With a whisper, Tori Amos brings the show proper to an end, her elegant fingers jumping off the final chord like a cat on hot coals before she walks the front of the stage clasping outstretched hands. She waves and smiles to every corner of the London Jazz Cafe before sitting back at the piano and hovering over the ivories.
"OK folks, this is the encore. I can't go up and down those fucking stairs in these heels!"
It's easy to fall in love with this lady, for all manner of reasons. Probably the most compelling is her performance – the chance to see a recognised genius play a venue as intimate as this, for free, is the kind of thing that comes up once in a decade or so. If you don't know how good this lady is... you wouldn't have been among the 400 or so hopefuls queuing in the rain at 5am on Wednesday morning.
It is an exhausted but elated crowd of fans in the Jazz Cafe tonight, feeling fortunate but thanked immediately for the early morning vigil by our hostess as she takes the stage. She's a pagan goddess, this one, at once beguiling and banshee, and it is a testament to a certain mellowing that she's here to promote a Christmas album, or as she puts it a 'Solstice collection'.
The set list is clearly visible taped to the floor, and some fans are no doubt relieved at the relatively light scattering of Christmas tunes. Although in the event, these turn out to be great fun – tracks like 'A Silent Night With You' and 'Star of Wonder' are a bit mellower and more schmaltzy than Tori in her most uncompromising form. But they sit atop virtuoso composition and bear the wit and twist of a lady whose sweetness is always tempered. Christmas is romantic, you get presents, you spend time with your family, but Christianity is always going to be ambivalent for this pastor's daughter.
Tori is spellbinding, but relaxed at the same time, telling one girl in the crowd that she used to do drugs with her Mom, and sharing stories about her own precocious daughter, and making eye contact with everyone in the room. Gentle laughter, wild applause and appreciative buzzing switches like a light into reverential silence whenever she plays. This is an up-close masterclass from a lady with a hauntingly beautiful voice and a compositional skill and poise that surely place her among the all-time rock music greats.
Of course, it's the old favourites that get the biggest reactions, kicking off with 'Lady In Blue' and 'Concertina' and including 'Ophelia', 'Doughnut Song' and 'Father Lucifer'. A charming encore features a cockney knees-up about London girls and motherhood represented in 'Pink & Glitter'. There's no time for 'Cornflake Girl', somewhat unusually, but perhaps because this is a hardcore fan gig. Each and every song including the Christmas ones throws the room into awed silence.
It's hard to describe what a privilege this kind of experience is. Perhaps the best thing to say about a show like this is that it leaves the crowd agog. This kind of pleasure can make you forget to breathe.
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