Rag’n’Bone Man, tour review: A surely unstoppable star in waiting

Rory “Rag’n’Bone Man” Graham borrows from many, yet he’s his own man and at times, his talent left the audience in awed silence

Backwoodsman’s growl: Rag'n'Bone Man

John Aizlewood25 November 2016

Far from slender, festooned with tattoos which suggest he’s spent the past few years at her majesty’s pleasure, the wrong side of 30 and blessed with the dance moves of a dustbin: Uckfield’s Rory “Rag’n’Bone Man” Graham is hardly a pop titan from central casting. Yet, as a rammed, sold-out Brixton Electric would attest, he’s on his way and he’s surely unstoppable.

Graham padded around the stage like a malevolent teddy bear, his backwoodsman’s growl soaring over a genre-blending melange of hip-hop beats, sweeping keyboards, tightly drilled soul, big drums and a gospel heart.

Whether throwing himself into Bitter End’s heart of darkness or the new, lovelorn As You Are (“It’s hard to write miserable songs when you’re as happy as I am,” he admitted), Graham borrows from many, yet he’s his own man and when he sang the traditional In My Time of Dying alone and a cappella, the awed silence was deafening.

In the epic, Biblical-imagery-swamped juggernaut that was Hell Yeah, Graham transformed himself into an Old Testament fire and brimstone prophet, but when the crowd hollered the chorus of Human (Germany’s No 1 single, right now) louder than Graham himself, an already airborne evening turned appropriately celestial for a star in waiting.