Will Young

Friday 18th November, The Corn Exchange, £35

[rating:5/5]

OHEMMGEE, I LOVE WILL YOUNG.

I’ll start with a confession. Will and I haven’t always seen eye to eye. In fact, there was a time – long, long ago – when I despised him. On 9th February 2002, Will cruelly stole the Pop Idol crown from Gareth Gates, my first love. And on that day I truly understood what it means to have a broken heart.

But I stood by Gareth. I queued for hours in the rain to see him live; I started drinking Pepsi because it sponsored him; and I developed a sort-of faux-stutter. Hell, I even got my friend’s aunt’s friend, who worked in the same hospital as Gareth’s mum, to get me a signed photo. It was love of the truest form.

But then something changed. Specifically, Gareth changed. He shagged Jordan. And then he lied about it. And then he married Susanna Mole. And named his baby Missy. And wore orange Ugg boots in public.

And so, just like that, my love disappeared. I needed a new man on whom to focus my attentions (read: lust).

Hello Will Young.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUIElKA3nwA

Will’s winning performance of Evergreen

And so I gave Will a chance. I went to see him do some acting in 2006, but I wasn’t ready, and I tripped him up. Five years later, I knew it was time to give him another shot. And so I went to The Corn Exchange ready to move on. And move on I did.

From the moment Will entered that stage, he was so painfully handsome and effortlessly charismatic that it was nigh on impossible not to fall in love with him. His banter with the audience was so spot on that my friend (a male friend, I might add) turned to me and said: “I think I am ovulating.” So did I. And so we ovulated together. And when Will picked up a teddy bear that someone threw onto the stage, read the note and said: “Thanks Charlene,” I wished for nothing more than to be Charlene’s bear, sitting in the comfort of Will’s hands.

Will opened with Jealousy, and was the perfect mix of cheeky, charming and genuinely brilliant. He continued to jump, dance and shimmy his way around the stage performing a perfect mix of his old classics and material from his new album, Echoes.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MHtrM-jf9o&ob=av2e

New hit Jealousy

Will was dressed head to toe in black, a sexy choice for a sexy, sexy man. His legs were perhaps a little too skinny, but his well-defined biceps made up for Sexy Will’s ONLY flaw. Oh Will. Oh charming Will.

Other highlights included a fantastic cover of Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill, which was genuinely better than the original, and a tear-jerking performance of Silent Valentine, in which pink love hearts cascaded upon our hero’s manly form.

But the standout moment was, without a doubt, Will’s closing performance of Evergreen. Until Friday night, I couldn’t listen to that song without weeping. It bought back all the memories of Gareth’s loss, you see. And true to form, I wept. But this time, I knew it was something different. This time I didn’t cry for Gareth, I cried for Will and Will’s voice alone. And in that moment, I simultaneously lost and found myself. God, I wish I were a gay man.