George has turned into a one-man Coldplay

George Ezra has often talked about struggling with anxiety, but you’d never know it from his CV. He makes being a pop star look very easy. He reached the top at 21 with his second single, Budapest, which went platinum five times over. Eight years later, he has released three albums, every one a No1.

Gazing around the Manchester Arena, you can see how he does it. For every gaggle of thirtysomethings, there’s a couple with small children. Ezra is a oneman Coldplay, a family entertainer with songs like smiley faces and manners to match.

‘Manchester!’ he exclaims after his first song. ‘Thank you for being here.’ After the second he adds:

‘My name is George Ezra and this is my lovely band.’

The shtick might be irritating if the music weren’t so affable, too. Ezra’s hits, mostly co-written with Joel Pott from Athlete, stand out on the chart shows because they’re neither clubby nor folky. They’re sunny timeless pop songs, sung in a voice so warm that nobody cares whether it’s cool.

As a lyricist he has two special subjects: getting away from it all and getting it off his chest. Early on, as he went from Budapest to Barcelona, you wondered if he was sponsored by Interrail.

But with Gold Rush Kid, released in June, the escapism gave way to introspection. ‘You’re not alone, though you feel alone,’ the title track goes, ‘you’re just like everyone, you’re holding on.’

The music hasn’t changed, apart from incorporating a whiff of the steel band. In some fields this would be frowned upon as cultural appropriation, but if the pop world worried about that, almost everyone would have to be cancelled, starting with The Beatles.

The Caribbean vibe suits Ezra, who wandered off a beach in St Lucia in 2018, came across an exuberant funeral and promptly wrote the chorus of his latest hit,

Green Green Grass. It’s big on TikTok and immense in concert as his sparkling horn section adds a layer of euphoria. The sound, throughout, is deliciously crunchy.

The only duds are a couple of stabs at arena rock, which doesn’t suit him with its lumpen layers.

He’s a pop singer and he proves it with pretty, shining versions of Paradise, Budapest and Shotgun.

Craig and Charlie Reid, the twins better known as The Proclaimers, have done two things this year to startle their fans.

One was turning 60, which seemed far-fetched for these boyish figures. The other was letting slip that they wouldn’t go 500 miles for anyone. Next thing you know, Tom Jones will be denying any involvement in the unfortunate death of Delilah.

Now the Reids have done two things to delight those fans. One is announcing a ten-week tour, starting next month; the other is releasing their 12th album, another set of cuddly protest songs.

On Sundays By John Calvin, they show that lockdown was just a

1970s sabbath writ long. The whole album is so full of life and wit, it could give opinionated middle-aged men a good name.