Roberta Flack

A soul legend takes no Flack

Roberta Flack
Hammersmith Appollo

By Richard Osley

FORTY quid a pop these tickets cost and still Roberta Flack expects us to sing the choruses for her.
But then Flack – 69, sideshow hair, curvy hips – has earned the right to do what she wants. If she wants to start a song and then jack it in after a few lines, she can do. If she wants to ramble on with an opening monologue that is longer than the song she is about to sing, then that’s her prerogative too. It might be annoying to sit through a ‘sunshine’ medley where she murders Ain’t No Sunshine and Here Comes The Sun with one aching blow – but Flack is at the stage where she does what she pleases.
Truth is, she has already booked her name in soul’s hall of fame and, whatever she does at the Apollo, she isn’t going to get her evicted. It means, however, we are left with an evening of high and lows.
There is a stirring version of Killing Me Softly, perhaps her most famous song of all (with thanks to The Fugees), a delicate rendition of Feel Like Making Love and the mushy but engaging First Time I Ever Saw His Face. It’s all wrapped up with the witty on-stage repartee that you would expect from someone who has been around the block a few times.
She knows what strings to pull so don’t be fooled by the “aw shucks” reaction to the standing ovation and the end of show flowers. Flack knows the score.
Yet for every hit, there is a miss. She is surrounded by a band which sounds so synthetic that at times you feel like you have been time-warped back to the 1980s, soul music’s worst decade.
The bass is clumsy. There are clarinet breaks that we could live without. Worst of all, vibrating wine bar keys that undermine Flack’s vocals. And, of course, every soul band of this generation has a finger-snapping guy with a back to front Kangol cap and sunglasses – this rag-tag brigade doesn’t disappoint.
Thankfully, Flack has enough hit records to lift her above it all. In the legend league, she is more important than Whitney and Chaka, if not quite a match for Aretha or Diana. And while she can still melt us with Killing Me Softly, she will always be on to a winner.