Rina Sawayama @ SWG3, Glasgow, 13 Oct

Almost six hours before Rina Sawayama hits the first note, fans are already outside the venue, taking pictures and posting TikToks. There was no press allowed on the first night while any kinks were ironed out but at her second Glasgow date, it’s clear that this is a high calibre pop performance, bringing the star power of an A-list show – and its walkways and wind machines – to the SWG3 stage.

New record Hold the Girl may not have quite set the charts alight – it managed a week at number three before plummeting to 92, sandwiched between a year-old FKA twigs mixtape and 50 Cent’s Get Rich Or Die Tryin’ – but it has helped her to build on a devoted fanbase and tonight, egged on by the screams of those fans, she delivers a performance packed with 1000 watts of star power.

The set itself is broken into four acts, each with its own associated outfit plus a bonus cowboy hat for closing crowd pleaser This Hell. The first section leads off with four tracks from Hold the Girl culminating in the roaring pop-rock of Hurricanes, but it’s the industrial indebted second act which really sees Sawayama shift into top gear, as green lights strobe like the club scene from The Matrix.

Backed by a guitarist, a drummer and two dancers, Sawayama roars her way through STFU!, with an extended intro referencing nu-metal staples Korn. The third act is comfortably the weakest, taking in the well-meaning but cloying acoustic Send My Love to John, the energetic but generic Phantom and the forgettable To Be Alive, a song which is charitably unlikely to make setlists beyond this tour.

Despite Sawayama’s energetic stage performance, it doesn’t quite manage to shake Hold the Girl’s most prominent flaws. Conceptually, it’s a record that tackles the idea of 're-parenting' oneself, but ultimately the drippy empowerment language is rarely as precise and brutal as her debut album’s stiletto-sharp skewering of racism, identity and consumerism.

Fortunately the final stretch rights these wrongs, spinning a garage remix of LUCID into her Charli XCX collab Beg for You and throwing everything into two much loved tracks from her debut, Comme Des Garçons (Like the Boys) and the scathingly acerbic XS.

Returning for This Hell, she strikes one final pose and takes the audience’s applause. It’s not a flawless performance but there’s no doubt that Rina Sawayama’s star shines brightly.