Tonight's is a pretty poor showing by one of R&B's brightest young hopes. While Common, Bilal, Jill Scott, Kelis and D'Angelo have been tearing up UK stages with live bands and energetic performances, this is one man wandering around a big space on his own.
In fact it's a PA with a £25 ticket. True Kelly Price is the main act, but Jaheim isn't billed as guest or support and judging by the screams and pre-match talk it is for his appearance that the vast majority of London's R&B females have made it to west London.
Most baffling is the fact that Kelly Price has a full piece band while Jaheim just sports shell toes and a mike. Perhaps we've been lead to expect too much from him with the glossy video for his single 'Could It Be', but Jaheim is short on professionalism.
Tall of stature and deep of voice he still can't fill the Apollo's stage. The two tweedle dum dancers gyrating to his side only make his effort at entertainment look even more sparse. This is an appearance much more suited to a small club than a 2,500 venue.
But he avoids the rap influenced tracks from his debut album 'Ghetto Love' to concentrate largely on the ballads. Though only 22 he's heavily influenced by Teddy Pendergrass and Luther Vandross, whose 'Give Me The Reason' he sings. He also does Willie Nelson's much covered classic 'When A House Is Not A Home'.
Great tracks of his own such as 'Could It Be', 'Lil Nigga' and 'Let It Go' are largely skipped through as he concentrates on seducing the ladeeeez. Red roses, stools on stage and flowers to the audience make up the full 80s cliche of what a soul singer should be.
R&B and rap shows have made a huge leap forward in the last two years in terms of value for money and entertainment. No one seems to have mentioned this to Jaheim who, like many artists in 'the bad old days', is much better on record than he is on stage.
