My first time seeing Prince and my first return to the big tent since Y2K. The venue has been totally rebuilt inside. There's a load of restaurants, but they were all full when we got there. There are also some empty units and space for more to be built. We got take-away burgers upstairs, but could have had pizza, stir fry or other options. Not cheap, of course, but it filled us up.

The arena itself is pretty big. Capacity is 20,000, but the top levels, above the private boxes, are very high up. We were down on the lower tiers and had a good view of the central stage. The stage is in the shape of Prince's 'symbol'. Those down on floor level might not have been able to see everything as the stage was above head height and the screens were up near the ceiling.

We were expecting a support act, but none materialised and the main act took the stage at 8:45. The band appeared from beneath the stage. There were two keyboard players, female drummer, bass 4-man horn section, two backing singers and two apparently identical dancers. To start with the band played some instrumental New Orleans-style jazz with the horn players taking turns at solos. Then the man himself rose up though the centre of the stage to deafening noise. He wandered around the stage singing Satisfied from 3121 before getting things rocking with Cream. During his cover of Play That Funky Music some bloke appeared on stage and I expected bouncers to chuck him off, but then others came up from a roped off exclusive area next to the stage. They proceeded to dance, badly, with Prince and the dancers. I'm not sure what they did or paid to deserve this honour. Luckily they only stayed for one song.

He went on to play extended versions of an assortment from various albums, but he did disappear whilst the band played What a Wonderful World. He did Lolita and Black Sweat, with Prince playing bass, from 3121, Kiss, U Got the Look, Lets Go Crazy and Take Me With U from Purple Rain. One one encore a backing singer did Gnarls Barclay's Crazy. He kept us waiting for the final encore, but appeared with his purple symbol guitar to play Purple Rain and finished with Guitar from the new Planet Earth album that we were given as we entered and I'm listening to now.

The sound could have been better. It was loud, of course, but the vocals were indistinct and everything was a bit 'mushy'. He played a lot of guitar and did it excellently.

He does put on a good show with lots to keep your attention. He seemed to enjoy it too and kept excouraging the audience to sing and dance. When he finished at 10:45 the house lights came up, but most people did not want to leave as they knew he had come out again at the first show after some people had left, but it was not to be. Eventually we were told to leave and were home a couple of hours later via tube and train.