Macy Gray, Old Vic Theatre, London

Soul sister number one

Although born in Canton, Ohio, Macy Gray's commercial success was moulded in Britain, her one-of-a-kind voice and celebrated eccentricities confirmed by the slow-burning but long-running chart success of her On How Life Is debut. The choice of a grand English theatrical venue for Macy and her flamboyant, 15-piece band to perform for the first time the bulk of her brand-new record The Id is an acknowledgment of her honorary Brit status. (A status she's achieved without donning a Union Jack and by simply being her weird and wonderful self.)

A well-established aspect of 'the Macy way" is a disregard for timekeeping that makes the national rail network seem like a model of efficiency. It is an hour after the advertised start time before the house lights are dimmed and the curtain is raised for introductions spelt out, Carry On-style, on the back of some men's undergarments. When Macy appears in Regency ruffles and medieval serving-wench apron, she looks as if she's raided the Old Vic costume department. This magpie approach is evident as she leads the band and five brilliantly choreographed singers into the angelic swoop and squelching grooves of "Relating To A Psychopath". The new songs may dig deep into Macy's mental and emotional states, but Freudian analysis is unnecessary when the grooves are this playful or the ballads as silken as "Boo".

Now 33, Gray spent years in obscurity after dropping out of film school. But her effortless movement between Prince-style party jams, Al Green-like confessionals, Pointer Sisters funk and hip-hop attitude makes her a perfect Poster Child for a generation with the entire history of black American music to draw on. Although the staid, seated atmosphere detracted from the show, it was hard not be uplifted by the mere sight and sound of her band. A mix of gender, races and ages, they epitomise the soul tradition, and turn a song with the unpromisingly prosaic title "Sexual Revolution" into a genuine call to arms. The whips brandished by the backing singers on this appeared again on "Oblivion", a song that used a Russian oompah theme for a rhythmically exact meditation on masturbation. All good dirty fun.

Some reservations were voiced about playing a set of almost unheard material, the overlong displays of instrumental prowess, and the Holiday On Ice nature of some of the routines, but a singleminded talent, the six-foot-plus Soul Sister Number One, towers above such criticism. Small wonder that the sizeable portion of the crowd who were let out of their seats to shake their freak thing onstage with Macy for the encore treated her like a homecoming queen.