Blast from the past as Kisstory tour comes to Birmingham - review

As soon as I saw the line-up, I knew immediately it was a night not to be missed. And was proved right too.

UK garage, 90s reggae, R'n'B and even some pop/rap in the form of Nelly.

How they managed to squeeze so many famous names into one evening is beyond me, but thankfully they did because it was such a superb night.

Having grown up loving the game of basketball, rap music became one of my favourite genres through osmosis more than anything else.

I've loved the music since I was a young teenager, but my first love was dance floor reggae.

It was hard to avoid growing up in the 90s – not that I wanted to avoid it – and slowly it developed into a love garage, rap, hip hop and even a little sprinkling of speed garage too, if you were in the right place at the right time.

So when The Blast Off Tour! came around, hosted Fatman Scoop, featuring live performances from Nelly, Salt N Pepa, Shaggy, Mya and Blu Cantrell, it was certainly one not to miss.

And of course there were plenty of representatives from the UK too, featuring UK garage stars So Solid members Lisa Maffia and MC Romeo, pioneer MC DT and the British duos Oxide & Neutrino, and Sweet Female Attitude.

A personal favourite duo of mine whilst growing up was DJ Luck & MC Neat – I can't remember any mates not having their first album in their locker during the 2000s.

It was the sort of album where there's 'no forwards'. Every track was a banger, expertly mixed and MC'd all at the same time.

Popping Resorts World Birmingham after work to catch The Blast Off Tour!, it was a shame I was unable to catch all the artists, as it was impossible to arrive any earlier than 7pm.

It meant we missed Fatman Scoop open proceedings, as well as the UK Garage Allstars – which really hurt – but all was soon well as Blu Cantrell, Mya, Eve, Salt & Pepa, Shaggy and then Nelly brought the house down.

I'd been lucky enough to catch Shaggy twice before, and he never fails to get the crowd jumping, but the rest were all new to me.

The likes of Blu Cantrell, Mya and Eve just remind me of lairy hoildays abroad with my mates, drinking far too much and waking up in some weird and wonderful places.

Their voices formed the backdrop of those heady days, with the clubs constantly playing their hits – plus the ladies always liked to dance to their songs too, which is never a bad thing.

A big shout out has to go to Fatman Scoop too, who did a superb job keeping the crowd entertained in between acts.

And as for the acts, all of them lived up to the hype and Nelly was a brilliant – but for me the star of the show was Eve.

She just owned that stage and really put everything into her performance. Does she ever age?

But I think my good friend, Richard McKenzie, summed up the night perfectly once it had ended.

Blu Cantrell showed Breathe is still a banger, Mya still sounds amazing, Eve remains the the Queen of Rap, seeing Salt 'n' Pepa perform was a bucket list moment, Shaggy was damned good yet again and although Nelly was never his favourite back in the day, after last night's gig he may have to re-evaluate his opinion.

Simply a brilliant night – and a single word about coronavirus either.