You've heard about those legendary rock shows that have "everything". But it's unlikely you've ever been to one. Unless, that is, you've been to see Wyclef Jean.
As part of the Fugees, the world-conquering rap trio he still insists he's a part of, and as a solo artist, Clef has concocted a style of live performance that pays eloquent homage to his multifarious musical roots while always looking forward. Just as on record, he exhibits a keen-eared sense of what disparate sounds and styles will work together, turning this marathon three hour set into, at times, part history lesson, part school disco.
The format, familiar to seasoned Wyclef-watchers, must be at least bemusing for everyone else. Clef plays it reasonably straight for an hour and a half, trotting out a sequence of tracks from his two solo albums and going on a quick run through some of the Fugees' bigger hits. The rest of the show finds the dreadlocked maverick orchestrating a party with the help of his DJ,
occasionally feeling moved to strap his guitar on, call the band back on stage and play another song. What the watching Mick Jagger can be making of it all one can only guess at, though the veteran rocker, sat on the balcony beside members of his family, certainly seems to be getting' his groove on.
Clef's band, which includes bass, drums and keyboards as well as himself on various guitars, takes the DJ as their starting point. So in between straightforward readings of Clef originals such as the sublime '911' or mantra-like 'Gone Til November' they charge off into hip hop history, belting out snatches of rap classics by playing along to the original records. Equally at home playing reggae, soul, funk and blues, the band turn out an authentic rock'n'roll jam, Clef doing his best Little Richard to underline the fact that this is black music, too. In fact, the only black music they don't dabble in tonight is jazz, though you get the feeling that they'll probably have worked out how to do that by the next time they're over here.
The "band as jukebox" theme is taken to its logical conclusion in the second half, when Clef abandons all the conventional trappings of a pop show to clamber up onto the venue's upper tiers, hassling his DJ to spin tunes to order while the dancefloor goes berserk. Jagger looks on with some amusement as 2000 rap fans jump around to the strains of 'Satisfaction', though the real surprise is the enthusiastic reception given to A-Ha's 'Take On Me'. No, really.
There's a real feeling of the changing of the guard here, old certainties and conventions being consigned to the dustbin while the new generation moves the game on. Wyclef's show might seem like flinging so much aural mud at the wall in an attempt to make some of it stick, but what he's really doing is showing us where his own polyglot music comes from by breaking everything down to its constituent parts.
At the same time, he never forgets that being a fan of music is just as important as making it, and in so doing offers new possibilities for performers with the confidence to overcome their self-consciousness. While some will inevitably feel his job is to play his own records and will feel cheated by his decision to chop and change songs midway through to spend so much of his time playing other people's records, that's their loss. This is musical revolution, and Wyclef Jean takes no prisoners.
IMAGES: HAYLEY MADDEN
