Tate McRae, Glasgow review: 'all the right poses'

The audience decibel level was high in the Hydro for Canadian pop star Tate McRae, the 21-year-old singer/songwriter/dancer making a play as the next Dua Lipa with music which makes all the right noises, a performance which struck all the right poses and a stage set with all the right moving parts.

What was missing through all the hair tossing and pouty attitude was any great sense of warmth or sincerity in her delivery and any originality or personality in her turbo-charged electro pop.

But for her target market of teenage girls, screaming in recognition to every song at what could well be their first arena concert experience, this Miss Possessive Tour was a year zero epiphany.

The entire set-up was austere, with McRae and her eight dancers strutting in mechanically sexy mode on hydraulic platforms illuminated by banks of simple but dramatic spot lighting. At least her live drummer and guitarist provided some propulsive clatter and costume change-covering shredding.

McRae is a better dancer than singer. Her vocals were shrouded in effects but there was nowhere to hide with the moves and she hit her mark on every occasion, whether wielding a walking cane in a wind tunnel or staying cool while all around her descended into a writhing group lapdance.

Much of the early part of her show comprised sultry electro R&B, with Guilty Conscience standing out as the strongest pop hook.

Moving to a small B-stage, she failed to conjure much intimacy for her mini-set of “throwback” snippets to her early teen angst YouTube performances, but some nice handheld camera work of McRae and dancers down in the crowd did the trick during the thudding drum’n’bass of Bloodonmyhands before the pumping dance routine to Revolving Door ushered in a more hi-octane dynamic, with the dancers really earning their wages in the energetic closing chapter.

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