IT may boast that it’s come “direct from the USA” but The Magic of Motown/Soul has been touring the UK on and off for a good few years now.

Of course you can’t really go wrong with a solid gold selection of classic soul hits. Or can you? Sadly the answer seems to be yes. The audience at the Pavilion had to suffer a show that veered wildly between pretty damn good and absolutely ghastly.

It’s hard to understand why. The seven piece band with keyboards, guitar, bass, drums and suitably upfront brass section were slickly competent and the four guys and three girls singing and dancing seemed, in the main, pretty good...until you gave them the wrong song.

So it was that sheer undiluted pleasure of numbers like Marvin Gaye’s I Heard It Through The Grapevine and Ike and Tina Turner’s River Deep, Mountain High were nearly eclipsed by appallingly dull versions of Knock On Wood and Midnight Hour and a reading of Aretha Franklin’s Respect that set my teeth on edge.

Happily there was considerably more good than bad and tributes to great stars like Stevie Wonder and the late Michael Jackson were clearly appreciated but this was certainly not the best version of this show I’ve seen.