Tinie Takes A Turn On London Street

Tinie Tempah Shows Up at Voodoo Daddy's

Tinie Tempah at Voodoo Daddy’s Showroom
London Street, Norwich

27th June 2026

“How are you doing Norwich?”

“How are you doing Voodoo Daddy’s?”

Tinie hitting the heights in the Voodoo basement

Norwich, or at least one hundred and fifty fine people were doing very well, thank you. As for Voodoo Daddy’s, this Everywhere At Once National Lottery funded festival event was a very welcome boost to the finest dive bar in the land.   No Glastonbury Festival this year meant that musicians have had to seek alternative venues to play and with small venues suffering from commercial pressures, jeopardising the very idea of specialist live music venues, someone came up with the truly excellent idea of distributing the names around the country to keep music live.  Tinie Tempah was one BIG name who was only to happy to take part. 

“If there were no places like this when I was coming up, I wouldn’t have made it.” he explained to the packed house.  I was lucky to get a ticket, having missed out on the initial round of ticket sales, I checked a later Instagram post and was chuffed to have a second chance.  The first allocation of tickets went within minutes of the initial post from Voodoo Daddy’s - which I didn’t believe was quite right. He who hesitates and all that. Two lads in the queue had a similar experience with a Spotify notice alerting them to a second batch of tickets on sale and they snapped a couple up without question.

As we shuffled forward toward the door the line stalled and eventually we discovered that some of the queue were just after the pizzas from the takeaway pizzeria oven, a vital part of the Voodoo Daddy's experience, if you have an early to fuel up for. 

As Tinie was being hustled through the crowd to the stage  by his posse of friends and minders, the lads took a detour into the left-hand standing area, which is a dead end. The urgent group had to make a rapid U-turn and find a different way through, He clearly found that an amusing moment, it being a reminder that this was a grass roots venue and not a slick stadium show. 

Who else was in the queue? As a regular at Voodoo Daddy’s Showroom, I admit I did not recognise any of the excited people.  One of the couple who joined the line after me had been to Gonzo’s 2, Gonzo’s Tearoom and the roof-top bar, possibly Brix ’n’Bones too, but never downstairs where all the magic happens. There were plenty or people dressed for the summer weather and they were spot on, as Voodoo’s can become a tad sweaty even during an East Anglian mid-winter.

Another comment from the queue was “It looks like there’s quite a mixed crowd for this one.” Music lovers of Norwich include a wide age range and most income groups, which is possibly what he meant, but there were high proportion of couples attending and there were certainly more women in this Saturday night crowd than men.  The audience reflected the broad appeal of Tinie Tempah’s ‘genre defying’ (as described by Apple Music) sounds, which certainly straddles pop, ‘Its Written In The Stars’, dance ‘From Ibiza to Miami’ and a some early grime (take your pick from this full repertoire).

Remarking on the relatively young age of the enthusiastic crowd, a 41 year old  wondered how these, (and I quote) “Old School sounds” would go down with her daughter’s generation. Her daughter and vape smoking chap had a perfectly fun night it appeared.  Twenty years ago, Tinie was a hot ticket for the mums here tonight and their kids had clearly been brought up listening to him from the womb. Possibly 'Earthquake' would be an unlikely up-date of the Mozart Effect that had been popular in the late-20th Century Muesli Belt, but the crowd new all the words, being able to prove their credentials as genuine fans, not 'fakes.' I wondered if Tinie might make a passing reference to the news from Venezuela after this number, (his song is clearly metaphorical, so why would he mention a real earthquake disaster and threaten the buzz of nostalgia).

When Tinie set the crowd up for a sing-a-long in the style of Blue or Take That, the women obliged, even to the point of harmonising the concluding phrase.  You tell that the main man was genuinely impressed. Out of the one hundred and fifty punters, at least one hundred and forty-eight were having an absolute ball. It was feverish down there.

The pit had been up given a shot of at least 50,000 volts to get them in the mood by DJ Jasmine, followed by the irrepressible Ash C who was absolutely determined to turn NR1 into an Ibiza style rave. By the time the main act took to the boards the place was jumping. Jasmine was given plenty insight to the technical wizardry unleashed by Ash C during his set, which ran for well beyond the hour set aside. There was no let up from the moment Jasmine launched the first tune, through Ash C to the finale in Tinie Tempah’s two song encore. When it was all over and we got back on London Street it was still light and people were heading for bars, clubs and home to watch the England v Panama match, or to avoid it. 

I had a blast this evening, even though the Tempah set fell well short of an hour. I wondered what others thought about that. The tickets were £33, which is at least twice what the venue usually charges for a gig. Obviously the price reflected the rep of the headliner and as the show was part of helping to keep music live, I hope that Voodoo’s took a good slug from the night, the city does need a venue of this quality and size and this show, so the turnout for much   The set list offered  a mash up of new material and hits. The pace never dropped and the foundations for all the fun had been well-laid during the two hours of work from the DJs.  Well done to Ben Street and all at the venue for pulling this one off. I enjoyed the evening immensely, it would have been difficult not to have a good time and Tinie Tempah and his crew had a lot of fun too. Nice one!

~

Spencer Ide

29th June 2026