WITH everyone packing their tents and heading out to festivals it's been a reasonably quiet summer at the BIC, until tonight that is.

It's Saturday night and Ronan Keating is out on tour and playing the BIC as the UK leg nears its climax.

First up though was support Metaxas who deserves to go far based on tonight's short set. A great voice and some songs to match got the crowd nicely warmed up for the arrival of the man everyone had come to see.

The main event of the evening started with a new song and then launched straight into 'Loving Each Day'.

The crowd was on its feet almost from the off and remained there for the majority of the evening. 

The pace didn’t let up until the crowd had a chance to catch their breath during an acoustic session from the 'kitchen' which had everyone temporarily seated with a duet with Metaxas and ‘Falling Slowly’ from the film and stage show 'Once'.

It was then out of the kitchen and back on with the full band show.

First up was ‘Last Thing on My Mind’, the duet with Leanne Rimes followed by 'Let Me Love You' from his first solo album. My favourite tunes of the evening had to be the Cat Stevens classic 'Father & Son' (which is the song Ronan sang for his Boyzone audition) and the Tracey Chapman song ‘Baby Can I Hold You’.

'When You Say Nothing At All', an up-tempo 'Brown Eyed Girl' and 'Life Is A Rollercoaster' ended the main set on a high note.

I have been to many gigs over the years and this show was everything a fan or even us neutrals would have wanted to see and hear.

A great mix of solo material with the odd older tune thrown in, plenty of chat from the stage, the sound was good and the light show was spot on.

What more could anyone ask for?

The show overran its planned timings but no one seemed to mind as a short two song encore ending with new song Long Goodbye sent everyone home happy.