The opening act of The Niall Horan Flicker world tour is 24 year old American singer/songwriter Julia Michaels who may have been a new name to some of the crowd but has a couple of Grammy nominations and numerous other awards in the US.

She delivered what was an almost perfect pop set and won herself a few thousand new fans.

A tour like this is a great platform for any artist to merit a support slot on and she should go on to bigger things in the UK. To be honest though the vast majority were here for one reason only.

The last time I saw Niall Horan he was here at the BIC right at the start of the first One Direction tour.

Like all the other members of the band he looked ill at ease on the arena stage and I wondered how far they would go.

As it turns out they went all the way! They learned their craft, conquered the world and went out on a massive high as one of the biggest bands on the planet.

So here we are again back at the BIC and this time he is the sole focus of the spotlight and carrying the whole night and indeed tour on his shoulders. On tonight’s showing that is something he is more than capable of doing.

The set list for tonight’s gig obviously relied heavily on Niall’s only solo album Flicker that it seemed that everyone in the crowd had bought and learned every word to.

From the uplifting pop of Seeing Blind to This Town and Paper Houses he had the crowd hanging on every note.

He threw covers of Springsteen and Camila Cabello in to a well-paced hour and a half that proved he has the voice and stage presence to continue to carve out a long and successful career on his own merits.

A mid set solo session, where Niall actually persuaded a few thousand teenage girls to put their phones away, contained an excellent rendition of album title track Flicker, Fools Gold and a piano based song that I didn’t recognise but I am certain everyone else did.

The main set ended with a rousing, full volume sing-a-long version of Mirrors before a quick three-song encore that included the One Direction tune Drag Me Down and solo track Slow Hands. A great show that I really enjoyed and proved that Niall Horan has shaken off the chains of his past and is well and truly the solo artist he wants to be.