IF Stereophonics’ last five albums had been as good as their first two, they would be the biggest band in the world right now.

Not that the boys from the Welsh valleys, who aptly opened their latest UK tour on St David’s Day, have failed to fulfil their potential. The thousands-strong crowd was testament to that.

Frontman Kelly Jones, whose vocals were at their gravelly best, made no secret of the fact that the band’s set would contain material old and new.

Early songs, such as Traffic and A Thousand Trees, were interspersed with later, radiofriendly numbers, such as Maybe Tomorrow and Have A Nice Day.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the more commercially-successful numbers went down as well, if not better, than the golden oldies.

The audience was treated to almost all of the band’s seventh studio album, Keep Calm And Carry On – surely an indication of Jones’ confidence in the new material.

And rightly so. Keep Calm is comfortably the band’s best effort since the heady days of Performance And Cocktails – released 11 years ago this week.

Standout among the new songs was punchy lead single Innocent and Could You Be The One?

Jones was content to let the music do the talking – although he did hint that his was perhaps the only Welsh band prepared to play on their patron saint’s day.

Andrew Walker