerged from the nine-man Wu-Tang Clan. His ability to leaven his verbally bejewelled stories of drug dealers and street life with the sense of vulnerability and heartfelt reflection sets him apart.
Over five solo albums, four Clan LPs and innumerable guest spots, Coles has pulled hip-hop out of shape and refocused it, showing that this is music capable of expressing emotions other than fear, envy and paranoia - though he remains a master of those, too.
His genius is on show sporadically tonight, but it is all too easy to see why Ghostface remains on the margins. Run, during which Ghost and the other members of his Theodore Unit crew fling themselves back and forth across the stage, and the infectious Be Easy, are punchy and thrilling. But entire swathes of the performance are lost to shoddy sound, the frequent stops and starts lose momentum, and a finale in which eight bemused women are invited on to stage to gyrate with the Theodores is unattractively shambolic.
However, Holla - in which he rap-sings not over a breakbeat but over the entirety of the Delfonics' La La Means I Love You - encapsulates everything that is great about Ghostface. At once he pays homage to the soul music he grew up with, respects the sampled roots of hip-hop, and takes the music forward with daring verve. He suggests that anyone could do this, if possessed of talent and a spark of originality.
If Coles could focus this brilliance for the whole performance, he would surely become the superstar records like Fishscale show he deserves to be.
