“THE show is over”, sings Paloma Faith. “The audience is walking out the room”.

It seems an odd choice for the opening song of her Liverpool Sound City gig at the Philharmonic Hall.

But, in the frankly bonkers world of this former magician’s assistant and burlesque performer, anything goes.

Take her tongue-in-cheek opening words, likening the show to a harvest assembly at school: “That’s what it’s like, it’s amazing. You’d have to bring food on from the cupboard for Help the Aged.”

And, asking the audience to wave their hands in time to the music: “This is the point when I like to see my water feature. When the music starts you all just look like an aquarium. Everyone has to do it or it won’t work”.

Arriving stage left in an all-black ensemble of PVC cat suit, sunglasses and four-inch stilettos, she’s mesmerising against a backdrop of colour-changing clouds and mirrors.

Faith is a consummate performer who wrings every last drop of dramatic potential from her time on stage. The night was filled with knowing winks to the audience and meaningful looks to the sky, combined with theatrical hand movements.

On stage, the 24-year-old comes across as an eccentric singing schoolteacher who has helped herself to her pupils’ dressing-up box (including a gold glittery dress with puffball sleeves).

“I’d like you to sing all the choruses for me, thank you very much”, she says, and the audience obediently follows her orders. With all the glitz and glamour on stage, the music plays second fiddle. Faith’s piercing voice was note perfect, but much of the night passed by in a blur of Blues and album tracks.