Sade plays to packed Yas Arena

Sade have toured only six times in their more than 25 years as a band, and at their final show on a world tour that ended in Abu Dhabi, they delivered a consummate performance.

Sade performing at Yas Arena in Abu Dhabi on Friday.

Artists and promoters often tout their concert performances as a must-see event, but when it comes to the British soul group Sade, it more than fits the bill; the group seemingly tours once a generation.
This perhaps explains the eclectic crowd at their much-anticipated Yas Arena performance on Friday night.
Not only did the concert cross the generational divide - one mother came with her three daughters while carrying a sleeping infant on her shoulder - but it resonated with all musical tastes, with tattooed metal-heads mixing it up with jazz fiends and ragamuffins.
Most groups spend more time on the road and initiate extra-seasonal tours to make up for dwindling record sales. Sade, however, keep it basic with one world tour per album release, which accounts for only six jaunts in more than 25 years.
The bottom line: a Sade concert is a rare event.
The situation was not lost on the band. With Yas Island being the last stop of a rapturous world tour, Sade delivered a consummate performance of a machine well-oiled.
One thing that was immediately apparent from the concert's opening chords is that Sade is no solo act.
The Nigerian-born British singer Sade Adu may be the face gracing the album covers, but it is in the live performance that one appreciates the musical virtuosity of her band members and fellow songwriters: the multi-instrumentalist Stuart Mathewman, bassist Paul Spencer Denman and Andrew Hale on keyboards.
Coming on to the stage to the sounds of thunder and storms, the band - dressed in black paramilitary gear - were seemingly beamed up from below the stage, with the mercurial Adu appearing separately at centre stage via a hidden set of stairs.
The group launched into the dramatic Soldier of Love, the title track of their last 2010 album, and the differences between the live sound and studio recording were immediate. There was an extra edge as Mathewman's guitar crackled and Denman's bass lines sounded thicker and pulsating. Adu's smokey alto was more dynamic, as it effortlessly moved from deep hushed tones to a quaking wail in the bridge.
Perhaps fearing the left-field opener could have spooked audience members, the group immediately followed it up with the first mass singalong of Your Love Is King before returning to Soldier of Love's sensuality with Skin.
In Love Is Found, one of two new tracks recorded from Sade's latest greatest hits compilation, the group showed their mastery of modern R&B with Adu's "my heart goes boom-boom-boom" sounding fierce and rugged.
Sitting at the edge of the stage, the solitary lit Adu transformed the arena into a small jazz club as she performed a beautifully aching rendition of Jezebel with Mathewman's roaring sax in the climax eliciting a euphoric response from the audience.
Sade's world tour has been acclaimed not only for the musical performances, but for the elaborate stage design and light show by creative director Sophie Muller and lighting designer Baz Halpin. The stage design acted as visual commentary on the themes and musical elements Sade played with throughout their career.
Before the opening sax notes for Smooth Operator, a three-minute animated noir-ish short film was shown representing the title character's slippery behaviour.
In It's a Crime, the stage was transformed into a cabaret club as the band performed as red velvet curtains swayed. In the pulsating Bring Me Home, the group performed behind a projection screen, giving them an eerie 3D image.
The group rounded off the show with a thunderous version of No Ordinary Love and By Your Side before the sweet finale, which featured Cherish the Day.
To the enthusiastic applause and cheers from the audience, Adu notably left out any references to the group's future plans, leaving us with: "Thank you, this is us".
It was a bittersweet moment, but Sade fans understood.
Sade have long since been doing things their own way and no amount of time in between will change that.
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