Patrick Wolf, Relentless Garage, London

As friends, fans and industry folk wait for Patrick Wolf to take to the stage for the launch of his fifth album, ‘Lupercalia’, projections of the singer and various nice looking wolves glide slow-mo across a screen. The room is busy but comfortably so. The room darkens, the screen rises revealing the star’s name, and the stage is soon occupied by band members playing (for now) violin, clarinet, synth, bass, and drums. After an unnecessarily long build-up, Patrick begins to sing ‘Armistice’ from offstage, creating even more suspense. Walking onstage and over to his piano, dressed in a fantastic suit, he is welcomed by the screams and cheers of his clearly devoted fans. The love song is beautiful and his voice passionate.

‘Time Of My Life’ opens incredibly cinematically with stunning violin from both Patrick and a band member. Some of the audience sing along and he smiles back gratefully - the interaction between him and his fans is wonderful.

Slowing things down with ‘Teignmouth’, Patrick gets his harp skills out before the song flows into much-loved classic from his first album, ‘Bluebells’. The whole room sings along to the smile-inducing track over the sounds of fireworks. Patrick is not only extremely talented, but a fabulous performer too. He has great stage presence, strolling between the harp, audience and piano with both charisma and ease. The glitter in his hair is a nice touch too, surrounding him like an aura as he dances.

Starting his latest single ‘House’, he messes up slightly with a cheeky “Oh shit!” “That’s why I’ll never end up in Las Vegas - I’m too British,” he says, making us love him even more. The track, taken from Lupercalia, is fun, poppy and lovely, and comparisons could be drawn between this and what Noah & The Whale are leaning towards with their latest album.

Next they take the opportunity to play songs they don’t often perform live, starting with ‘Wolf Song’. Again, he plays a wrong note. “Oh fuck!” He explains that he’s pretty overwhelmed by today, the fact that it’s the launch of his fifth album. He first played this venue when he was just twelve years old, when him and a friend had a band called Japan Anti-Rock (an anagram of Patrick and Joanna). He tells us that it feels like a sort of homecoming tonight. Starting up again he shows off his versatile voice alongside his uke.

Patrick’s flirty performance of ‘The Libertine’, with its great lyrics and Middle Eastern style violin contrasts completely with the harsh electronic sounds of ‘Slow Motion’ that follow. Again from his new album, tonight’s version of ‘The Falcons’ is very fun, and almost Indian sounding at times. It is clear that Patrick loves performing as he jumps around the stage before ending with an exaggerated exhausted collapse onto the piano. Continuing with tracks from the new album, we’re given “another London song” in the form of ‘Burmondsy Street’. With his violinist on piano, clarinettist on sax, and Patrick on the harp, it is clear that his band of multi-instrumentalists are just as talented as he. He follows this with ‘The Days’ - “Yet another very local song” that he explains was written for a friend’s film.

Patrick unbuttons his shirt for the jazzy, musical theatre like ‘The Bachelor’ and ‘This City’, which feature nice sax and an energetic performance once more from our favourite redhead. The brilliant ‘Magic Position’ is dedicated to recently departed saxophone legend Clarence Clemons, before Wolfy and the band end by performing ‘The Future’ for the very first time (apart from, we are told, when he sung it on a friend’s houseboat, drunk, at three in the morning). The set up is beautiful, with the lights shining almost through a seated Patrick.

After a fairly speedy costume change and continuous applause, the sextet return, bringing with them a completely new atmosphere. A dubstep version of ‘Tristan’ livens things up, followed by the upbeat ‘Together’ which Patrick performs from the middle of the audience, singing and dancing together with them. The night is rounded off splendidly with ‘William’ as the handsome Wolf sits on the edge of the stage, holding the hands of his fans. People’s nights were most certainly made tonight.