Only a handful of current artists can light up the stage in the way that Usher Raymond manages to.
Blessed with an incredible voice and even more impressive dance moves, the 36-year-old still knows how to put on a show.
With his last album underperforming, the new one delayed and a track given away in a cross-promotion with Honey Nut Cheerios, the R&B A-lister perhaps has cause to take stock – but tonight he plays it like a winner.
A successful businessman as well as singer and dancer, this superstar still has his swagger.
He opened up with the bouncy Euphoria and quickly followed it up with Love in The Club.
“It’s been some time since I’ve been here,” he said. No-one would have known. He is still adored around the world and England’s second city is no exception.
Arenas are his natural habitat: his 20 musicians and dancers need the stage room, but so does he, given his propensity for big gestures. Usher baits-and-switches, getting fans to bawl along to the much-loved Pop Ya Collar, only to cut it off as they reach a high-pitched crescendo and slip in a medley of other people’s less worthy hits that he’s featured on, including Diddy’s I Need a Girl and Chris Brown’s New Flame.
International popstar Usher has told of his admiration for the Royal Academy after visiting the Summer Exhibition and how he hopes to use a similar model to help young people at his own foundation.
Usher O2 Arena London 2015,
The US singer, who has sold millions of records worldwide, first visited the art institution two years ago for the world’s largest open-submission exhibition and was so impressed with the concept that he started a dialogue with them.
Last night he returned to speak about his career, inspirations and his charity New Look Foundation to an audience of young Londoners from charity Kids Company as part of the Royal Academy of Arts’ Learning Programme at The RA Schools at Burlington House.
The 36-year-old, who is tonight set to close his tour at The O2, said it was “really encouraging” to see emerging or unknown artists exhibited in the same space as the well-established.
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