Posted: Friday 27th June 2008

25-year old, Australian-born Sam Sparro (aka Sam Falson) has quickly marked himself out as one of pop’s finest rising stars. The success of his single Black and Gold, a super-smooth slab of cool pop, has catapulted him into the limelight and ensured that his debut self-titled album crashed straight into the Top 5 in the albums chart. After successfully supporting Adele on her recent UK tour, Sparro headlined his own show last night at the Bloomsbury Ballroom in London.

Prior to Sparro’s arrival on stage, newcomer Eliza Doolittle had the job of warming up the crowd but judging from the energy and enthusiasm the crowd really didn’t need any help. Sparro arrived on stage a little after 10.15pm and launched straight into new single 21st Century Life. As witnessed during his support slot on the Adele tour, Sparro brings a really energetic performance to the stage and dressed his unique geek-chic style manages to whip the crowd into a frenzy. Last night this energy was present and Sparro threw everything he had into putting on a great show.

Over the course of the hour long set, Sparro performed the best selections from his debut album leaving Black and Gold for his penultimate number. Highlights included Clingwrap, Too Many Questions and the hilarious Cottonmouth. Sadly Sparro didn’t perform our favourite album track Sally but we’ll forgive him. For the encore Sparro and his band arrived back on stage for a rather effective cover of the Crystal Waters’ classic Gypsy Woman (She’s Homeless) which had the crowd singing along at the top of their lungs.

Sparro is a real entertainer and one of those rare artists that actually sound even better in the live environment. With every song Sparro was note-for-note perfect and even when he switched the way he sang certain lines it enhanced rather than ruined the song. Sparro had a clear rapport with his band and his three backing singers and regularly interacted with them and danced along with them whilst performing.

Last night’s gig proved that there’s more to Sparro than the current hype surrounding him and we can say it’s one of the best pop gigs we’ve been to in some time. If you get the chance to catch him live then do as you’d be a complete fool to miss it. We suspect that we’ll be hearing a lot more from Sam Sparro and last night heralded the arrival of a genuine pop icon in the making.