Christine & The Queens at Royal Festival Hall review: a transcendent expulsion of a past identity

“Hopefully by the end of this night we’ll know what this ritual is about,” a suited Redcar, arms spanned showman-like, told the audience at the start of a special concert in London. Last night was the sole opportunity for fans of the French artist – stage name Christine & The Queens – to catch him in the capital for a poetry-meets-music-and-theatre spectacle. It was a chance to see his new album Redcar les Adorables Toiles brought to life.

Redcar is the male artistic iteration of the soloist born Héloïse Letissier. For debut album, 2014’s Chaleur Humaine, Letissier explored gender fluidity and pansexuality under the assumed guise of Christine. A revised alter ego entered for his 2018 synthpop masterpiece Chris, in which he championed female sexual freedom as a masculine woman, where the binary system that blinkers society was put under the lens.

The hall’s stage last night was adorned with religious iconography including a red statue of the Archangel Michael, which transformed the space into something of a church. Redcar, who steered the show as a magician or other times as a knight or sailor in search of love and acceptance, deployed ample metaphors with which to confront the crowd.

He performed his new record largely in sequential order, interspersing the show with playful jokes and a vague narrative about being received into heaven. Opener Ma Bien Aimée Bye Bye, a slinking precursor to the record’s gothic Eighties synthpop palette, was startling in its vigour played live. Letissier danced alone, a spotlight revealing the loose frills of his bridal gown skirt clashing with the taut contours of his exposed, muscular upper body. It was an arresting visual representation of change.

The French artist has always been an exceptional performer but his vocals in particular were flawless. Some visuals and parts of the Archangel story, however, were muddled, including footage of basketballers aired as an angel-winged, part-topless Redcar strutted along to synthwave bop Looking for Love. The disconnect could be due to elements of the mainly French language album not quite translating - but it promises good things for when the artist curates the Southbank Centre’s Meltdown Festival next year.

But other moments were striking. The closing minutes, soundtracked by what appeared to be a combined reversioning of the tracks Angeles and Les Âmes Amantes, saw Redcar throw himself violently about the stage. Strobe lights flashed as he projected his voice in a rallying cry for acceptance. It was like watching an exorcism, an expulsion of a past identity, which spoke to the show’s overarching theme of transcendence and transformation.

Some oblique symbolism aside, by the end it felt like the audience had mostly understood what the ‘rituals’ were about. Letissier, meanwhile, still appears to be continuing a deeply personal journey. With a concert like that, fans will surely stay the course.