If Jill Scott hadn't left that teacher training course a few years back, she would have made one hell of a school teacher. Two songs in, she rounds upon an unidentified misdemeanour in part of the crowd. Then she urges the front row not to mess with her. Then she stops a song to admonish the poor sound man. "There are two things I will not tolerate," cries Philadelphia's answer to Miss Jean Brodie. "I wanna hear my backing singers and my mother-fucking self!"
All this is delivered with a smile and, authority established, she sets about giving a lesson in soul. For anyone familiar with Scott's studio-tempered records a live experience is something else again. Her entrance is that of a Hollywood star: her voice scorching out of the speakers like a great beast. She can do sultry Billie Holliday or powerful Aretha. At one point, she is even narrating mantras like a female Jim Morrison, the legacy of previous existence as a poet. Then there's her astonishing stage presence: big and brassy - Muhammad Ali in a hair wrap.
Scott can do sassy all night, and does. The Kung Fu moves are unfeasible but her real triumph is in presenting the complexities of womanhood in a manner that thrills men and woman alike. Much has been made of Thickness, Scott's strident feminist, slightly anti-sex anthem, but Scott is not down on sexuality, just the way it is presented.
Physically, she makes a mockery of pop's obsession with size eights. When she removes her jacket to reveal a straining white blouse, whoops fill the auditorium. "I'll give you what you want," she cries, alarmingly. However, her moods veer between seduction, strength, insecurity, vengeance and hurting.
Her band don't do badly either, a nine-piece outfit who effortlessly revitalise old soul sounds. The clarinet solo is one highlight. Another arrives when the drummer gets so excited he leaps around his kit while Scott is speaking, although this is understandable. At the end of a particularly comic ramble which explains - rather graphically and involving a scream - why sex is better with love, Scott stands hands on hips daring anyone not to be impressed.
· Jill Scott plays Brixton Academy, 16 February, 0870 771 2000, then tours.
