Peter Gabriel, Hydro, Glasgow ****

It’s been quite some time since Peter Gabriel last toured and even longer since he had new music to showcase. Twenty years after he first mooted the project, his latest album, i/o, named after one of Jupiter’s moons, is within touching distance, with a new track to be released on each full moon of this year.

Gabriel was essentially asking his audience to trust him with material they didn’t yet know – with our host on spine-tingling form, backed by an unimpeachable band, they were delighted to do so. The i/o tour is suitably celestial but also driven by terrestrial concerns. Gabriel calmly posited fair ideas on how to make the world a better place while he gathered his musicians for the intimate campfire gathering of Growing Up.

Peter Gabriel, Glasgow Hydro PIC: Calum Buchan

The show moved from micro to macro with a run of new songs, including the title track, each accompanied by stellar visuals commissioned from artists such as Cornelia Parker and Ai Weiwei. In keeping with the album theme of "stuff coming out and stuff going in", the music was beautifully calibrated. Still, it was a blast to hear the bass judder and discordant trumpet of Digging in the Dirt and the pop thrust of Sledgehammer, with Gabriel strutting across the stage.

After a short interval, he added digital action painting to the palette as the band delivered the delicate balm of Love Can Heal and an exquisite Don’t Give Up, with Ayanna Witter-Johnson deputising emotionally in the Kate Bush role.

Gabriel, meanwhile, may joke about his age and girth but his impressively preserved voice must have a degraded recording in the attic, so limber and eloquent was his performance, whether gently supported by subtle French horn and tremulous cello on And Still or bossing it on the beefy likes of Red Rain and Big Time, the joyful Solsbury Hill or atmospheric anthem Biko.

Music review: Peter Gabriel, Hydro, Glasgow